Iowa 2024 caucus results: Trump projected to win, DeSantis in 2nd

Former President Donald Trump is projected to have easily emerged victorious in Iowa's first-in-the-nation Republican caucuses on Monday night, despite facing unprecedented legal troubles and spending less time on the campaign trail than his rivals, who had hoped to puncture his persistent popularity with the base.

"So it's now off to New Hampshire, a great place," Trump said in his victory speech flanked by some of his family and supporters.

"The truth is the people in our country are great ... They only want to see one thing: They want our country to come back," he said. "They're embarrassed by what is going on. Our country is laughed at. All over the world, they're laughing at us. And they want our country to come back."

In what was largely regarded as the race for second place, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is projected to have pulled ahead of former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley while Trump looks set to win more than 50% of the vote.

Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, projected to finish a distant fourth place at less than 10%, dropped out of the race before the night was over.

Trump struck an unusual tone of unity in his Monday night speech and congratulated DeSantis and Haley: "I think they both actually did very well. I really do." He further congratulated Ramaswamy "because he did a hell of a job."

Still, Trump faces some challenges on the road to winning his third straight presidential nomination, though -- as Iowa shows -- he remains the front-runner. New Hampshire is next on the calendar, with a Jan. 23 primary, and Haley is hoping to capitalize on her polling momentum there.

Perhaps more important are the looming trials and court proceedings that will complicate Trump's campaign schedule because of the 91 criminal charges he faces in four cases.

He denies all wrongdoing and has claimed he is being politically persecuted, which prosecutors reject.

Trump has fiercely loyal supporters and entrance polling underscored just how loyal they are -- further revealing that a majority of caucusgoers said they were not turned off by the former president's criminal charges or election denialism.

According to the entrance poll, Trump won 43% of caucusgoers who said they want a candidate who "shares my values" and 63% of voters said they'd consider Trump fit for office even if he were convicted of a crime while 66% claimed, falsely, that President Joe Biden did not legitimately win the White House.

Trump won majorities in the latter groups, the entrance poll showed.

In his speech on Monday, he returned to suggesting widespread threats of election fraud, saying, "We're going to straighten out our elections. We're going to do a lot of great things."

"We have to get rid of mail in ballots," he added.

Trump also hit on Biden, calling him the worst president in the country's history. Bide and Democrats, gearing up for a likely general election rematch with Trump, hit back at him as a "MAGA extremist."

DeSantis, Haley thank supporters

After his projected second-place finish -- which fueled some complaints from local Republicans and campaign staff that the analysis was done too quickly, though that analysis matched up with the results -- DeSantis thanked his voters and told them that he got his "ticket" out of Iowa.

"We have a lot of work to do, but I can tell you this as the next president of the United States: I am going to get the job done for this country," he said.

On Tuesday morning, the governor will campaign in South Carolina -- which holds its Republican primary at the end of February -- before traveling to New Hampshire to participate in town halls later in the day.

Set to come in third in Iowa, Haley congratulated Trump and said in her own speech that "Iowa made this Republican primary a two-person race." She also told her supporters to expect her in New Hampshire.

"I will be back in the great state of New Hampshire and the question before Americans is now very clear: Do you want more of the same, or do you want a new generation of conservatives?" she asked.

"Our campaign is the last best hope of stopping the Trump-Biden nightmare," she said. "But it's more than that. Republicans have lost a popular vote in seven of the last eight presidential elections. That's nothing to be proud of. We should want to earn the support of a majority of Americans."

ABC News' Libby Cathey, Hannah Demissie, Lalee Ibssa and Will McDuffie contributed to this report.