Donald Trump is known for making headlines. But someone else is nearly as capable as he is of attracting attention: Sarah Palin. And Trump is using his fellow headline grabber to try to help seal a win in Iowa.

The “big announcement” Trump had been saying all day he intended to make Tuesday night during a rally in Ames, Iowa, was in fact an endorsement from the former governor of Alaska and 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee.

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There is little question Palin’s backing will boost Trump’s support among conservative evangelicals, a demographic that his chief rival, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, has also been courting.

“Sarah Palin’s speculated endorsement of Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump would be a big boost,” conservative author Jeffrey Lord said on “The Laura Ingraham Show” earlier in the day, before the choice was known. “She’s got a lot of friends in Iowa, yes, she does. I think it would be a big help.”

But Palin’s embrace has its potential downside for Trump. Already lampooned as a reality show phenomenon, Trump’s biggest endorsement yet is a fellow veteran of the television silly circuit. Whether her backing will play as intended with a buttoned-down Midwestern audience is not completely clear.

What’s more, a Sarah Palin stamp of approval does not always have the hoped-for payoff. Of the 64 candidates she backed during the 2010 cycle — near the height of her popularity — only about half found their way to victory, according to ABC News. More recently, her support in 2014 in her native Alaska for Tea Party candidate Joe Miller in the GOP Senate primary famously flopped, with the Establishment candidate seizing the nomination instead. All told, in 2014, only four of the 15 congressional candidates she endorsed won their primaries.

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But Palin remains strongly popular among conservatives, and her support could potentially stall any momentum Cruz has among evangelical voters in Iowa with the caucuses less than two weeks away.

The Cruz campaign had an unhappy reaction Tuesday morning to then-suspected announcement. In an interview on CNN’s “New Day” Tuesday morning Cruz spokesman Rick Tyler said, “I think it’d be a blow to Sarah Palin because Sarah Palin has been a champion for the conservative cause, and if she was going to endorse Donald Trump, sadly, she would be endorsing someone who’s held progressive views all their life on the sanctity of life, on marriage, on partial-birth abortion.”

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Lord suggested the Cruz campaign was crying crocodile tears.

“Frankly, if (Palin) were going to endorse Ted Cruz, Ted Cruz would be chirping this from the rooftops, as well he should,” Lord said.

Cruz tried to repair the damage later during an appearance in New Hampshire. “I love Sarah Palin, Sarah Palin is fantastic, without her friendship and support I wouldn’t be in the Senate today,” he said. “So regardless of what Sarah decides to do in 2016, I will always remain a big, big fan.”