Iowa’s contested Senate race wasn’t top of mind when I booked a trip to visit my best friend who attends the University of Iowa’s medical school. The Hawkeyes were taking on (the) Ohio State University last weekend in the biggest event of the year for sleepy Iowa City, and this New Englander wanted to tailgate at a Big Ten college football game.
But as luck would have it, state Rep. Josh Turek (D) was just two streets over from my tailgate, so I paid him a visit to hear why voters should make him the first Iowa Democrat elected to the Senate in 18 years.
The sunny day and crowds of well-lubricated Iowans made for the perfect venue for Turek to connect with prospective constituents. When I arrived at his first tailgate stop of the day, a couple of kids were handing him a football. The two-time Paralympic gold medalist in wheelchair basketball then threw a perfect spiral.
“I feel good about this game, and I feel good about our chances in November, too,” he told nearby supporters.
The Hawkeyes didn’t fare quite as well as Turek predicted against the favored Buckeyes, losing 31-14. But there’s reason to believe that the Democrat has a better shot at flipping a Senate seat left open by the retiring senator Joni Ernst (R). RealClearPolitics’s polling average has Turek leading U.S. Rep. Ashley Hinson (R) by less than a point.
Turek’s competitiveness in a state Donald Trump won by 13 points in 2024 is partly a reflection of a national environment that favors Democrats. Americans are wary of high gas prices resulting from the prolonged conflict in Iran. They’re tired of stubborn inflation and volatile trade wars after being promised an “economic boom.”
“Even some of my right-wing Republican friends are tired of what’s going on in Washington these days,” Jon Hedgecock, a 59-year-old Democrat, told me at the tailgate. “So maybe it’s time for a change here in Iowa.”
Kitchen-table frustrations have created a tantalizing opportunity for Democrats in red states to challenge the status quo. But Iowa is among the most promising for two reasons.
First, the state isn’t as red as, say, Texas. Barack Obama carried Iowa twice, and voters elected Democrat Tom Harkin to the Senate five times. Liz Cecil, a 49-year-old who works at the University of Iowa, told me that she moved to Iowa City 20 years ago when Iowa “was not a red state. It was Tom Harkin, like it was a different place.”
“There’s just been something that has taken hold with the MAGA politics and the extremism … and people not working across the aisle,” Cecil said. She believes that Turek will work with people whom he doesn’t “see eye to eye with.”
Turek is keen to lean into the state’s moderation. “I’m a common-sense prairie populist,” he told me. “To me, populism is everything through the guise of what is best for Iowa, what’s best for Iowans, what’s best for the middle class, what’s best for our workers, what’s best for our farmers and our small rural communities.” Being able to work across the aisle is becoming one of the biggest issues in the race. On Wednesday night, Hinson and Turek sparred over their bipartisanship bona fides in their first debate.
The second factor that makes Iowa fertile ground for Turek is that voters’ major issues this cycle are magnified in an agrarian economy. “Iowa is uniquely hurting,” he told me as supporters waved to him from their various drinking games. “You’ve got the tariffs and you’ve got the war in Iran that has hurt Iowa more than any other state.”
The war has raised prices on critical supplies such as fertilizer while spiking operating costs through higher fuel prices. As of this week, the average price of diesel in the state is over $6 per gallon, up more than $2.50 from last year’s average.
Just outside ESPN’s “College GameDay” panel in downtown Iowa City, Dennis Dorr, a retired 72-year-old from Davenport and a Democrat, told me that farmers are being ignored here. He explained that “with the tariffs and the war in Iran, the diesel prices and, you know, everything — like, they’re being ignored, as are all the people in the state.”
At the same time, Trump’s trade wars have wreaked havoc on Iowa’s corn and soybean markets. Reciprocal tariffs with Beijing slashed U.S. agricultural exports to China by 66 percent in 2025 from 2024 levels, driven largely by a drop in demand for American soybeans.
The cattle market is also in chaos. In August, the president suspended tariffs on ground beef imports to help lower prices ahead of the elections. The move comes after Trump expanded Argentina’s beef import quota in February, frustrating domestic ranchers.
With farmers facing “one gut punch after another,” Turek said Iowa is approaching “farmageddon.” He cited a high number of farm foreclosures in the state and a growing suicide rate among farmers.
Despite listing many problems, Turek wasn’t always specific about solutions. “I’m for strategic tariffs to protect American jobs and American manufacturing,” he said, “but certainly not at the expense of our rural communities, small family farms.”
On health care, Turek was well-versed in Iowa’s poor medical outcomes but was short on fixes. “I mean, you can look at a state like Iowa, dead last for nearly every health care metric,” he said. While Turek believes in fully funding entitlements such as Medicaid and Medicare, he stopped short of parroting his party’s increasing call for Medicare-for-all. He said he supports a “public option” but that Americans should have the right to keep their private insurance.
The GOP has resorted to branding Turek as too left-wing for Iowa. Republican groups have attacked him as a “big liberal,” and tried to tie him to progressive issues such as radical gender ideology and amnesty for illegal immigrants.
But the culture wars didn’t come up in my conversations with Republican Iowans — they were more worried about their own crew turning out. At the Marriott parking lot in Iowa City, Shawn Krantz was at one of the tailgates forming a festive alley of campers and beer pong. “It’s all about bringing out your base,” he said, sporting a cowboy hat. “I’m worried that the Republican base won’t come out because Trump’s not on the ticket. What everybody needs to understand is Trump is on the ticket.”
Krantz said Republicans need to turn out to preserve the Iowa way of life. “We need to come out in full force. Iowa cannot turn into Illinois and, like, Minnesota. It just can’t happen.” He explained that the attacks Democrats are hurling — high prices and expensive gas — are rich, considering “Democrats didn’t say anything when it was high gas under Biden.”
Turek said his campaign has largely avoided culture wars because he’s focused on corruption and affordability issues.
“When people can’t afford to keep food on the table and they can’t afford to keep a roof above their head, everything else starts to pale in comparison,” he said.
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