“It’s not about left/right, Democrat/Republicans, it’s about doing the right thing,” Kevin Techau told me on April 17, the day he launched his campaign for Congress in Iowa’s second district. “I think my record supports that that’s been the direction of my career.”

IA-02 wasn’t on either party’s target list in 2024. But Techau has potential to mount a serious challenge to three-term U.S. Representative Ashley Hinson.

This analysis assumes Hinson will run for re-election to the U.S. House. Although she has been mentioned as a possible candidate for governor, I doubt she would roll the dice on a statewide primary, where she would probably compete against a Republican with closer ties to President Donald Trump.

That said, if Hinson did seek another office in 2026, Techau’s prospects would improve dramatically. With rare exceptions, it’s easier for the party out of power to win an open seat than to defeat an incumbent. Hinson outperformed the top of the Republican ticket in 2024 and goes into this cycle with high name ID and more than $2.2 million in the bank, whereas a new GOP candidate would be starting from scratch.

DEEP ROOTS IN NORTHEAST IOWA

“I feel pretty comfortable in this district,” Techau told me during our interview, which you can watch in full here.

It’s easy to see why. Although he’s a first-time candidate for office, Techau has deep family roots and work experience across northeast Iowa. A sixth-generation Iowan, he lived in Mason City and Dubuque as a child and went to high school in Marion, a suburb of Cedar Rapids in Linn County.

After high school, his campaign website notes, Techau “worked third shift on the assembly line making circuit breakers at the Square D Company in Cedar Rapids,” and later “worked summers as a track laborer on the Chicago North Western Railroad.” He earned undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Iowa.

He’s been living in the Cedar Rapids area again since President Barack Obama appointed him U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Iowa. In that role from early 2014 to early 2017, Techau was the lead federal prosecutor for 52 counties, including all but one (Poweshiek) of the 22 counties that are now part of IA-02. This map shows the second Congressional district in green.

In a Senate floor speech supporting Techau’s nomination for U.S. attorney, Republican Senator Chuck Grassley said, “I’ve known the Techau family for decades and I know Mr. Techau personally. He’s even been a running partner of mine from time to time.”

Not only does Techau have many of his own friends and relatives across the district, his wife Stephanie Techau grew up in Cedar Falls. Black Hawk County is the second-largest by population in IA-02, after Linn.

“WE FOUGHT IMMIGRATION CRIME. WE DID IT THE RIGHT WAY”

Soon after finishing law school, Techau spent seven years on active duty in the Air Force. He then served as an officer in the Iowa Air National Guard for nearly 20 years.

During the 1990s, he worked in private practice and as a federal public defender before joining Governor Tom Vilsack’s administration as director of the Iowa Department of Inspections and Appeals in 1999. Vilsack named him Iowa Commissioner of Public Safety in 2002.

Techau’s early campaign messages lean into his military and public safety background. Excerpt from his campaign website (sections in bold appear that way online):

As a member of Governor Tom Vilsack’s administration, Techau oversaw law enforcement as Iowa Commissioner of Public Safety. As Commissioner, Techau had responsibility for the Department of Criminal Investigation, Iowa State Patrol, Division of Narcotics Enforcement, Iowa Fire Marshal’s Office and Traffic Safety Bureau. Among his accomplishments, Techau lead the implementation of Iowa’s Amber Alert system for missing children, stood up the Iowa Internet Crimes Against Children program to keep kids safe from online predators, enhanced the Drug Endangered Children Program, launched the Sex Offender Registry, fought for increased funding and training for firefighters, and increased state crime lab capacity. The Blank Children’s Hospital recognized Techau with the Safe Kids Iowa Leadership for his work as Commissioner of Public Safety.

[…] As the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Iowa, Techau oversaw the prosecution of federal crimes and was the top federal law enforcement official for 52 Iowa counties. As U.S. Attorney, Techau led an office that successfully prosecuted high-profile business crime, drug trafficking, environmental crime, gun violence, immigration crimes and health care fraud. Cedar Rapids Chief of Police Wayne Jerman praised Techau as “instrumental in stepping up the fight against the opioid crisis,” highlighting Techau’s service in tackling gun violence and drug trafficking.

During our interview, Techau highlighted his service in the Air Force and the Iowa Air National Guard and said he was “very proud” of two programs implemented during his time as state commissioner of public safety: the Amber Alert system and the Internet Crimes Against Children program. As U.S. attorney, he said, he was proud to be in charge of an office with good prosecutors going after corruption, immigration crimes, health care fraud, gun violence, and drug trafficking.

People expect government to work at the federal, state, and local levels to protect public safety, Techau said. “We work best when we work together, and she just doesn’t seem to believe in that,” he added, referring to Hinson.

I asked Techau to comment on what has been going on in the Trump administration’s Justice Department. He recalled three occasions when President Obama invited U.S. attorneys to the White House. “Each time, he said, ‘Remember, I appointed you, but you work for the people.’ And that’s really the essence of the Department of Justice. And I don’t think the current attorney general is really doing that.”

Techau added that he thinks “we work best when we work together in law enforcement, federal, state, and local. And they all have their roles. And it’s just not happening under this leadership. It seems more about retribution than, you know, going after the bad guys.”

When he was a U.S. attorney, Techau said, “We fought immigration crime. We did it the right way. Those are important laws, and I believe in enforcing those laws.”

“SHE’S TURNED HER BACK ON ALL THOSE PROMISES”

When Techau left the federal government in 2017, some contacts encouraged him to run for Congress. (Republican Rod Blum represented what was then Iowa’s first district, covering most of the same counties.) The timing wasn’t right personally or professionally. But after the 2024 election, the same people encouraged him again, and his family was supportive.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee announced in early April that it was adding IA-02 to its list of “districts in play.” The main campaign arm of House Democrats had previously indicated only Iowa’s first and third districts would be targeted in the 2026 midterms.

Techau told me he had already “gone well down the road” toward running for Congress before the DCCC changed its stance. “It was good news that they decided to rate this district as competitive,” and he thinks that’s an “accurate” assessment. He said it would give him “more credibility as I go out and tell my story.”

A common theme for Techau when speaking to me (and other interviewers) is that Ashley Hinson “has turned her back” on the district, not following through on the economic issues she campaigned on. He likes to say it’s not a matter of left or right, it’s right and wrong. He thinks he can do better and “stand up for what’s right.”

Asked which promises Hinson didn’t keep, Techau said, “It starts with the economic issues.” She complained the Biden administration wasn’t doing enough to bring down prices for gas or eggs or essential items. “And she’s turned her back on all those promises and aligned herself with Elon Musk.”

The reference to Musk was not a one-off.

“MARCHING IN LOCKSTEP WITH AN UNELECTED, UNACCOUNTABLE BILLIONAIRE”

Donald Trump carried the counties that are now part of IA-02 by about 4.4 points against Joe Biden in 2020 and outpolled Kamala Harris by 10 points across the district last November. While early evidence suggests Trump’s approval rating is falling, he probably isn’t underwater (yet) in northeast Iowa.

Rather than press a case against Trump, Techau is doing his best to connect Hinson to Elon Musk, whose so-called “Department of Government Efficiency” is taking a chainsaw to federal programs.

Techau’s first campaign news release didn’t mention the president by name. But it accused Hinson of “marching in lockstep with an unelected, unaccountable billionaire — as he rips apart our government and sticks it to the middle class.” The statement went on to say, “Instead of putting the whims of the richest man in the world first, Techau will fight to protect Social Security and Medicare, make health care more accessible and affordable, and strengthen the middle class.”

A quote from the candidate hammered the point home:

We’re paying the price for downright corruption in Washington—driven by an unelected, unaccountable billionaire. The special interests are getting billions in special tax breaks—while we get stuck with the bill. Ashley Hinson marches in lockstep with Elon Musk and his reckless, ruthless war on the middle class. We just can’t afford it any more.

In our interview, Techau didn’t bring up Trump but repeatedly referenced Musk and his “reckless” and “ruthless” approach.

There’s nothing wrong with going after waste, fraud, and abuse, but Musk’s method is “just chaos” that “doesn’t make sense.” Essential safety net programs like food assistance, heating assistance, and Medicaid are on the table, Techau said. People need to be able to count on getting their Social Security checks; closing Social Security offices and making it harder for people to get services “is just nuts.”

But Hinson is “nodding her head and saying that’s just what we need,” he asserted. He repeated that this isn’t a question of being a Republican or a Democrat. “It’s just, like, being efficient, doing the best you can for your constituents. And she’s not doing it.”

At Hinson’s April 24 public appearance in Mason City—the first in-person town hall she’s held this year—many constituents challenged her on the Trump administration’s mass layoffs and cuts to government programs. The incumbent didn’t distance herself from Musk’s efforts. Tom Barton reported for the Cedar Rapids Gazette,

Hinson responded by highlighting the need to respect taxpayer dollars, cut waste and focus on policies that grow jobs in the private sector, including in the biomedical field, rather than by growing the size of the federal workforce. She said efforts by billionaire Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, to root out wasteful spending, inefficiencies and fraud in the federal government frees up resources to ensure services and benefits are strengthened and maintained, and go to those who need them most.

Time will tell whether those talking points hold up. Musk could be a liability for Hinson (and many other House Republicans) if Social Security checks start arriving late, or other programs Iowans rely on are scrapped.

Hinson’s campaign doesn’t appear to have settled on a message against the likely Democratic nominee.

A JUMBLE OF MAGA-WORLD INSULTS

As a former television reporter and anchor, Hinson is more skilled than most politicians in setting the agenda for the news media. Her campaign tried to frame coverage of Techau by releasing a statement about his candidacy on April 16, the day before he launched. (She did the same thing in 2023 before Democratic challenger Sarah Corkery made her campaign official.)

The Hinson campaign’s news release had a Mad Libs quality, as if some consultant cobbled together a string of MAGA-world insults.

Today, the Hinson Campaign released the following statement on the candidacy of Kevin Techau to represent the U.S. Second Congressional District of Iowa. Kevin was a captain for Hillary Clinton, an Obama appointee, and a Biden donor. He is only running because of his vendetta against Donald Trump.  

“Kevin Techau is a radical Leftist who wants to return to Biden’s open border agenda and push the woke policies that Iowans rejected in November. Kevin is out of touch with Iowa values and would be a rubber stamp for AOC’s squad of radicals in Congress. Iowans will reject a Hillary Clinton supporting, Obama appointee, Biden donor.” – Addie Lavis 

When I asked Techau to respond to that statement, he wisely didn’t get into the weeds. He said he was proud to take an oath four times: as a member of the Air Force, while serving in the Iowa National Guard, as state commissioner of public safety, and as U.S. attorney. “Each of those oaths, you’re going to defend the constitution and do the right thing. The rule of law is important.” He said he’ll stand on his record and let others judge whether the statement was accurate. “I’m proud of the service I did and the people I served it with.”

It’s worth taking a moment to consider whether any of these talking points might be effective. Will northeast Iowa voters care that Techau was a precinct captain for Hillary Clinton before the 2008 caucuses? Will they look down on a former U.S. attorney simply because he was “an Obama appointee”? (Many of the counties now part of IA-02 voted for Obama twice.) Will they believe a former prosecutor “wants to return to Biden’s open border agenda” and “would be a rubber stamp for AOC’s squad of radicals”?

The OpenSecrets donor database doesn’t show any contributions from Techau to any of Biden’s campaigns. But if he were a “Biden donor,” would that matter to voters in 2026? (Disclosure: Techau has made three small donations to support Bleeding Heartland’s work in the past. He has not contributed this year, nor would I accept future donations, in keeping with my policy not to receive financial support from Iowa elected officials, candidates, or paid campaign staff and consultants.)

As for that supposed “vendetta” against Trump: the evidence is an open letter that more than 1,600 attorneys and law professors signed in November 2018, shortly after Trump had removed Attorney General Jeff Sessions. The letter denounced the president’s “attacks on the rule of law” and “outrageous attempt” to undermine special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation. Trump’s disrespect for the rule of law is even more apparent now, as his administration ignores court orders and deports people (including some U.S. citizens) with no due process.

Hinson stirred up animus against immigrants during the 2024 campaign, complaining about English language learners burdening schools and health care clinics across her district. In Mason City last week, she defended Trump’s deportation policies: “Look, we’ve got so many (pending immigration cases) that if we had every single one of these people have an individual hearing, it would take 100 years.”

But immigration may be a less potent line of attack against a Democrat who is a veteran and former prosecutor. And the issue may be less salient next year if Trump’s tariffs lead to a recession, empty shelves, or higher prices for basic goods.

Although Hinson doesn’t yet have a coherent message against Techau, she goes into the 2026 campaign strongly favored. The Cook Political Report rates IA-02 a safe Republican district; Inside Elections with Nathan Gonzales and Sabato’s Crystal Ball both consider the seat a “likely Republican” hold.

That’s because in addition to the usual advantages of incumbency, Hinson represents territory that has trended strongly toward the GOP over the past decade.

A REDDENING POLITICAL LANDSCAPE

For many years, voters in northeast Iowa preferred Democratic candidates for president but were open to Republicans in down-ballot races. According to the Cook Partisan Voting Index, which has measured presidential voting by Congressional district since 1997, this part of Iowa voted a few points to the left of the U.S. for president during the 1990s and early 2000s, while repeatedly electing Republican Jim Nussle to Congress.

The area seemed to trend blue after Democrat Bruce Braley was elected to Congress in 2006 (the seat was open because Nussle ran for governor). After redistricting in 2011, the area Braley represented—which like Hinson’s current district, covered most of northeast Iowa and was anchored by Linn, Dubuque, and Black Hawk counties—had a Cook Partisan Voting Index of D+5. In other words, Iowans in that Congressional district had voted about 5 points more Democratic than the U.S. as a whole in the previous two presidential elections.

Given that context, many Iowa politics watchers were surprised when Republican Rod Blum overcame a Democratic voter registration advantage to defeat former House Speaker Pat Murphy in what was then IA-01 in 2014. Some saw that result as a fluke caused by an open-seat race; Braley left the House to run for U.S. Senate in what turned out to be a Republican wave election.

But Blum’s win was no fluke. Not only did Trump carry the northeast Congressional district in 2016, Blum won a second term in the U.S. House, and Republicans flipped several Iowa legislative districts in the area.

Democratic challenger Abby Finkenauer defeated Blum in 2018 by performing well in the district’s largest counties and keeping it relatively close in the redder areas. But Trump pulled Republican challenger Hinson over the line in 2020. Hinson matched Trump’s vote share across most of the district and improved on his performance in Linn County, where she had lived and worked for many years. The Republican also benefited from having no third-party candidates on the ballot when she ran against Finkenauer, as well as a big advantage in outside spending on her behalf during the 2020 campaign.

Democrats had high hopes for challenger Liz Mathis, who seemed to match up well against Hinson. But by November 2022, Democrats no longer had a voter registration advantage in IA-02. A weak statewide GOTV operation led to poor Democratic turnout in the last midterm.

Mathis was also at a huge financial disadvantage in her race against Hinson. While the Democrat raised and spent a little more than $4 million, the incumbent (considered a rising star in the House GOP caucus) raised and spent more than $7 million, according to the OpenSecrets database. Adding to the challenger’s difficulties, Republican-aligned groups spent spent more than $3.2 million on messaging that backed Hinson or attacked Mathis. National Democratic-aligned groups spent almost nothing on the IA-02 race during the 2022 cycle.

After Hinson defeated Mathis by 54.1 percent to 45.8 percent, her district dropped off the target list. Outside groups spent more than $20 million across Iowa’s first and third Congressional districts in 2024, but nothing in IA-02. Hinson was able to coast through the 2024 cycle. According to the OpenSecrets database, the incumbent’s campaign raised more than ten times as much money as Democratic challenger Corkery and spent more than seven times as much on the race. Hinson didn’t start running TV ads until about three weeks before the election and kept quite a bit of cash in her bank account, ending 2024 with more than $1.9 million cash on hand.

That spending disparity helped Hinson outperform the top of the ticket. She defeated Corkery by 57.1 percent to 41.5 percent, as Trump carried IA-02 with about 54.3 percent of the vote to 44.3 percent for Kamala Harris. (That was more than double Trump’s winning margin against Biden across the same counties.)

No wonder national election forecasters see Iowa’s second district as less competitive than the first and third. On paper, IA-01 and IA-02 look similar. Republicans have a small voter registration advantage in both districts (it’s slightly larger in IA-02). Both have a Cook Partisan Voting Index of R+4, indicating that presidential voting was about 4 points to the right of the national popular vote in the last two presidential elections.

But Hinson performed better than Trump, while Mariannette Miller-Meeks in IA-01 was one of the country’s worst-performing House Republicans, relative to Trump’s 2024 vote share.

With all that in mind, why would the DCCC add IA-02 to its target list? There is a realistic road map for beating Hinson.

A WINNING PATH FOR TECHAU

Hinson defeated Finkenauer by narrowing the gap in Linn and Dubuque counties and running up the score in the rural areas. This post includes a table with county-level results from the 2018 and 2020 races.

The political map adopted in 2021 somewhat changed the configuration of this district. But the big picture remains the same: Techau will need sizeable margins in Linn and Black Hawk counties. He will need to do substantially better than Mathis in Dubuque and Cerro Gordo counties. And he will need to keep the race closer in the red counties.

I created this table using the certified county-level results from the IA-02 race in 2022. I chose that year because the midterm electorate is a better frame of reference for 2026. Counties are listed in descending order by number of ballots cast in the Congressional race.

Some of these northeast Iowa counties had enormous swings from Obama to Trump. As Nick Conway discussed in a recent Bleeding Heartland post, Howard County ranked tenth in the country in movement from Obama 2012 to Trump 2024. Chickasaw County ranked 20th, and several others in IA-02 are among the 100 counties nationally with the largest shifts to Republicans.

I asked Techau why he thought northeast Iowa’s political transformation happened and how he would try to reverse the trend. He argued that Hinson had “turned her back” on issues like bringing costs down and bringing good-paying jobs to Iowa. Main streets in towns like Oelwein (Fayette County) don’t have the resources they used to, like a shoe store or a bike store. Techau plans to put “the meat and potato, the kitchen table issues” for hard-working families “front and center.”

Running for Congress is expensive. Techau will need to mobilize high Democratic turnout and to persuade lots of swing voters. The first test will be raising enough money to reach voters district-wide.

Being listed as one of the DCCC’s “districts in play” should help with fundraising. However, it’s too early to know whether outside Democratic groups will invest significant resources in IA-02. During the 2022 cycle, the DCCC signaled it would target Iowa’s first and second districts, but national groups spent almost nothing on behalf of Christina Bohannan in IA-01 or Mathis in her race against Hinson. We’ve already seen some outside spending against Miller-Meeks and Zach Nunn in Iowa’s first and third districts, but nothing yet against Hinson.

The bottom line is that Techau has a realistic path to win, if 2026 turns out to be a good year for Democrats. But Hinson starts in a much better position than Miller-Meeks or Nunn, who will be among the top-targeted House Republicans in the country.

Final note: I have long believed Hinson plans to run for U.S. Senate in 2028, when Chuck Grassley’s term ends. I also believe she would be the most likely Republican appointed to replace Grassley, if he is unable to serve out his term for health reasons.

So whether or not Techau wins in 2026, Democrats have good reason to invest in IA-02 now, to build capacity for what is very likely to be an open-seat race in 2028 or earlier. If Hinson were appointed to U.S. Senate, voters would choose her successor in the House in a special election.

To follow Kevin Techau: website, Facebook, X/Twitter

To follow Ashley Hinson: website (official and campaign), Facebook (official and campaign), X/Twitter (official and campaign)

Top photos of Kevin Techau and Ashley Hinson were first published on their campaign Facebook pages.

More than a year before Iowa’s 2026 primary election, Democrats already have one announced candidate for U.S. Senate (Nathan Sage) and two officially running for the U.S. House (Travis Terrell in the first district and Kevin Techau in the second). More Democrats will launch campaigns for Iowa’s statewide and federal offices in the coming months.

So it’s a good time to preview how this website will cover the next round of Iowa Democratic primaries.

GUIDELINES FOR MY OWN REPORTING

First, I don’t plan to endorse a contender in any competitive Democratic primary. My goal is to produce in-depth reporting on the major races, with details about the candidates and the political landscape that readers may not find in other media outlets.

Second, my coverage will focus on candidates with the capacity to run a credible statewide or district-wide campaign. I don’t mean just front-runners; plenty of little-known candidates have built a following and eventually won the nomination for a major office. I mean that when deciding where to spend my time and energy on individual candidate profiles or surveys of the primary field, I will be looking for signs that a candidate is doing the work this kind of campaign requires.

The House Majority PAC, one of the biggest spenders supporting Democrats in U.S. House races, has confirmed Iowa’s first and third Congressional districts are among its “top targets” for the 2026 election cycle.

The PAC also put IA-02 on a list of sixteen House districts that “could become competitive” in 2026.

Fourth in a series interpreting the results of Iowa’s 2024 state and federal elections. This post has been updated with certified results as of December 2.

As ticket-splitting has declined in recent election cycles, few Iowa candidates have managed to win where the other party has a big advantage at the top of the ticket. So it was in Iowa’s 2024 Congressional races: former President Donald Trump outpolled Vice President Kamala Harris in all four U.S. House districts, which helped GOP incumbents hold off their Democratic opponents.

But one challenger massively outperformed Harris, and Trump barely pulled one underachieving incumbent over the line.

Election analyst Drew Savicki was first to publish the 2024 presidential vote and swing in Iowa’s U.S. House districts. I later confirmed his calculations, using unofficial results from the Iowa Secretary of State.

First in a series interpreting the results of Iowa’s 2024 state and federal elections.

Two years ago, Iowa appeared to be on a different trajectory than much of the country. As Democrats won many of the midterm election races, including in our Midwestern neighboring states, Iowa experienced yet another “red wave.” Six of the last eight general elections in Iowa have been GOP landslides.

On November 5, Donald Trump improved on his 2020 performance almost across the board: in blue states like New York and New Jersey, swing states like Pennsylvania and Georgia, and red states like Texas and Iowa. He gained in rural counties, suburban counties, and urban centers, in states where both presidential candidates campaigned intensely, and in states where there was no “ground game” or barrage of political advertising. He gained among almost every demographic group except for college-educated women. He may become the first Republican presidential candidate to win the popular vote since George W. Bush in 2004, and only the second GOP nominee to win the popular vote since 1988.

The Trump resurgence isn’t unique to Iowa, or even the U.S.—grievance politics has been winning elections all over the world lately.

But that’s no comfort to Democrats here, who probably won’t win back any Congressional districts and suffered more losses among their already small contingents in the Iowa House and Senate.

Continuing a Bleeding Heartland tradition, I will post Iowa’s latest absentee ballot numbers, statewide and for each Congressional district, every weekday, based on figures released by the Iowa Secretary of State’s office. That office also publishes daily absentee ballot totals by county, state House district, and state Senate district.

You can compare this year’s numbers to daily charts from the last six election cycles by clicking through to Bleeding Heartland’s archive of absentee ballot totals from 2022, 2020, 2018, 2016, 2014, and 2012. But use caution when comparing, because Iowa’s early voting window lasted for 40 days through 2016, and was 29 days for the 2018 and 2020 elections. Only the most recent midterm also used the 20-day window currently in effect.

Also, keep in mind that this year’s early voting numbers will certainly be much lower than in 2020, when a majority of Iowans who participated cast a ballot before election day. Voting by mail skyrocketed during the last presidential election cycle, because the COVID-19 pandemic discouraged many from voting in person, and the Secretary of State’s office sent absentee ballot request forms to all registered Iowa voters. Republican legislators and Governor Kim Reynolds subsequently prohibited county auditors and the secretary of state from sending absentee ballot request forms to any voter who had not requested one.

The Secretary of State’s office now breaks down ballots received by voting method: mail, in person at a county office, in person at a satellite location, through a drop box, at a health care facility, or by email or fax (options for military or overseas voters). I’m keeping it simple with one table each day for ballots voters in each Congressional district have requested, and one table for ballots county auditors have received. After the election, I will write about how many Iowans used the various early voting options, and the partisan split for each.

In recent years, Iowa Democrats have been far more likely than Republicans to cast early ballots. However, the Iowa GOP has invested in a big early voting push this year. So far, Republicans are not far behind in early ballots requested and received in the first, second, and third Congressional districts. The GOP leads in early voting in the fourth district, where the party has a massive voter registration advantage.

Remember, though: the tables below show how many Iowans of various partisan affiliations have voted early. That doesn’t mean they all voted a straight party ticket.

Editor’s note: This post discusses Selzer’s September 2024 poll of likely Iowa voters. Her final pre-election survey, which the Des Moines Register published on November 2, showed Harris leading Trump by 47 percent to 44 percent. Original post follows.

Dan Guild is a lawyer and project manager who lives in New Hampshire. In addition to writing for Bleeding Heartland, he has written for CNN and Sabato’s Crystal Ball, most recently here. He also contributed to the Washington Post’s 2020 primary simulations. Follow him on Twitter @dcg1114.

Ann Selzer’s gold standard poll is out, and suggests a remade presidential race in Iowa.

The top line numbers from Selzer & Co’s latest poll for the Des Moines Register and Mediacom indicate former President Donald Trump has 47 percent support and Vice President Kamala Harris 43 percent among likely Iowa voters. This poll started contacting respondents on September 8 (before the debate) and concluded on September 11, the day after the debate. At the end of this piece is a summary of post-debate national polling, which has found a gain for Harris of about 1 percent.

When you compare the new survey to Selzer’s numbers from June (Trump 50 percent, President Joe Biden 32 percent in Iowa), you will find a 14 point shift in margin. But purely focusing on the margin may be a mistake.

The last few weeks could hardly have gone worse for the Libertarian Party of Iowa. Republican activists successfully forced the party’s three U.S. House candidates off the ballot, leaving Nicholas Gluba, Marco Battaglia, and Charles Aldrich to run write-in campaigns in the first, third, and fourth Congressional districts.

Meanwhile, a crowded field of presidential candidates imperils Libertarian prospects to retain major-party status in Iowa for the next election cycle.

Jody Puffett will appear on the general election ballot in Iowa’s second Congressional district, alongside two-term Republican U.S. Representative Ashley Hinson and Democratic challenger Sarah Corkery. While Hinson is not generally viewed as a vulnerable incumbent, Puffett’s candidacy could make the IA-02 race more interesting.

Since launching her campaign in early June, Puffett said in an August 28 statement, her “small but mighty grassroots team” surpassed the number of signatures needed to qualify as a U.S. House candidate (at least 1,726, including at least 47 signatures from at least eleven of the district’s 22 counties).

Puffett is the only independent candidate running for Congress in Iowa this year, and could end up being the only alternative to Democrats and Republicans in any of the four U.S. House races. Libertarians filed in the first, third, and fourth districts, but Republicans on the State Objection Panel knocked them off the ballot on August 28. It’s unclear whether the Libertarians will successfully appeal that decision in court.

JODY PUFFETT’S KEY ISSUES AND EXPERIENCE

Puffett has spent the summer “attending county fairs, community events, and going door-to-door to businesses across the district engaging with constituents.” She is trying to reach voters who are disenchanted with both Republicans and Democrats, and is highlighting the following priorities, according to her campaign:

Declaring that “This election is bigger than any one person” and “the stakes are just too high,” first Congressional district nominee Christina Bohannan on July 11 called for President Joe Biden “to withdraw from this campaign and pass the torch to a new generation of leadership.”

The same day, the Democratic nominee in Iowa’s second Congressional district, Sarah Corkery, said the president should “pass the baton” to Vice President Kamala Harris.

Bohannan and Corkery were the first Iowa Democratic candidates to publicly endorse replacing the party’s presumptive presidential nominee. It’s a risky move that could appeal to independents who overwhelmingly disapprove of Biden’s job performance, but could also alienate the party faithful the challengers need to volunteer for and donate to their campaigns.

The appropriations bill President Joe Biden signed into law on March 9 includes $74.36 million in federal funding for designated projects in Iowa, Bleeding Heartland’s analysis of a 605-page earmarks list reveals. Another $8 million earmark for Dubuque Flood Mitigation Gates and Pumps was part of the Homeland Security bill Biden signed on March 23, completing work on funding the federal government through the end of the current fiscal year on September 30.

All four Republicans who represent Iowa in the U.S. House—Mariannette Miller-Meeks (IA-01), Ashley Hinson (IA-02), Zach Nunn (IA-03), and Randy Feenstra (IA-04)—were among the 339 members who approved the “minibus” spending package on March 6. Miller-Meeks, Hinson, and Nunn voted for the second minibus on March 22; Feenstra voted against that package with no public explanation.

Hinson is the only Iowan now serving on the House Appropriations Committee. Her projects will receive a combined $27.54 million; she had requested $37.06 million. Projects submitted by Miller-Meeks will receive about $28.38 million in earmarked funding; she had requested $40.15 million. Earmarks for projects Nunn submitted will total $26.22 million; he had asked for $41.25 million.

The 36 counties in IA-04 will receive none of the earmarked funding, because for the third straight year, Feenstra declined to submit any earmark requests.

Two of Iowa’s four U.S. House districts are among the 31 top targets for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee next cycle.

On April 3, Sahil Kapur of NBC News was first to publish the Democratic target list. It includes Iowa’s first and third districts, now represented by Mariannette Miller-Meeks and Zach Nunn.

Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee executive director Julie Merz told NBC that Democrats will present their candidates “as ‘team normal’ against a chaotic band of “MAGA extremists” they say have taken over the House Republican conference.”

Fourth in a series interpreting the results of Iowa’s 2022 state and federal elections.

Many people have asked why Iowa experienced the red wave that didn’t materialize across most of the country. While no one factor can account for the result, early signs point to turnout problems among groups that favor Democratic candidates.

Although this year’s turnout was the second-highest in absolute numbers for an Iowa midterm, participation was down about 8 percent compared to the 2018 general election. The number of Iowans who cast ballots this year (1,230,416) was closer to the 2014 level (1,142,311) than to the high-water mark of 1,334,279, reached four years ago.

My impression is that the decline in turnout was not evenly distributed, but was more pronounced among registered Democrats than among Republicans, who have long been more reliable midterm voters in Iowa.

That alone could account for the narrow defeats of U.S. Representative Cindy Axne (who lost to Zach Nunn in the third Congressional district by 2,145 votes, a margin of 50.3 percent to 49.6 percent), Attorney General Tom Miller (lost to Brenna Bird by 20,542 votes, 50.8 percent to 49.1 percent), and State Treasurer Michael Fitzgerald (lost to Roby Smith by 30,922 votes, or 51.3 percent to 48.7 percent).

Continuing a Bleeding Heartland tradition, I will post Iowa’s latest absentee ballot numbers, statewide and for each Congressional district, every weekday, based on figures released by the Iowa Secretary of State’s office. You can find Iowa’s new Congressional map here or at the bottom of this post.

You can compare this year’s numbers to daily charts from the last five election cycles by clicking through to Bleeding Heartland’s archive of absentee ballot totals from 2020, 2018, 2016, 2014, and 2012. Remember that Iowa had longer early voting windows for all of those elections: 40 days through 2016, and 29 days for 2018 and 2020. Republicans shortened the early voting period as part of a wide-ranging effort to suppress early voting in 2021.

In addition, the Secretary of State’s office has changed the format of its absentee ballot statistics. In the past, all ballots received were lumped together, whether the Iowans voted early by mail or in person.

Now, the statistics show ballots returned by mail or email (an option for military or overseas voters), ballots cast from a health care facility, early votes cast in person at county elections offices, and those cast in person at satellite locations. I’ve adjusted my tables accordingly.

Since larger, Democratic-leaning counties tend to have more satellite voting locations, I’ll be on the lookout for Republican lawmakers to attempt to further restrict that voting method during the coming legislative sessions. (The 2021 law put up some new roadblocks for satellite voting.)

The Secretary of State’s office also publishes daily absentee ballot totals by Iowa county, state House district, and state Senate district.

Republicans seeking Iowa’s federal offices take some important advantages into the November election. Most are incumbents with more money to spend than their challengers. Recent history suggests midterms favor the party out of power in Washington, and President Joe Biden has low approval numbers in Iowa.

One wild card complicates the equation for GOP candidates here, as in many other states. Republicans are on record supporting near-total abortion bans, while a majority of voters favor keeping abortion mostly legal.

Republican campaign messaging has emphasized other topics, such as inflation, taxes, or unpopular Washington politicians. When they can’t avoid talking about abortion, Republicans have claimed their Democratic opponents are the real extremists on the issue.

Several races may hinge on whether moderate voters buy into that distortion of the facts.

Iowa’s filing period for the 2022 general election closed on August 27 with no third-party candidate qualified for the ballot in any federal race, or any statewide race other than for governor and lieutenant governor.

The landscape could hardly be more different from four years ago, when the Libertarian Party of Iowa fielded a full slate of federal and statewide candidates, and no-party candidates also competed in three of the four U.S. House districts.

The lack of a third-party presence could be important if any of Iowa’s Congressional or statewide elections are close contests.

Top Iowa Republicans crowed this month when the state’s official figures showed the GOP had expanded its voter registration lead over Democrats. At this point in the 2018 election cycle, registered Republicans outnumbered Democrats in Iowa by around 24,000. The current disparity is more than three times as large. According to the latest numbers released by the Secretary of State’s office, Iowa has 681,871 active registered Republicans, 597,120 Democrats, and 555,988 no-party voters.

The voter registration totals should concern Democrats, but two other trends facing the party’s candidates in this midterm election should worry them more.

David Farwell of Spillville, Iowa is a service-connected PTSD disabled veteran and activist for veteran health services as owed to them by law.  

I’ve moved 49 times in 50 years, which is not surprising for a military brat and former global project leader at an international corporation.  

What may be surprising is why my last move was from a Chicago high-rise to Spillville, Iowa, and how an invisible epidemic shattered my life, ended my career and brought me to the tiny town in Iowa where Dvorak completed his New World Symphony.

Former President Donald Trump announced on June 5 that four Iowa Republican incumbents who are up for re-election in 2022 have his “Complete and Total Endorsement!”

U.S. Representative Mariannette Miller-Meeks was missing from the list.

New laws enacted by Republican legislators and Governor Kim Reynolds succeeded in limiting third-party competition for Iowa’s state and federal offices.

According to the general election candidate list published by the Iowa Secretary of State’s office on March 21, only one minor-party candidate qualified for a federal office this year: Bryan Jack Holder, who is running in the fourth Congressional district. Libertarians are fielding candidates for governor and lieutenant governor: Rick Stewart and Marco Battaglia. In 2018, Libertarian candidates were on the ballot for all of Iowa’s statewide and federal offices.

No independent candidate filed for any federal or statewide office in Iowa this year. For most of the last decade’s elections, independent candidates were on the ballot for several of those offices.

Only two candidates not representing a major party filed for any of the the 34 Iowa Senate seats on the ballot in 2022; both are running in Senate district 17. Across the 100 Iowa House races, only three Libertarian candidates and four independents will appear on the November ballot.

Before Republicans passed new restrictions in 2019 and 2021, Iowa voters were able to choose candidates not representing either major party in more elections.

Two Iowans are among the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s twelve top-tier U.S. House challengers. Politico’s Ally Mutnick was first to report on the DCCC’s initial group of candidates added to the “Red to Blue” program, aimed at flipping Republican-held districts.

State Representative Christina Bohannan is challenging Representative Mariannette Miller-Meeks in the new IA-01, covering much of southeast Iowa. State Senator Liz Mathis is challenging Representative Ashley Hinson in the new IA-02, covering much of northeast Iowa. Both Democrats have qualified for the June 7 primary election ballot, and both have been endorsed by EMILY’s List, among the big outside spenders in Congressional races.

Iowa’s four U.S. House members all entered the election year with substantially more cash on hand than their opponents, the latest quarterly filings with the Federal Election Commission show.

However, Democratic challengers in the first and second districts are raising enough money to fund strong general election campaigns.

U.S. Representative Ashley Hinson tried to pull a fast one on Iowans this week.

After the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers approved funding for two lock and dam projects along the Mississippi River, Hinson took credit for the spending. “We secured $829 million in federal funding to upgrade locks & dams along the Upper Mississippi River,” she tweeted on January 19, describing the projects as “game-changing for Iowa’s agriculture industry & our Mississippi River communities!”

The trouble is, Hinson voted against the bipartisan infrastructure bill that provided this “game-changing” funding.

As election year approaches, the leading national political forecasters have updated their analysis of the coming U.S. Senate and House elections. Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball revised its House ratings on December 16, while Inside Elections with Nathan Gonzales and the Cook Political Report did so on December 28 and December 29, respectively.

The consensus is that Republicans are favored to win most of Iowa’s Congressional races, but the one House district held by a Democrat is a toss-up.

One of the leading Democratic-aligned political action committees endorsed three Iowa candidates this week. EMILY’s List, which backs pro-choice Democratic women seeking federal, state, or local offices, endorsed U.S. Senate candidate Abby Finkenauer on December 15 and U.S. House candidates Christina Bohannan and Liz Mathis in the new first and second Congressional districts on December 16.

The PAC endorsed U.S. Representative Cindy Axne for re-election in the third district in March.

This week’s announcements were no surprise, since EMILY’s List supported Axne and Finkenauer in their 2018 and 2020 U.S. House campaigns, and said in April that Senator Chuck Grassley was one of three Republicans the group planned to target in 2022 Senate races.

Backing from EMILY’s List helps candidates raise money through the organization’s large network of donors. Perhaps more important, it indicates the group is prepared to pay for advertising on behalf of endorsed candidates or against their opponents.

The big question is whether EMILY’s List will keep its messages positive before the June 2022 Senate primary, or also target Democratic rivals. I couldn’t get an answer from the group yesterday.

Iowa lawmakers overwhelmingly approved the Legislative Services Agency’s second redistricting plan on October 28, by 48 votes to 1 in the Iowa Senate and 93 votes to 2 in the House. Democrats had already committed to approving any nonpartisan maps. Republicans liked that this plan (unlike the first LSA proposal) creates four U.S. House districts that Donald Trump carried. It also gives the party an excellent chance to maintain their Iowa House and Senate majorities.

Republican State Senator Ken Rozenboom cast the only vote against the maps in the upper chamber. The plan puts him in the same district as his GOP colleague Adrian Dickey.

In the lower chamber, only GOP State Representatives Tom Jeneary and Jon Jacobsen voted against the redistricting plan. Both are placed in House districts with other Republican incumbents, but Jacobsen told Bleeding Heartland in a telephone interview that’s not why he opposed the plan. Rather, he said the legislative maps carve up Pottawattamie County outside Council Bluffs into several districts represented by incumbents who live elsewhere.

I’ll have more to say about some legislative districts in forthcoming posts. For now, here are the basics about the plan Governor Kim Reynolds will soon sign into law. UPDATE: The governor signed the bill on November 4.

There are winners and losers in every redistricting plan. The second set of nonpartisan Iowa maps, which the Legislative Services Agency released on October 21, was much kinder to U.S. Representative Ashley Hinson than the first map, which put Hinson in a Democratic-leaning Congressional district.

Fortunes were reversed for U.S. Representative Mariannette Miller-Meeks. The first plan put her in a district that Donald Trump carried by more than 10 points in 2020. Today’s proposal puts most of the territory she now represents in a district Trump carried by about 2 points. She was certified the winner last year against Rita Hart by six votes in a district Trump carried by 4 points.

Even worse, Miller-Meeks’ home in Ottumwa (Wapello County) is part of the proposed third Congressional district, where Trump outpolled Joe Biden by just 0.4 points.

On Iowa social media feeds today, I’ve seen some speculation about how Miller-Meeks might fare against Democratic Representative Cindy Axne, or about Democrat Christina Bohannan being able to run for Congress in an open seat covering most of southeast Iowa.

I wouldn’t spend a lot of time pondering those scenarios.

Part 8 in Evan Burger’s series on Iowa redistricting.

This morning, Iowa’s nonpartisan Legislative Services Agency (LSA) released their second redistricting proposal on October 21. Here’s a quick analysis of the Congressional map included in Plan 2; Laura Belin will write a companion piece examining the legislative maps later today.

The big takeaway is that this plan strongly resembles Iowa’s current map of U.S. House districts, especially when you look at the ten largest counties. Here is how Plan 2 groups those counties:

• IA-01: Johnson (Iowa City), Scott (Quad Cities)
• IA-02: Linn (Cedar Rapids), Black Hawk (Waterloo/Cedar Falls), Dubuque
• IA-03: Polk (Des Moines area), Dallas (Des Moines suburbs)
• IA-04: Story (Ames), Woodbury (Sioux City), Pottawattamie (Council Bluffs)

The current map groups those counties the same way, with the exception of Pottawattamie, which moves from the Polk district to the Story district.

Candidates running for U.S. House in Iowa raised a surprising amount of money from July through September, given that we have no idea what their districts will look like in 2022.

Follow me after the jump for highlights from the latest quarterly filings to the Federal Election Commission. Notable numbers from Congressional candidates’ fundraising and spending during the first half of 2021 can be found here.

U.S. Representative Ashley Hinson was among many Republican officials to wish U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley a happy birthday on September 17.

But if Iowa lawmakers and Governor Kim Reynolds enact the first map proposed by the nonpartisan Legislative Services Agency, Hinson’s political career could be cut short, unless the 88-year-old senator opts not to seek re-election.

Evan Burger continues his series on redistricting with analysis of the newly released proposed congressional map.

This morning, the Legislative Services Agency released their first set of proposed maps, which can be found here. As expected, the LSA released both congressional and legislative maps — for today I’ll focus on the former, with more analysis to come on the legislative front.

By the numbers

As I’ve written here before, the three standards that the LSA considers in producing a map are contiguity, population equality, and compactness. Of the three, contiguity is an absolute standard: a congressional district must be made up of whole counties that are contiguous. The next most important standard is population equality, meaning the LSA tries to make districts as close in population as possible. However, they must also consider the compactness of a given map, both in terms of minimizing the difference between the length and width of each district, and in terms of minimizing the total perimeter length of all districts.

The LSA’s proposed congressional map easily meets the contiguity requirement. Here is how it scores on population equality and the two measures of compactness:

• Lowest Population: District 2 (797,556)
• Highest Population: District 1 (797,655)
• Difference between lowest and highest population: 99
• Total Perimeter Score: 2,772.02 miles
• Average Length-Width Compactness: 34.96 miles

“If true, this is insane,” U.S. Representative Mariannette Miller-Meeks tweeted while sharing an article headlined, “Biden Orders VA To Withhold Health Benefits From Unvaccinated Veterans.”

The article wasn’t true. The website that published it even has a disclaimer: “All stories herein are parodies (satire, fiction, fake, not real) of people and/or actual events.”

Most politicians would delete the tweet and apologize, or (if they were cowards) blame the mistake on a staffer.

Miller-Meeks won’t take the tweet down. It’s not the first time the Republican from Iowa’s second district has refused to retract false information about the COVID-19 pandemic.

State Representative Christina Bohannan confirmed on August 24 that she’s running for Congress in Iowa’s second district. She’s the first declared Democratic candidate for the seat, where Republican U.S. Representative Miller-Meeks was certified the winner in 2020 by six votes out of nearly 400,000 cast.

Last year’s campaign in IA-02 was Iowa’s most expensive U.S. House race, with the candidates spending nearly $6 million and outside groups putting in more than $15.5 million over the cycle. Both parties are expected to target the district next year, and Miller-Meeks’ campaign had more than $1.1 million cash on hand as of June 30.

Speaking by phone a few hours after her campaign became official, Bohannan told Bleeding Heartland, “I’m having way more fun than I think you’re supposed to when you’re running for Congress.” She said she’s enjoyed the conversations she’s had today and is feeling “really good” about her early fundraising.

I had more questions for the new candidate.

Evan Burger continues his series on redistricting with analysis of some of the reddest and bluest possible Congressional districts.

On August 12, the Census Bureau released the “PL 94-171 Redistricting Data File” – the official population counts of every precinct, city, county, and state in the country, as of April 1, 2020.

As I wrote last weekend, Iowa’s redistricting process can now start in earnest – and members of the public can get a clearer view of what districts are possible. For today, I’ll focus on the implications for Iowa’s Congressional maps. Future articles will contain similar analysis at the legislative level.

Evan Burger continues his series of posts on Iowa redistricting scenarios.

Last week, the U.S. Census Bureau announced some exciting news: they will release the next round of redistricting data this Thursday, August 12, four days earlier than promised. 

At long last, Iowa will have the population counts needed to start drawing new district lines – and just in time, considering that the Iowa Constitution requires the legislature to finish redistricting by September 15. 

Candidates for federal offices are raising more money than ever, and that trend was noticeable in the second-quarter Federal Election Commission filings for Iowa’s four U.S. House incumbents. Most of them reported fundraising numbers that would have attracted national attention just a few cycles ago. Many large donors live outside Iowa, a sign that national committees are driving contributions to candidates perceived to be in competitive districts.

The cash on hand totals may seem daunting for challengers who recently launched their campaigns or are still considering it. On the other hand, war chests are less important than they used to be, given the massive growth in outside spending on battleground U.S. House races. A fundraising advantage for an incumbent in 2021 may not be a major factor by next summer.

With that caveat, let’s review where things stand for the three Republicans and one Democrat who represent Iowa in the lower chamber of Congress.

For the second straight election cycle, Iowa Republicans have gotten away with not counting disputed ballots in a race the GOP candidate won by fewer than ten votes.

Democrat Rita Hart announced on March 31 that she was withdrawing her contest of the election in Iowa’s second Congressional district, where Republican Mariannette Miller-Meeks was certified the winner by six votes out of more than 394,000 cast.

Spenser Mestel is a freelance journalist and author of Spenser’s Super Tuesday, a weekly newsletter about voting rights. -promoted by Laura Belin 

The race in Iowa’s second Congressional district, the closest U.S. House election since 1984, isn’t over just yet.

On December 22, Democratic candidate Rita Hart filed a “notice of contest” in the House, officially challenging the six-vote margin that separates her from Republican Mariannette Miller-Meeks. Now, the issue goes to the House Administration Committee, which recently agreed on rules to hear the case. Should it agree to investigate further, the winner could be decided by a majority vote in the House.

Hart’s bid is a long-shot. In the last 107 elections to be contested under the Federal Contested Elections Act, 104 failed. However, other circumstances favor Hart: Democrats control the chamber (221 to 211) and have already taken the unprecedented step of expelling Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene from her two committees. Plus, the Hart campaign has credible evidence that the initial vote-counting and subsequent recounting were flawed.

Evan Burger: Despite census delays, what we know about Iowa’s redistricting process allows us to say a surprising amount about how the new Congressional districts will look. -promoted by Laura Belin

Last month, I wrote that census delays might prevent the Iowa legislature from fulfilling their constitutional requirement to finish redistricting by September 1. Since then, the U.S. Census Bureau announced that they will not finish compiling the data necessary for redistricting until September 30, so the legislature is now guaranteed to miss their deadline.

All eyes are now on the Iowa Supreme Court. Will the justices exercise their authority to take over redistricting on September 15, or will they give the legislature more time to finish the standard redistricting process? So far, the judicial branch hasn’t said.

How the legislature will handle the delay is also not clear. Facing a similar situation, California legislators asked their state supreme court for an extension of the constitutional deadline, which the justices unanimously voted to grant. Legislative leaders in Iowa have not said whether they will take a similarly proactive approach. Iowa Capital Dispatch and Radio Iowa have quoted Senate Majority Leader Jack Whitver and House Speaker Pat Grassley as saying they are evaluating their options.

The census delays continue to add uncertainty into Iowa’s redistricting process. But we do know some things about redistricting – and that allows us to say a surprising amount about how the new districts will look.

Seventh in a series interpreting the results of Iowa’s 2020 state and federal elections.

Hawaii became the 50th state to certify its 2020 election results this week. The Cook Political Report’s national popular vote tracker shows Joe Biden received 81,282,376 votes (51.3 percent) to 74,222,576 votes for Donald Trump (46.9 percent).

With the books closed on the popular vote for president, we can fill in some details on a reality that came into focus last month: Iowa no longer has any Democratic-leaning U.S. House districts.