One of the most experienced Iowa House Republicans failed to qualify for the 2022 primary ballot after collecting some signatures from voters who no longer live in his Council Bluffs district.

Assistant Majority Leader Brent Siegrist served eighteen years in the Iowa House, rising to the positions of majority leader and speaker, before retiring in 2002 to run for Congress. He worked as a lobbyist for many years, then ran for the state House again in 2020 and was elected to represent a district covering part of Council Bluffs.

Iowa’s new political map placed Siegrist in House district 19, also covering about half of that city. He submitted his nominating papers on March 16 and initially appeared on the primary candidate list. But that list no longer has any Republican candidate for House district 19 after Siegrist withdrew his papers.

How on earth did this happen?