On Politics War Room Podcast, Rob Sand Talks Iowa Special Election and Public Service

DES MOINES, IA – This week, candidate for governor Rob Sand sat down with James Carville and Al Hunt on the Politics War Room podcast to discuss Iowa’s recent state Senate special election results, which is the fourth special election in Iowa since 2024 where Democrats have overperformed by 20 points or more. Iowa is also home to four of the five top overperformances in the country since 2024. This latest victory signals Iowans’ desire for change and for leaders who will put public service over politics.

On the podcast, Rob also talked about why transparency and accessibility matter in government, and why he believes it’s important to show up and listen, to everyone, everywhere.

Listeners can catch the full episode HERE or key quotes below:

“This is now four special elections that we have had in the state of Iowa this year, and in every single one of them, the Democrat has overperformed by at least 20 points. That makes for, I think, four of the top five overperformances in the nation this year. And let me tell you why: people are fed up here in the state of Iowa.”
“We’ve had 10 years of one-party control. That is unusual for us. Most people think of Iowa as purple…and that’s typically the way we think of ourselves. But they’ve really sort of gone off their rocker in terms of just focusing on insiders and special interest groups instead of serving Iowans.”
“I do a town hall in every county seat, every single year. I tell the public I’m coming. We’ve done 40 of them this year, we’ve got 60 more to go. And I think people are hungry for that kind of leadership. They want someone who’s willing to come out and talk to them — even if it’s going to be a disagreement.”
“I’ll go, I’ll go anywhere. I’ll talk to anybody… I think that’s my obligation as a candidate, as an elected official.”
“I went to a town hall with a very conservative group. When they announced that I was going to be there, the headquarters of the Republican Party of Iowa called them up and read them the riot act for having the gall to talk to one of their own statewide elected officials. That is just a level of arrogance and entitlement that I think is incredibly unattractive in the state of Iowa, where people value public service and hard work. You try to tell somebody who not to talk to, they’re probably going to make a point of talking to them twice as long as they were going to in the first place.”