Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) is one of the most polarizing figures in Iowa politics. Over the past few years, King has spent quite a bit of time in the national spotlight; he has become known for formerly displaying a Confederate flag on his desk office, retweeting neo-Nazis, and touting derogatory views on immigration and LGBTQ rights. Due to King’s notoriety, his Democratic challenger, J.D. Scholten, began to gain traction and support in the run-up to the election. On Nov. 6, 2018, Scholten lost to King by a mere 10,000 votes. Scholten’s near-victory indicates that the tide may be turning in one of the reddest districts in the nation.
The Race
Iowa’s fourth congressional district is nearly half urban and half rural. The district includes bigger cities such as Ames, home to Iowa State University, as well as Sioux City, which borders South Dakota. It is fairly homogenous, with 92.9 percent of its residents identifying as white.
The past three congressmen — all Republicans — have held a tight grip on Iowa’s fourth district since 1994. Rep. King first ran for congress in Iowa’s 5th congressional district, which has since been absorbed, in 2002. He won, and continues winning, as he will begin his eighth term in January.
Scholten is new to politics. In a recent interview with the HPR, Scholten said he decided he couldn’t “sit on the sidelines” anymore after both the 2016 Presidential Election and conversations with his grandmother, whom he found inspiration from before her death.
Scholten set off on three 39 county tours, while Rep. King released his first TV ad just five days before the election. “The first [tour], people basically [said] ‘God bless you, someone should run against him.’ The second time was, ‘he’s not only not Steve King, he stands for something.’” Scholten told the HPR. “The last tour we did a town hall in all 39 counties. It was there that we saw the hope in people’s eyes.”
In the wake of the Pittsburgh shooting, Scholten made an appearance on Pod Save America in light of his race against — as he was described in the podcast — “white nationalist” Steve King. After the podcast, polls showed Scholten and Rep. King were only one percentage point away from each other. Then, Scholten raised over 1 million dollars in one week. Altogether, Scholten’s campaign raised $1,684,427 compared to Rep. King’s $736,629. Scholten similarly spent double the amount that Rep. King did.
Running a civil campaign against someone covered distinctly in the media — the Washington Post describes Rep. King as “the U.S. congressman most openly affiliated with white nationalism” — is something Scholten strove for. “You have to be disciplined with messaging,” he told the HPR. “We made sure that we didn’t run an anti-Steve King race but rather what we stood for. Our town halls barely mentioned King.”
Throughout these town halls, Scholten could feel something in the air in Iowa’s fourth district, “With the crowds we were drawing and the excitement throughout the district, I knew we were doing something special, something different,” he told the HPR.
Although Scholten lost his race, Democrats took the majority of the house in the rest of Iowa with two districts flipping from Republican to Democrat.
What Does it Mean?
This is the first time a Democrat has come close to winning in Iowa’s fourth congressional district since one was elected back in 1992. Scholten doesn’t see this race as a failure.
Scholten recognizes there is a lot of work to be done, and this is simply the beginning. In an op-ed in USA Today, he stated that the headlines regarding Rep. King around the nation aren’t the same as the those in small-town papers. As Scholten put it, a farmer working on a combine listening to the radio typically won’t care as much about neo-Nazi retweets as they do record low soybean prices.
Scholten still believes in the future of Iowa. As he wrote in his op-ed, “Is Steve King invincible? Absolutely not. We ran a campaign that I am damn proud of. We did a lot of things right …” Scholten wrote in his op-ed. “I’m convinced that if we continue listening to [rural] voices, we can eventually dethrone Steve King.”