Why are Republican policies so bad for rural Iowa?
Rural Iowans have nobody to represent them; Republicans certainly aren't doing it.
It’s conventional wisdom these days that America is divided between city and country, an urban-rural divide that drives our politics. Urban Democrats and rural Republicans, they say, have different cultures and rarely mingle. In this story, Democrats represent the interests of the cities and Republicans those of rural areas.
How, then, do we explain Iowa’s state government?
The allegedly pro-rural GOP has controlled the governor’s office and both houses of the state Legislature since 2017. So why are state policies so bad for rural Iowa?
Consider a few recent examples:
Republicans’ signature accomplishment last year, public funding for private schools, has almost no benefit to Iowa’s rural counties, most of which have zero private schools.
Gov. Kim Reynolds’ greatest priority this year has been cutting back the state Area Educational Associations, which primarily benefit smaller school districts. Iowa City can hire a multi-school speech pathologist and make its own bulk purchases; even Mason City needs access to the pooled professionals and purchasing power of the AEAs.
Prominent Republicans back CO2 pipelines, despite their unpopularity with farmers.
Large rural sections of the state lack mental, maternity, or reproductive health care after Republicans closed regional mental health centers and “reformed” a once-successful state family planning program.
Meanwhile, the governor’s budget recommended zero funding for a UI initiative to better provide rural healthcare.
If Republicans are the party for rural Iowans, why are the Democrats the ones trying to protect rural water quality? Why doesn’t the Republican-controlled state government have a meaningful plan to slow or stop population decline in rural counties? Why isn’t the state government doing more to support rural hospitals and small farmers, or reducing Iowa’s reliance on ethanol mandates?
In short, why isn’t the so-called rural party focused on rural issues?
Maybe because it isn’t really the rural party.
Any post-election map will show Iowa with great swaths of red counties that voted Republican. But those are the counties that are losing population. Do they really have enough votes to carry an election?
According to the 2022 voting totals, the answer, at least for statewide races, is “no.”
We looked at two of the more competitive 2022 races, U.S. Senate and state auditor. In both races, the GOP performed better in rural counties. However, using the most generous definition of “rural,” at most 40% of Iowans live in rural counties. Even with high rural vote tallies, Republicans still draw up to 3 in 5 of their votes from urban and suburban counties.
And there’s the rub: Republicans need strong support in rural Iowa to compensate for how badly they do in cities. But because fewer people live in rural Iowa, a clear majority of Iowa Republican voters do not live in rural counties and may not care about rural issues.
The urban/rural narrative might be truer in the Legislature, where rural counties have direct representation. The growing number of uncontested legislative races says that the political parties think so and means that Republican legislators don’t have to work for their votes.
The end result for rural Iowa is that no party really represents its interests. Democrats care about things like education, water quality, and health care, but most Democratic representatives have an urban constituency. And rural Republicans may fear crossing the governor, who has brought out-of-state interest groups to fund primary challengers to Republicans who oppose her agenda. Food for thought, and perhaps a reason to run for office as an independent, if you live in a rural area.
But all of us should reconsider how we think about our communities and their needs. Bright blue Johnson County has more Republican voters than the 10 smallest rural counties combined. 30,000 more rural Iowans voted for our Democratic state auditor than for the Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate. Our state is more purple than it looks at first blush, and both parties would do well to remember that.
Kelcey Patrick-Ferree and Shannon Patrick live in Iowa.
Originally published in the Iowa City Press-Citizen on February 10, 2024.
Iowa is one of the best led states, thanks to the Republican control of the Governor’s office and the statehouse. Just look at any Democrat run state and you will see the absolute failure the left is known for. States like Minnesota, Michigan, California, Illinois and Louisiana all have extremely high crime rates, lousy schools, failed fiscal policies with extremely high taxes and the strict limitation of individual liberties not seen in any Red states. Blue states welcome violent illegal aliens who terrorize innocent citizens with vicious crimes and a complete disdain for our laws. Red states, like Iowa, are sending national guard soldiers and state troopers to Texas to help keep these animals out of our country. One only has to look at our uniformly incompetent administration in Washington led by a demented and incoherent stooge and all the national crises they’ve caused to see that Democrats have absolutely no place in positions of power. You claim to prize our liberties, yet you routinely take them away. You try to deny us the right to vote for whom we like. You deny us our Constitutional rights under the First and Second Amendments. You deprive citizens of their rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Put frankly, there is no such thing as a decent Democrat. You are all contemptible, corrupt, narcissistic buffoons and a stain on humanity. Publish that.
Republicans are interested in power, money, and doing the bidding of people with power and money. But since voters without power and money outnumber voters with power and money, Iowa Republicans know the only way to win elections is to play on people's fears and pretend to be concerned about the same stupid culture-war bullshit the national party pretends to be concerned about. Honestly, I don't know how these people sleep at night.