DES MOINES, IOWA — The Iowa Democratic Party plans to deploy 60 field organizers across the state by June and staff a coordinated campaign of about two dozen people to support candidates for governor, U.S. House and U.S. Senate in 2026. The party has signed leases on eight field offices and plans to open at least seven more, including in blue-collar areas in eastern Iowa along the Mississippi River.

Senior leaders of the state party expect their spending this cycle to reach the high seven figures, on par with presidential years. The party said 7,000 people have signed up over the past year to volunteer for Democratic candidates, and is targeting three of the four Republican-held U.S. House seats.

"Iowa is still, in my view, a purple state. We just haven't given them an opportunity to show that lately." said state party chair Rita Hart.

Hart said the party is shifting from text messages and digital advertising to face-to-face conversations. "Since the pandemic, we've really struggled with getting back to the basics with person-to-person communication. We've got to get back to that," she said.

Iowa Democrats have faced a difficult political environment since Barack Obama won the state in 2008 and 2012. Republicans have had total control of the Iowa state government for nearly a decade, all six members of Iowa's federal delegation are Republicans, and Democrats run at a deficit in registered voters by roughly 200,000 statewide. Donald Trump won Iowa by double digits in the last presidential election and chose the state as his first stop when he began his midterm campaigning earlier this year. Vice President JD Vance is visiting Iowa to support Representative Zach Nunn, who represents Des Moines, its suburbs and the state's rural center.

Governor Kim Reynolds and Senator Joni Ernst are not seeking reelection in 2026. State auditor Rob Sand, who is running for governor, ended 2025 with $13 million in his campaign account and has introduced policy proposals including term limits, bans on stock trading while in office, and open primaries. State lawmakers Josh Turek and Zach Wahls are seeking the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate in the June 2 primary. Turek calls himself a "prairie populist" and has said there are too many millionaires in Congress who don't know what it is to live paycheck to paycheck. Wahls said corruption in politics benefits corporate interests over working people.

Iowa Democratic strategist Jeff Link said the party had erred in its response to Trump. "Because the knee-jerk reaction to Trump is to be the opposite of Trump, we went away from economic populism to our detriment," he said. "By just being anti-Trump, it is being condescending towards people that chose him three times," Link added.

Jeff Kaufmann, chairman of the Republican Party of Iowa, said the Democrats' shift would not quickly change voters' perceptions. "You can't have political born-again experiences," he said. "Tweaking the message and running away from the national party is not going to erase your history in one election cycle." Kaufmann also said, "It's going to take a long time for them to build it back up again."