What Iowans Are Reading: Zach Lahn “Commutes on the Wing” and “Doesn’t Understand What Has Happened to Rural Iowa”
DES MOINES – Longtime political observers are putting carpetbagger and career political operative Zach Lahn on blast for supporting unaccountable private school vouchers, living a luxurious out-of-state lifestyle in Kansas, and backing tariffs that are making life unaffordable for working families.
What Iowans are reading about how out-of-touch Lahn is:
Storm Lake Times Pilot’s Art Cullen: Editorials: Laments and heckling
- Zach Lahn got on his soapbox at the Iowa State Fair to Lament Democrat Rob Sand calling him a carpetbagger from Kansas. Lahn takes offense that Sand’s TV ads show Lahn in the cockpit flying to Wichita … It’s a fair point for Sand to raise in the governor race, as it speaks to how Lahn doesn’t understand what has happened to rural Iowa in the years since he quarterbacked the Sioux City East football team, and wound up working for the … fertilizer industry.
- Lahn commutes on the wing. It can be difficult to see what is going on below depending on the cloud cover.
- Lahn is okay with what has been done. He applauds the education record of the legislature and Gov. Kim Reynolds. Vouchers for private school and home-school corporations are a good thing because Lahn owns such a home-school business in Kansas. The vouchers are suffocating rural public schools in a zero-sum funding game against home schools and private schools, while reducing revenue through income tax cuts. Lahn is not calling out the problems with this stuff. It is the orthodoxy that got him that airplane.
The Gazette’s Todd Dorman: News flash: Wealthy guys are running for Iowa governor
- Lahn raised $6.3 million, with $5 million from the Republican Governors Association, funded largely by rich donors and corporations.
- Lahn also is wealthy. The Daily Beast reported this month that he sold his “ski-in, ski-out” home in Montana for nearly $5 million. His Kansas home is worth $2 million, including a lake and indoor pool.
- Lahn would eliminate state income taxes, which would surely make fat cats purr. How he pays for improving public schools and paying more farmers to curtail nitrate water pollution is a mystery.
Wall Street Journal’s Faith Bottum: Discontented Iowans Consider the Democrats
- Why are Iowans so downbeat? They invariably mention the farm economy. The state saw a 53% decline in net farm income between 2022 and 2024, and rural voters aren’t convinced Republicans have done enough to help them recover. “Tariffs, wars, corporations taking advantage, lack of competition—those kinds of things that are on Iowa farmers’ minds,” says Mr. Struthers, the farmer from Collins.
- On Mr. Trump’s recent tariff fight with Canada, Mr. Sand immediately wrote, “30% of Iowa’s exports go to Canada. This is going to hurt us.” His Republican opponent, Mr. Lahn, danced around the issue.
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