Josh Turek flips Iowa Senate seat for Democrats, boosting fight for the majority

Democrat Josh Turek has defeated Republican Rep. Ashley Hinson in Iowa's open Senate race, NBC News projects, delivering his party a critical pickup in the battle for control of the chamber. Democrats needed a net gain of at least four seats to wrest the majority from Republicans, and the party had not won a Senate race in Iowa in nearly two decades.

Turek, a state representative who emerged from a contested primary earlier this year with the tacit backing of Democratic leaders in Washington, built his campaign around tying Hinson to President Donald Trump and a Republican agenda that proved unpopular with Iowa voters. He repeatedly attacked her votes supporting Trump's trade war, which has hurt Iowa producers and consumers, and the war with Iran, which has contributed to rising prices for gas, diesel fuel and products transported into and around the state.

Hinson campaigned on her record across three terms in the House and on Iowa's Republican tilt, but she could not overcome Trump's sagging approval ratings or voter frustration over the cost of living. As was the case across the country, the president played an outsize role in the race, forcing Hinson into a high-wire act in which she courted his MAGA base while searching for ways to distance herself from him.

In September, after the last of her seven votes against efforts to end the war, Hinson announced she believed the conflict should come to an end. The shift moved her closer to Iowans' sentiments but gave Turek an opening to call her a flip-flopper. On Oct. 21, the same day Trump held a rally in Sioux City to bolster Hinson and other Iowa Republicans, she told "NBC Nightly News" anchor Tom Llamas she was not disappointed in Trump. "I work alongside the president. When he's right for Iowa, I'm going to tell him. When he's wrong for Iowa, I'm going to tell him," she said.

Hours before Trump's arrival, Hinson split with her party's leaders by condemning Ohio Republican gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy's controversial ad featuring the mother of Democratic rival Amy Acton, who accuses her daughter of being a liar. Acton and her brother say they were removed from the family home after allegations that her mother's husband sexually abused Acton. Trump and Vice President JD Vance expressed support for the ad. "I think it's absolutely terrible, and I think they should take the ad down," Hinson told ABC News.

Turek's personal story anchored his candidacy. Born with spina bifida, which he attributes to his father's exposure to Agent Orange in Vietnam, he won gold medals in wheelchair basketball at the Summer Paralympics in 2016 and 2020. He was then elected to the Iowa state House in 2022, becoming the first ever permanently disabled member of the Legislature.

Turek defeated state Sen. Zach Wahls 63% to 37% in the June primary. Hinson had an easier path to her nomination after Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., and National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Tim Scott, R-S.C., endorsed her in the fall of 2025, helping clear the field of serious opponents; she won her primary with 75% of the vote. Turek appeared to be the preferred candidate of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, though neither officially endorsed him, and both Wahls and Hinson used the signs of that support to paint him as beholden to Washington. Hinson also hammered him for missing votes in the state Legislature early in the year while he campaigned.

Hinson countered by noting that two of her bills, one on preventing stillbirths and one creating a federal study of rural veterans' mental health, were signed into law by President Joe Biden. Rather than picking fights with Trump, she found niche ways to separate herself from the national party.

As one of the marquee matchups on the map, the race drew about $200 million in spending between the candidates' committees and outside groups, more than the $167 million annual appropriation for state agriculture and natural resources programs signed into law by Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds this summer. For months, surveys showed a contest within the margin of error, with some finding Hinson ahead and others finding Turek in the lead. In the end, Hinson was unable to free herself from the Trump anchor that Turek tied her to.