American Ag Network’s Corryn La Rue reported that “farmers and ranchers spent the past year paying record prices for diesel and waiting on a farm bill that never came. Tuesday night, many of the states they farm in helped change who will write farm policy in Washington.”
“Democrats won control of both the House and Senate,” La Rue reported. “Several of the deciding Senate seats came in farm states that Republicans had long counted as safe.”
The Democratic victory in the midterms included nearly a half dozen flips of House seats held by Agriculture Committee Republicans, with the futures of a handful of other Ag Committee Republicans still hanging in the balance, as of Wednesday morning. In the Senate, Democrats flipped the seat held by Kansas Ag Committee member Sen. Roger Marshall, while Mississippi Ag Committee member Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith is locked in a race that remains too close to call.
Democrats Win Governor, Senate Races in Iowa
Agri-Pulse’s Kim Chipman, Olivia M. Bridges, Noah Wicks and Hannah Guthoerl reported that “in Iowa, the No. 1 corn, ethanol, biodiesel, hog and egg producer, Democrat Josh Turek defeated GOP Rep. Ashley Hinson in the Hawkeye State’s race to succeed retiring Republican Sen. Joni Ernst, a member of the Senate Ag Committee.”
“In another upset, Democrat Sarah Trone Garriott is projected to win Rep. Zach Nunn’s seat,” Chipman, Bridges, Wicks and Guthoerl reported. “Nunn is another House Agriculture Committee member to lose a midterm bid. With 91% of votes counted, Garriott won 54.6% of votes, with Nunn trailing at 45.4%.”
“Democrat Rob Sand, Iowa’s current state auditor, is also projected to win Iowa’s gubernatorial race, beating out Republican contender Zach Lahn, a businessman and farmer backed by the Make America Healthy Again movement, AP says,” according to Chipman, Bridges, Wicks and Guthoerl’s reporting.
Kansas Sen. Roger Marshall, Ag Committee Member, Loses
The Washington Post’s Alexei Koseff reported that “Democratic challenger Adam Hamilton defeated Sen. Roger Marshall (R) in conservative Kansas, meaning the state will send a Democrat to the U.S. Senate for the first time in nearly a century.”
“Kansas, which Donald Trump won by 16 percentage points in the 2024 presidential election, was not supposed to be competitive,” Koseff reported. “But Trump’s sinking approval ratings, Hamilton’s strong public profile and several potent scandals involving Marshall put the traditionally Republican territory into play.”
NBC News’ Raquel Coronell Uribe reported that “Hamilton and his allies hit Marshall, 66, on the high prices that resulted from the Iran war and Trump’s tariff agenda, as well as the healthcare cuts in the ‘big, beautiful bill’ Republicans enacted last year. Rising diesel fuel and beef prices hit Kansas’ agricultural economy particularly hard.“
Incumbent House Ag Committee Members Who Lost
- Republican Zach Nunn loses to Democrat Sarah Trone Garriott in Iowa’s 3rd Congressional District
- Republican Rob Bresnahan loses to Democrat Paige Cognetti in Pennsylvania’s 8th Congressional District
- Republican Monica De La Cruz loses to Democrat Bobby Pulido in Texas’ 15th Congressional District
- Republican Derrick Van Orden loses to Democrat Rebecca Cooke in Wisconsin’s 3rd Congressional District
