Cancer Crashes Iowa's Midterms, and Nobody Can Dodge the Water

Cancer Crashes Iowa's Midterms, and Nobody Can Dodge the Water

A farm state confronts the nation's second-highest cancer rate

Iowa, the country's leading corn- and hog-producing state, carries the second-highest cancer rate in the United States and is one of only three states where the rate is still rising. A state cancer report showing Iowa's increase is the fastest in the nation has jolted voters and forced the disease — and its possible links to agricultural pollution — into the governor's race, a competitive Senate contest, and House battles alike. An issue almost unimaginable as campaign fodder a few years ago now opens debates.

Senate rivals spar over taps and trust

Republican Congresswoman Ashley Hinson and Democratic State Representative Josh Turek are vying for the seat vacated by Senator Joni Ernst, and both called this month for more funding to guarantee safe drinking water. Turek, born with spina bifida linked to his father's Agent Orange exposure in Vietnam and a two-time Paralympic gold medalist, has made water his refrain on the trail. Meeting cancer patients last week, he said every Iowan deserves to turn on the tap knowing the water is clean and not causing cancer.

Nearly $3 million in ads weaponize the crisis

A Democratic super PAC has spent nearly $3 million on airtime since September on an ad that puts the crisis bluntly. In it, Dr. Selden Spencer of Huxley, Iowa, says cancer rates are falling across America but rising in Iowa, and that as a doctor he cannot ignore it. Turek deputy campaign manager Emma O'Brien argues her candidate's ally Rob Sand is the only contender with a real plan, while Republican Zach Lahn backs the One Big Beautiful Bill, which cuts cancer research funding, and wants to restrict mRNA vaccines that research has flagged as a promising cancer therapy.

Governor's debate opens on the same question

The first gubernatorial debate between Democrat Rob Sand, a moderate lawyer, and Republican Zach Lahn, a farmer-turned-candidate backed by the Make America Healthy Again wing, opened with the moderator asking what immediate steps each would take against the cancer crisis. Both called it foundational — then accused each other of falling short. Lahn, whose surprise primary win over Trump-endorsed Representative Randy Feenstra was powered by MAHA backing, proposed more funding for saturated buffers that strip nitrates from streams. Sand countered with radon mitigation at home and pointed to Iowa's heavy smoking and drinking. MAHA Action, run by longtime Robert F. Kennedy Jr. ally Tony Lyons, put $1.5 million behind Lahn in what it called its first 2026 endorsement.

Nitrates in the waterways point at fertilizer

About 85 percent of Iowa is farmland, much of it in fertilizer-heavy corn, according to the US Department of Agriculture. Nitrate concentrations in the state's main waterways have doubled over the past 50 years and regularly exceed Environmental Protection Agency levels, according to a 2025 statewide report commissioned by the Polk County Board of Supervisors. Federal rules cap nitrates in drinking water at 10 milligrams per liter, a threshold set against blue baby syndrome; new studies are probing links between below-limit nitrate exposure and certain cancers. Lahn says he tested his own well and creek in rural east-central Iowa and found both well above the federal limit. He has also spoken of his father's battle with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, a cancer associated with the herbicide glyphosate, the active ingredient in RoundUp.

A two-year study hunts for answers

Outgoing Republican Governor Kim Reynolds commissioned a two-year study in 2025 by the state Department of Health and Human Services and the University of Iowa into the rise. University of Iowa researchers estimate 22,000 Iowans will be diagnosed and 6,000 will die of cancer this year, with prostate, breast, and lung cancers climbing faster than the national pace. Their state-funded work finds most — but not all — of the excess in five cancers is explained by demographics and behaviors like smoking and binge drinking; environmental factors including nitrates are examined next. In the House arena, Republican Congressman Zach Nunn, joined on the Iowa State Fair stage by his wife and four of their six children, touted new money for screening in the third district and spoke of his mother, a survivor. His Democratic challenger Bohannan said on a five-county August tour that voters ranked water quality among their top worries.

No candidate dares mandate farm-country medicine

For all the heat, neither Sand nor Lahn has called for mandating the conservation practices that would cut runoff at the source. Fertilizer, water testing, research dollars, and vaccine policy have become ammunition in all three races — while the measure that might most directly curb pollution stays off every platform.