Two of Iowa’s most prominent Democratic candidates have made it clear they do not want former Vice President Kamala Harris anywhere near their campaigns heading into the midterms, a striking sign of the party’s ongoing struggle to define itself after her 2024 loss.
According to POLITICO’s Jonathan Martin, Iowa gubernatorial candidate Rob Sand was asked directly whether he wanted Harris to come and campaign for him. His response was blunt: “No thanks.” He added, “Let’s move on. We need some new leadership.”
When asked whether Harris should make another run for the presidency in 2028, Sand’s answer was similarly emphatic, though the specific wording of that response was not detailed in the report. Martin noted on social media that Sand was the first high-profile Democrat to answer that question directly, and he contrasted it with the private and public statements many Democrats made about Biden and Harris between 2021 and June 2024.
The Washington Examiner reports that Josh Turek, the Democratic Senate candidate challenging Rep. Ashley Hinson (R-IA) for the seat being vacated by retiring Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA), has issued a similar warning. Turek’s campaign told the Examiner he has no plans to campaign with Harris and is not seeking her support.
The distance between Turek and Harris is notable given their respective performances in Iowa in 2024. Turek, a state representative at the time, outperformed Harris by roughly 13 points in his district, according to the report — evidence of the dramatically different political coalitions the two Democrats assembled in the state. Harris lost Iowa to Donald Trump by a wide margin in the presidential race, while Turek managed to win over voters who were unwilling to back the national ticket.
The reluctance is not confined to Iowa. In Alaska, former Rep. Mary Peltola, who is campaigning to unseat Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan, has also distanced herself from Harris. Harris had attempted to boost Peltola by sending supporters a fundraising email asking them to contribute to both her own political operation and Peltola’s campaign. The email claimed, “If there’s anyone who can flip Alaska and secure the Senate majority for Democrats — it’s Mary.”
But Peltola’s campaign quickly made clear that she was not seeking Harris’s backing. “Mary isn’t seeking endorsements from anyone from the Lower 48 — her focus is and always will be Alaska,” a campaign spokeswoman said, according to Anchorage station KTUU.
Peltola won Alaska’s at-large House seat in a 2022 special election before losing it two years later, and she is now trying to reclaim a Senate seat for Democrats in a state that has been reliably Republican at the presidential level.
Harris’s Political Future
The pushback comes as Harris appears to be keeping her options open. After losing the 2024 presidential election by a landslide, she briefly considered a run for governor of California before abandoning that idea, according to the report.
Despite the public snubs from some Democrats, Harris still leads the field in early polling for the 2028 Democratic nomination. The latest RealClearPolitics polling average shows her with 27.6 percent support, well ahead of California Gov. Gavin Newsom at 16.4 percent, former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg at 11.6 percent, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at 9.4 percent.
Still, the decisions by Sand and Turek — both of whom are competing in races that could determine control of state and federal offices — suggest that some Democratic candidates see Harris as a liability rather than an asset. By publicly asking her to stay away, they are signaling that they believe their own political survival depends on distancing themselves from the national party’s most prominent figure.
The Iowa races are seen as competitive. Sand, the state’s current auditor, is running for governor against a Republican incumbent who has been in office since 2017. Turek is trying to flip a seat that has been held by Ernst for years, but Hinson is a well-funded Republican who has won three terms in the House.
Neither Sand nor Turek has explicitly endorsed a different candidate for the 2028 nomination, but their comments underscore a broader anxiety within the Democratic Party about how to move forward. Some strategists have argued that the party needs to embrace new voices and break with the recent past, while others believe Harris remains the strongest contender given her name recognition and fundraising network.
The response from Iowa Democrats is notable because it comes not from anonymous aides or backroom chatter, but from the candidates themselves, and it is being reported by major national outlets. When the top candidates on the ballot in a key state say they don’t want the former vice president to campaign for them, it is a clear sign that the political winds have shifted.
Harris has not publicly commented on the Iowa Democrats’ statements as of this writing. Her team did not respond to requests for comment from The Gateway Pundit.
The midterms are more than a year away, but the jockeying has already begun. Candidates are making early calculations about which national figures will help them and which will hurt them. In Iowa, at least, the answer appears to be that Kamala Harris is viewed as a drag on the ticket.
Source: www.thegatewaypundit.com — https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2026/08/top-iowa-democrats-urge-kamala-harris-stay-away/