Josh Turek flips Iowa Senate seat in stunning upset over Trump-backed Ashley Hinson
Democrat Josh Turek has defeated Republican Ashley Hinson to win Iowa’s open US Senate seat, the first Democratic win there since 2008 and the pickup that clinched Senate control for Democrats.
Democrat Josh Turek has won Iowa's open United States Senate seat, defeating Trump-backed Republican Ashley Hinson in one of the biggest upsets of the 2026 midterm elections and handing Democrats a crucial pickup in the battle for control of the chamber.
The Associated Press called the race for Turek on Tuesday night, and NBC News and Decision Desk HQ followed shortly afterwards. With more than 90 per cent of the expected vote counted, Turek led Hinson by about 50.9 per cent to 46 per cent, according to the networks' tallies, while the Iowa Secretary of State's unofficial figures put him ahead by a similar margin.
The result ends a run of Republican dominance in Iowa's Senate contests that stretched back to 2008, when former Democratic Senator Tom Harkin last won a race in the state. Turek, a state representative from Council Bluffs and a two-time Paralympic wheelchair basketball gold medallist for Team USA, becomes the first Democrat to win a Senate seat in Iowa in 18 years.
He will succeed retiring Republican Senator Joni Ernst, who was first elected in 2014 and announced last year that she would not seek a third term. Her departure turned the seat into one of the most competitive open races in the country, and the contest became one of the most expensive in Iowa's history, with candidates and outside groups spending close to 200 million dollars, according to the analytics firm AdImpact.
Turek, who describes himself as a 'prairie populist', built his campaign around affordability and fighting corruption. He attacked Hinson's support for President Donald Trump's 2025 tax law, which included cuts to Medicaid and food assistance, and hammered her over the president's trade war, arguing that tariffs had hurt Iowa farmers and pushed up prices for fuel, groceries and goods transported across the state.
Hinson, a former television journalist and congresswoman who was regarded as a rising star in Iowa Republican politics, had the backing of President Trump and of Senate Majority Leader John Thune. She won her primary with 75 per cent of the vote, while Turek emerged from a contested Democratic primary against state Senator Zach Wahls with 63 per cent.
For months, opinion polls showed the race within the margin of error, with some surveys putting Hinson ahead and others giving Turek a narrow lead. In the final quarter of the campaign, Turek significantly outraised his opponent, and his late momentum carried him through election night.
The win was the sixth Democratic Senate pickup of the night, according to the Wall Street Journal, clinching control of the chamber for Democrats in the next Congress. Republicans had entered election night holding a 53-47 majority, meaning Democrats needed a net gain of four seats to take charge.
The result also capped a striking night for Iowa Democrats. State Auditor Rob Sand was projected to win the governor's race, becoming the first Democrat elected governor of Iowa since 2006, in a further sign of how far the state's politics have shifted in a cycle dominated by cost-of-living concerns.
A late promise of 8 billion dollars in economic aid to farmers from President Trump was not enough to save Hinson, whose campaign struggled to separate itself from an unpopular national agenda in a state the president had carried in three consecutive presidential elections.
Results remain unofficial until county and state canvasses certify them, but the scale of Turek's lead left little doubt about the outcome. He is expected to take his seat when the new Congress convenes in January, giving Democrats a new voice from a state that had looked safely Republican only a year ago.
For Iowa voters, the race turned less on party loyalty than on kitchen-table issues: the price of food and fuel, the future of farm incomes, and whether Washington was listening to rural communities. Turek's victory suggests that, in 2026 at least, those questions mattered more than the state's recent Republican habit.
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