Iowa Farmers Squeezed as Trump Rallies for Hinson

Kelly Nieuwenhuis spent $16,000 filling his farm’s fuel tanks in Primghar, Iowa, this fall. Diesel for his tractors and combines costs almost double what it did earlier in the year. President Trump heads to Sioux City on Thursday to rally for Rep. Ashley Hinson, and those are the kinds of numbers he’ll be talking over.

Trump planned the midterm rally for October 22, as he works to boost Republican candidates in the final weeks before Election Day. Hinson is running for Iowa’s open Senate seat against Democratic state Rep. Josh Turek, in a race NBC News classifies as a toss-up. The contest has tightened more than expected, despite Trump carrying Iowa by double digits in 2024, and the Republican Senate majority hangs in the balance.

Who Is Affected

Nieuwenhuis farms 3,000 acres and is a registered Republican. He voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020, but not in 2024. This year, he plans to split his ticket, backing Democrat Rob Sand for governor and Hinson for Senate. “It’s the economy, stupid,” he told The New York Times. “Every election it comes down to the economy, and this policy is not working,” he said. “The Iran war, all the energy costs, the inflation — everything has gone up in price drastically.”

His troubles keep piling up. Fertilizer prices are rising as Russia’s war in Ukraine continues. Trade fights with China, Canada and Mexico have depressed sales of his corn and soybeans. Beijing boycotted American soybeans during last year’s U.S.-China trade war. Iowa’s economy contracted in 2025 and recorded the weakest annual growth rate in the country, according to the federal Bureau of Economic Analysis.

A Senate Candidate Keeps Her Distance

Hinson once pledged to be Trump’s “top ally” in the Senate. Now she’s hedging. At a debate earlier this month, she said she would be his ally when it was “important for Iowa,” but would “push back on him” when needed. “If he’s going to say something that’s wrong, I’m going to challenge him on it,” she told Fox News last week.

Her record is more complicated. In September, the House considered a resolution aimed at reining in Trump in Iran. Two other Iowa Republicans in tight races supported it. Hinson opposed it. Asked why she didn’t back congressional war powers resolutions, she said, “I don’t think we need another resolution.” She added that she doesn’t want to see the president unable to carry out “a orderly end to this war.”

Turek has seized on that vote. “We are in this situation because of this unnecessary war in Iran that Ashley Hinson voted in favor of continuing,” he said during a debate discussion of energy costs. Hinson has since written that “the war needs to be brought to a successful and immediate end,” and criticized Trump’s waiver of sanctions against Moscow: “I don’t think we need to be making any more deals with Russia.” She also skipped a September rally featuring Vice President JD Vance.

Instead, she’s leaning on a campaign image. “You want a mom, a minivan-driving mom who’s common sense, who’s driving that common sense back into Washington, D.C.,” Hinson said. She described a five-minute call from Trump, during which she thanked him for efforts to move forward on trade with China and asked about a deal for China to buy more soybeans.

The Wider Map

Iowa’s other contests are tight, too. Sand faces Republican Zach Lahn in the race to succeed Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds, who isn’t seeking re-election. Democrat Christina Bohannan is challenging Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks in the 1st District, while Democrat Sarah Trone Garriott takes on Rep. Zach Nunn in the 3rd. Senate races in Michigan and Kansas are close as well, with the Detroit contest described as neck-and-neck.

The Rally Script

A transcript of Trump’s October 21 rally in Pendleton, South Carolina, shows the kind of case he makes on the stump. He claimed inflation had been 1.8 percent for the previous three months, poverty was the lowest in American history, and more Americans were working than ever. He cited $22.2 trillion in new investment commitments, then corrected himself to “$22.2 million -- billion,” and later repeated the $22.2 billion figure. He defended his tariffs, saying they’re the reason companies are building plants in the United States. He also called his South Carolina Senate-race opponent, Annie Andrews, “a radical left lunatic.”

Those claims don’t square easily with what Nieuwenhuis sees at the pump and in his grain bins. Trump’s Thursday stop marks his second visit to Iowa this year. He launched his midterm push with a January trip to the Des Moines area, and in December promised what he called the largest steel plant in U.S. history for the state. Hinson answered then, “We’ll save you a good Iowa pork chop, sir.”

Why This Matters:

Iowa’s Senate race tests whether household costs outweigh party loyalty. A farmer who backed Trump in 2016 and 2020 says he’ll split his ticket because diesel, fertilizer and trade disruptions are eating his income. Iowa posted the weakest annual growth in the country in 2025.

Farm families and rural communities absorb that pain, not the officials setting trade and war policy. Hinson’s careful distancing, alongside her vote against a war powers resolution, shows how hard it is to separate from decisions that carry real prices. With the Senate majority at stake, the outcome could shape how much congressional oversight any president faces on war and trade, the two issues Iowans say hit their wallets hardest.