Iowa 2026 poll: Sand leads governor’s race; Hinson holds narrow Senate advantage; Trump, Reynolds approval ratings underwater

A new Emerson College Polling/Nexstar Media survey of Iowa voters in the race for Governor finds 48% of voters support Democrat Rob Sand, while 43% support Republican Zach Lahn. Seven percent are undecided. In the race for U.S. Senate, 48% support Republican Ashley
Hinson, while 45% support Democrat Josh Turek. Six percent are undecided.

“Driving Democratic competition in the Iowa general election are independent voters, who break for Sand by a 26-point margin, 58% to 32%, and Turek by an 11-point margin, 49% to 38%,” Spencer Kimball, executive director of Emerson College Polling, said. “Sand performs better among these swing voters, who broke for Trump in 2024 by about 17 points in Emerson’s final poll. About 1 in 10 Trump voters indicate they would support Sand.”

President Trump holds a 43% job approval rating among Iowa voters, while 51% disapprove of the job he is doing in office. Governor Kim Reynolds has a 44% job approval rating, while 47% disapprove of the Governor.

Looking at name recognition of statewide candidates, Rob Sand has the highest favorable rating, at 51%, followed by Ashley Hinson at 44%, Josh Turek at 42%, and Zach Lahn at 36% favorable.

Hinson and Lahn have the highest unfavorable ratings at 40%, while 31% have an unfavorable view of Sand and 27% of Turek.

The economy is the top issue for voters at 38%, followed by healthcare at 19%, threats to democracy at 11%, education at 10%, and immigration and housing affordability at 6%, respectively.

A majority of Iowa voters (53%) think the state should keep its presidential caucus system, while 25% think they should move to a primary, and 23% are not sure.

A majority of Republicans (67%) think the state should keep its presidential caucus system, compared to pluralities of independent voters (44%) and Democrats (42%).

Iowans are split on the state-funded private school tuition assistance program for K-12 students: 42% support the program, 41% oppose it, and 17% are neutral or are unfamiliar with the program.

Methodology

The Emerson College Polling Iowa survey was conducted August 2-4, 2026. The sample of likely voters, n=712 has a credibility interval, similar to a poll’s margin of error (MOE), of +/- 3.7 percent. The data sets were weighted by gender, education, race, age, party registration, and region based on U.S. Census parameters and voter file data.

Data was collected by contacting registered voters from a voter file provided by Aristotle using MMS text-to-web and a probability-based panel of voters provided by Consensus Strategies using MMS text-to-web. Additional panel interviews were provided by PureSpectrum. The survey was hosted on QuestionPro.

It is important to remember that subsets based on demographics, such as gender, age, education, and race/ethnicity, carry with them higher credibility intervals, as the sample size is reduced.

Survey results should be understood within the poll’s range of scores, and with a confidence interval of 95% a poll will fall outside the range of scores 1 in 20 times.

All respondents were recruited using customized links that prevent responses from anyone outside of the poll’s sample frame. Panel responses were matched to the Aristotle voter file using respondents’ full name and ZIP code. The survey was offered in English.

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