An open seat, a dead heat, and a state feeling the squeeze
Iowa voters will choose a new United States senator on Tuesday, November 3, 2026, in a race that has become one of the closest and most expensive in the country. The seat is open because Senator Joni Ernst, a Republican who has held it for two terms, is retiring rather than seeking re-election. That decision transformed what might have been a difficult challenge to an incumbent into a wide-open contest for a seat that could help decide control of the Senate, and both parties have poured resources, advertising, and national attention into a state that, on paper, should favour Republicans — but that, in practice, has produced a statistical tie.
The candidates: Hinson and Turek
Ashley Hinson has represented Iowa in the United States House since 2021, winning re-election in a district that covers much of eastern Iowa. Before entering politics, she was a television news anchor, a background that shows in her campaign style: disciplined messaging, strong on-camera presence, and an ability to distil complex issues into clear, memorable lines. In the House, she has built a reputation as a mainstream conservative Republican, supportive of the Trump administration’s broad direction while occasionally signalling independence on specific issues affecting Iowa, including trade and agriculture. Her campaign presents her as a common-sense, practical voice for Iowa families, a mother who understands household budgets, and a legislator who can deliver for the state from within the Republican majority.
Josh Turek is a state representative from Council Bluffs, in western Iowa, and a two-time Paralympic gold medallist in wheelchair basketball. His personal story is one of the most distinctive in any Senate race this year: an athlete who represented the United States on the world stage, who has spoken openly about disability, perseverance, and public service, and who entered state politics with a focus on health care, education, and economic opportunity for working families. His campaign has sought to translate that biography into a broader argument about character and independence — that he is not a career Washington politician, but an Iowan who understands struggle and who will fight for ordinary families against powerful interests.
A third candidate is also on the ballot: Libertarian Thomas Laehn, a pipeline opponent who has drawn between 2 percent and 7 percent in recent polls. In a race this close, even a small share for a third-party candidate could matter. Laehn’s support appears to come disproportionately from voters dissatisfied with both major parties, and his final total could affect the margin between Hinson and Turek, even if he has no realistic path to victory himself. Pollsters include him in their ballot questions, and his presence is one reason why neither major-party candidate is polling close to 50 percent in most surveys.
What the polls say — and why they disagree
The defining feature of Iowa polling in October 2026 is disagreement. Different pollsters, using different methods and samples, have produced different leaders, and the polling averages themselves point in opposite directions depending on which surveys are included and how they are weighted. That disagreement is not a sign that polling is broken. It is a sign that the race is genuinely close, and that the true margin is smaller than the error in any individual survey. Every reader should keep that in mind before treating any single poll as a prediction.
Start with the averages, because they summarise the broader picture. RealClearPolling’s average, covering polls from September 29 to October 28, put Hinson ahead by 0.5 percentage points, at 46.0 percent to 45.5 percent for Turek. The Silver Bulletin average, by contrast, put Turek ahead by 1.2 percentage points. A third aggregator, Pollsmax, put Turek ahead by 0.8 points, at 46.2 percent to 45.4 percent, based on a larger set of 36 polls. Decision Desk HQ’s forecast, which blends polls, fundamentals, and market prices, gave Hinson a 55 percent probability of winning and a projected margin of about one point in her favour. In other words, the best available summaries of the polling data disagree by roughly one to two points — a range that, in a race this tight, is the difference between a narrow lead for either candidate and a pure tie.
Look next at the individual October polls, with their dates and margins, because the details matter. The most recent major survey in the RealClearPolling set was from co/efficient, a Republican-leaning firm, fielded on October 28 among 1,020 likely voters, which found Hinson ahead 48 percent to 46 percent, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 points. Echelon Insights, also Republican-leaning, released a survey on October 27 that found Turek ahead 45 percent to 43 percent, among a smaller sample of 403 likely voters, with a much larger margin of error of plus or minus 6.5 points. InsiderAdvantage, fielded October 21 to October 22 among 1,200 likely voters, found Hinson ahead 47 percent to 45 percent, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2.8 points. The task briefing for this article cited that InsiderAdvantage result as 47 to 45.5 percent, reflecting unrounded figures; the rounded public topline is 47 to 45. Either way, the lead is two points or less.
Earlier October surveys told a similar story of a split field. Marist, fielded October 8 to October 11 among 1,100 likely voters, found Turek ahead 48 percent to 45 percent, with a margin of error of plus or minus 6.6 points — a lead well within the survey’s error range. Emerson, fielded October 5 to October 6 among 650 likely voters, found Hinson ahead 47 percent to 45 percent, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.8 points. A CNN survey fielded September 29 to October 5 among 801 likely voters found Hinson ahead 45 percent to 43 percent. A YouGov survey fielded October 6 to October 12 among 2,245 likely voters found Turek ahead 47 percent to 46 percent. A New York Times/Siena survey fielded September 22 to October 1 among 606 likely voters found Hinson ahead 48 percent to 47 percent. A bipartisan Cook Political Report survey fielded October 9 to October 13 among 602 likely voters found Turek ahead 46 percent to 44 percent. And a Suffolk University survey fielded October 1 to October 4 among 500 likely voters found Turek ahead by a wider margin, 48 percent to 44 percent, with a margin of error of plus or minus 4.4 points.
Prediction markets add another layer, but they do not resolve the uncertainty. In late October, markets put Hinson’s chances of winning at roughly 55 percent to 59 percent, depending on the platform — a modest edge, but far from a certainty. Decision Desk HQ’s model, which incorporates market prices, gave Hinson a 55 percent probability. Those figures reflect traders’ judgments about polls, fundraising, campaign quality, and the state’s Republican lean, but they are not votes, and they can shift quickly on news. A 55 percent market probability implies a 45 percent chance for the other candidate — essentially a coin flip with a slight tilt.
Money: a fundraising gap that narrowed
Money has been a major subplot in this race, and the figures require careful dating, because they have changed significantly over the course of the campaign. The briefing for this article cited Decision Desk HQ figures as of June 30 showing Hinson with about $23 million raised compared with about $6.3 million for Turek — a very large early gap in Hinson’s favour, reflecting her head start as a sitting congresswoman with a national fundraising network. Those June figures, if accurate for that date, describe the race as it stood in the summer, not as it stands in the final days.
Later reporting tells a different story about the autumn. By late October, multiple outlets reported that Turek had outraised Hinson in recent months, with totals of roughly $20 million for Turek compared with roughly $14 million for Hinson in the figures cited by Al Jazeera and other summaries of the race. Another late-October summary put Turek’s total contributions above $20.1 million, with about $3.6 million in cash on hand, compared with $14.1 million for Hinson, with about $2.4 million on hand. The discrepancy between the June and October figures does not necessarily mean either set is wrong. Fundraising totals grow over time, candidates report at different intervals, and different sources count different things — total raised, cash on hand, outside spending, and super PAC commitments are not the same number.
The farm economy and the final debate
Turek’s argument is straightforward: tariffs supported by Hinson, combined with the economic fallout of the Iran war, have raised costs for farmers and squeezed their margins at exactly the wrong time. In a video posted to his campaign’s social media on October 23, filmed on a family farm in Dunlap, he argued that skyrocketing diesel prices linked to the war Hinson voted repeatedly to continue, together with chaotic tariffs she voted for multiple times, are directly harming family farms. His campaign has warned of a looming second farm crisis, pointing to rising farm bankruptcies, foreclosures, and the closure of rural schools, roads, and hospitals as evidence that current policies are failing rural Iowa. Independent fact-checkers have urged caution about some of the broadest claims — for example, noting that Iowa’s farm bankruptcy ranking and health metrics are more nuanced than campaign advertising suggests — but the underlying pressures on farm incomes are widely documented.
Hinson’s response has been to defend tariff policy as part of a broader pro-American manufacturing strategy, intended to stimulate domestic investment and job creation, and to point to specific investments, including a planned steel mill project, as evidence that the approach can deliver long-term benefits. She has also argued that she has pushed back on administration policies when they hurt Iowa, and that she has called for an immediate end to the Iran war so that Iowans do not have to pay higher fuel and grocery prices because of it. Fact-checkers have noted, however, that she voted against multiple resolutions seeking to end United States involvement in that war, a record Turek has used to question the consistency of her position. That tension — between supporting the administration and claiming independence on its most consequential economic effects — is one of the central dynamics of the race.
The candidates’ final debate, held on October 13, brought those arguments into direct confrontation. The debate covered the farm economy, gas and diesel prices, the Iran war, and the candidates’ personal finances — a topic that has drawn attention because of the contrast between Hinson’s fundraising network and Turek’s later surge, and because both campaigns have sought to portray the other as out of touch with ordinary Iowans’ financial pressures. The debate did not produce a decisive moment that shifted the polls by itself, but it crystallised the choice for voters who were still undecided: a Republican congresswoman arguing for continuity with a pro-Trump economic agenda, tempered by Iowa-specific advocacy, versus a Democratic state legislator arguing for a break with tariff and war policies he blames for the current squeeze.
Turnout, early voting, and the final weekend
The final weekend has also featured a high-profile national intervention. Trump, who had already rallied in Sioux City earlier in October to support Hinson, was scheduled to return to Iowa on Sunday, November 1, the day before early voting ends and two days before Election Day. The visit is designed to energise Republican turnout in a state Trump won comfortably, and to remind Republican-leaning voters who might otherwise sit out a midterm that the Senate seat is at stake. Hinson, speaking the day before that visit, argued that Trump’s return would help her case that Turek is too liberal for Iowa, and she framed the race explicitly as a fight for control of the Senate. Turek’s campaign, for its part, has welcomed Trump’s visits as an opportunity to highlight the administration’s tariff and war policies and their effects on Iowa families and farmers.
What the result will mean
As with Maine, the national stakes of the Iowa race are best understood in the context of the broader Senate map. USN has previously reported on Democrats opening leads in four Senate battlegrounds as the fight for Congress tightens, and on the 2026 midterm outlook, with Democrats favoured for the House and the Senate race tight. Iowa is a crucial piece of that map, because it is one of the few states where Democrats have a realistic chance to flip a Republican-held open seat, and one of the states where Republicans most need to hold the line to preserve their majority.
How to read the final polls
The bottom line is simple, and it is the same bottom line that applies to Maine: this is a dead heat. Hinson leads in some averages and some polls; Turek leads in others; and the gap in every case is smaller than the uncertainty in the measurement. The farm economy, fuel prices, tariffs, and the Iran war have made Iowa competitive in a way that few expected when Ernst announced her retirement. The final result, when it comes — on election night, or in the days that follow if the margin is razor-thin — will be decided by the voters who actually cast ballots, not by the polls that tried to predict them. Iowa voters who have not yet voted have until 5 p.m. on November 2 to vote early in person, and until polls close at 8 p.m. Central on November 3 to vote on Election Day.
Sources
USN reviewed reporting from multiple outlets for this story. Read more from RealClearPolling, USA Today and Election Tracker Live.