The Democratic nominee for governor in Iowa bluntly answered a question that scores of national Democrats have thus far refused to respond to.
Asked by Politico whether the 2024 Democratic presidential nominee, Kamala Harris, should run for president again, Rob Sand responded: “Nope.”
Sand, who Democrats hope can flip the midwestern state back to their control this year, also said he would not want former president Joe Biden or Harris to campaign for him in the state, where he will need to win over independent and Republican voters to win in November.
“Can he even do that right now?” Sand responded when asked by the Politico columnist Jonathan Martin whether he would want Biden to campaign for him in Iowa. When asked whether he would want Harris to campaign for him in Iowa, he said: “No thanks.”
“We need some new leadership,” he added.
Prominent national Democrats have often dodged the question when asked directly, saying it is Harris’s choice or that the 2028 presidential field is too far away for them to opine.
Harris, the former US vice-president who lost the 2024 presidential election to Donald Trump, has not said whether she would seek another run for president – only saying she has “not made a decision”.
Mary Peltola, a Democrat running in Alaska who similarly needs to win over non-Democrats to flip a US Senate seat, rejected support from Harris, who sent a fundraising email on Peltola’s behalf that appeared to be unsolicited by the candidate. Peltola’s campaign said she “isn’t seeking endorsements from anyone from the Lower 48 – her focus is and always will be Alaska”.
Sand, expanding on his thoughts, noted to Politico that he is the state auditor of Iowa and running to be governor, so his focus is on his own state and the issues that affect its people and differentiate him from his opponent, Republican Zach Lahn.
He also gave a blunt “no” when asked if he would one day run for president, or be open to being tapped as a vice-presidential candidate.
“You’re asking a guy who was a registered independent first,” Sand said. “I don’t tend to like the party politics stuff. I think that we have a fundamentally broken two-choice political system. I don’t think that either the Democratic or the Republican parties are solving enough problems or deserve special legal privileges in order to force us to pick between the lesser of two evils. My inclination is that I want it to be shaken up.”
