Iowa Senate

2020 Election Update

Heading into the 2020 election, Republicans controlled the Iowa Senate 32-18. Democrats flipped one seat (SD 22) and lost one seat (SD 42) for no net gain. EveryDistrict endorsed successful Democratic challenger Sarah Trone Garriott. EveryDistrict also endorsed Steve Gorman (SD 8), Rhonda Martin (SD 20), Matt Tapscott (SD 28), Pam Egli (SD 32), Tom Courtney (SD 44), and Chris Brase (SD 46).

The below table shows 2020 and 2018 election results for the Iowa Senate. The LDI scores are for the 2020 cycle. EveryDistrict will release new scores and district rankings after the redistricting process.

2018 Election Update

After the 2016 election, Republicans controlled the Iowa State Senate 29-20 with one Independent. In the 2018 election, Democrats flipped one Republican-held seat and lost three Democratic-held seats for a two-seat net loss. Republicans also won the formerly Independent-held seat, growing their majority to 32-18.

Democrats flipped SD 7 and lost SD 15, SD 49, and SD 29.

Understanding the Map

EveryDistrict’s Legislative District Index (LDI) is the gold standard of state legislative competitiveness. Our LDI ranks state legislative districts on a scale from 100 to -100, using statewide elections data. Districts with a score of 100 would vote for statewide Democratic candidates by an average of 100 points (with the Democratic candidate receiving 100% of the vote); districts with a score of -100 would vote for statewide Republican candidates by an average of 100 points (with the Republican candidate receiving 100% of the vote). For a more realistic example, a district with a score of 10 would vote for statewide Democratic candidates by an average of 10 points (meaning we would expect the Democratic state legislative candidate to win with 55% of the vote compared to the Republican winning 45% of the vote).

After the 2018 election, EveryDistrict reviewed and enhanced our LDI system, improving the accuracy of the metric with new methodologies and the most recent electoral data.

For more information about EveryDistrict’s LDI, please click here.