Democrat Sarah Trone Garriott is putting a spotlight on her opponent Republican U.S. Rep. Zach Nunn’s decision to refrain from holding a town hall as she held one of her own as part of her congressional campaign.
Trone Garriott, a state senator from West Des Moines who’s running in the competitive race for Iowa’s 3rd Congressional District, held a town hall at Big Grove Brewery in Des Moines on Sunday, Sept. 7, where she criticized Nunn’s refusal to hold his own as town halls nationwide have turned testy for Republican incumbents.
Trone Garriott told the crowd of more than 100 that the heated nature of the town halls is no reason not to hold the events.
“If people are showing up angry, it’s even more important that their voices are heard because there’s a problem,” Trone Garriott said. “There are problems that are not being addressed there.”
Nunn maintains he is accessible to the public but wants to avoid hosting “a taxpayer-funded protest event.”
“We do public events all the time, and we make sure that those are well-shared,” he told reporters Aug. 25. “We’re not going to do what the Democratic groups want us to do and just host a taxpayer-funded protest event.”
Several of Iowa’s Republican congressional lawmakers have held heated town halls this year where they’ve faced criticism from the public, including over the GOP tax and spending law dubbed the “big, beautiful bill.”
Nunn’s challengers are drawing attention to the issue in the race, which national Democrats are targeting as they look to gain control of Congress in the 2026 midterm elections. The 3rd District spans 21 counties in south-central Iowa, including the cities of Des Moines, Ottumwa and Winterset.
State Rep. Jennifer Konfrst, a Windsor Heights Democrat who was previously Iowa House minority leader, as well as internal communications strategist Xavier Carrigan of Waukee also are seeking the Democratic Party’s nomination for the seat.
Nunn’s congressional website states the Bondurant Republican has held 129 mobile office hours and 304 events with Iowans and provided 120,676 answers to Iowans.
His campaign manager Brendan Duffy said in a statement that Nunn is “consistently accessible to Iowans, holding hundreds of events in all 21 counties and hosting real listening sessions that deliver real results.”
“Congressman Nunn isn’t going to take advice on meeting with his constituents from far-left activists who are out of touch with Iowa values,” Duffy said. “Zach Nunn delivered $11,000 in tax cuts for Iowa families, $60 billion in direct assistance for farmers and $50 billion for rural hospitals. While Democrat activists lie to Iowans, Congressman Nunn will continue delivering for them.”
Trone Garriott wants to ‘turn around these reckless cuts’ to Medicaid
Chief among problems facing Iowans, Trone Garriott said, was Nunn’s vote along with Iowa’s entirely Republican congressional delegation for the “big, beautiful bill.”
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates it will reduce federal Medicaid spending by an estimated $911 billion over 10 years and leave 10 million more people without health coverage by 2034.
She said the move will threaten nursing homes and rural hospitals, raising health care costs and reducing access to care for all Iowans if facilities shutter.
Trone Garriott also criticized the law’s steep cuts to Supplementary Nutritional Assistance benefits.
“People are angry about that,” Trone Garriott said. “They’re right to be concerned, they’re right to be frustrated, because he promised early on that he was going to lower costs for people and all we’ve seen is costs keep going up. We’re not getting the results we need.”
Trone Garriott said she would work to “turn around these reckless cuts” to Medicaid in Congress.
If she’s elected, Republican President Donald Trump would have another two years left in his term and it’s uncertain which party will control Congress, but she told reporters she would “use every power of my office” to ensure those affected have a voice in the political process.
Trone Garriott told the crowd “we need to get creative and think about what are the opportunities to cover more Americans.”
Federal lawmakers should ‘incentivize’ more farmers to adopt conservation practices to tackle water issues
The federal government has the “real power” to address water quality, Trone Garriott said in response to an audience member’s question about the issue as she criticized congressional inaction on passing a new Farm Bill with measures to address the water crisis.
Iowa’s largest drinking water utility, Des Moines Water Works, pushed back against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s removal of segments of the Raccoon and Des Moines rivers — its prime water sources — from a list of waterways considered impaired by pollution.
But Nunn has not said whether he agreed with the EPA’s move, deferring instead to EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin.
The EPA’s decision came after Central Iowa Water Works, the regional authority of which Des Moines Water Works is the largest member, issued an unprecedented ban on lawn watering to maintain enough treatment capacity to ensure safe water remained for essential uses while facing high nitrate levels. The ban has since been lifted.
While the nitrate removal process helps, Trone Garriott said it can’t keep up with the levels in Iowa’s waterways. She said certain conservation practices that improve soil health and reduce agricultural runoff “are voluntary, but they shouldn’t be optional.”
“We can incentivize the practices we want to see,” she told reporters. “We can put expectations tied to any subsidies and supports, because we have that opportunity to use that tool, and I think that’s really what farmers need is support to make changes. They have a really difficult market that they’re dealing with right now, in large part because of the tariffs really wreaking havoc on our economy here in Iowa.”
Current immigration policy ‘adding to chaos’
Trone Garriott said she is “deeply concerned” about federal immigration policy and upholding the nation’s immigration laws needs to be done in a way that respects due process and human rights of all people.
An audience member asked about reports of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials in some cities swiftly grabbing people they believe are undocumented immigrants off the streets and detaining them in unmarked vehicles, using methods that are facing legal challenges over their constitutionality.
Trone Garriott said she supported well-funded border security and having appropriate technology and trained, qualified individuals enforcing immigration laws.
“Folks all across the political spectrum agree that we need to fix this system, and what we’re seeing right now is not fixing it,” Trone Garriott said. “It’s just adding to the chaos. It’s taking advantage of the chaos for political purposes. We should absolutely not have masked individuals who will not identify themselves on our streets,” she said to applause from the audience.
Republicans argue that ICE agents’ unprecedented use of masks is necessary because of threats to their safety.