Iowa House Speaker Pat Grassley, a Republican from New Hartford, is seeking another term in House District 57.
Grassley will be challenged by Shawn Ellerbroek, a Democrat from Waverly, during the November 5th election. Grassley has served in the Iowa House of Representatives since 2006 and points to his leadership as to why he is running for another term in the Iowa House.
“In my time in the legislature since I was elected in 2006, I’ve never missed a vote on the floor of the Iowa House. The reason why I think that’s so important is whether you’re a Republican, whether you’re a Democrat, whether you’re an Independent, it doesn’t matter. The one thing that I can tell you in my track record proves is I’m willing to take a position on every issue. I have never ducked a vote. And I think that the votes that I have taken to reduce taxes for Iowans to pass bills out of the house that would protect landowners rights, record levels of funding and investment into education while being able to cut taxes and have a sustainable budget. Those are the kind of the reasons not only that I’m running for election, but I think my track record of what you’re going to get from me has been very clear.”
Ellerbroek is a professor of chemistry at Wartburg College and serves on the Waverly-Shell Rock School Board. Ellerbroek says there are several reasons why he is running for the Iowa House District 57 seat next Tuesday.
“I definitely want to reverse gears on public education. We need to restore the area education agency, direct funding and stabilize it because we’ve had over 400 employees leave. We’re already seeing the results in a negative way. I strongly believe that public dollars belong in public schools. The school voucher program is already directing hundreds of millions of dollars towards these private schools, but not the same oversight and accountability that public schools have. The other thing is the carbon pipeline. I’m absolutely 100% against the carbon pipeline. As a chemist, I’m concerned about it from a safety point of view. It’s going to be very hard to keep that water out of there. We’re going to have issues if there’s a rupture, it’s when there’ll be a rupture. And there’s some serious concerns about that.”
Iowa House District 57 covers Butler County and portions of western Bremer County.
