— Daily Freeman-Journal photo by Anne Blankenship
Democrat JD Scholten recently announced that he’s running for the Fourth District Congressional seat. He brought his campaign to Webster City Wednesday and spoke to supporters at the Next Generation picnic at West Twin Park.

J.D. Scholten, a Democrat from Sioux City, announced Monday that he’s making another run for Iowa’s Fourth District Congressional seat, the seat currently held by Republican Steve King of Kiron.

“Ultimately, I’m following in the footsteps of my political heroes, Berkley Bedell and Tom Harkin,” Scholtens said Wednesday Night in Webster City. He stopped by the Hamilton County Democrats’ Next Generation picnic. “They both lost their first races. Through all of this, I got to be very good friends with both of them and they were very encouraging about running again.”

In his bid against King in 2018, Scholten said he moved the needle 24 points from the previous cycle. He lost by less than 11,000 votes in the heavily-Republican district.

“We got 25,000 more votes than there are Democrats in the district. It was more than just me. It was all the volunteers and my staff and others who gave their all for the campaign,” he said.

After the loss in 2018, Scholten said he didn’t expect to run again.

“Eventually, I found this is where my heart’s at,” he said, adding, “Especially now that there are 55,000 farmers in this district with their backs up against the wall.”

King, who’s been stripped of his committee assignments in Congress after making comments that many deemed to be racially offensive, will face a challenge from his own party. Three other Republicans have indicated they will challenge King for the Republican nomination, including State Sen. Randy Feenstra.

On Wednesday, King again made headlines when he spoke to a conservative group in Des Moines. He discussed his call for legislation that would ban abortion, even in cases of rape and incest. He reportedly questioned how many people would be alive if not for rape and incest throughout history.

“It’s such a bizarre statement. You don’t see too many people defend rape and incest,” Scholten said. “It’s so insensitive to the survivors.”

“But I want to make sure we’re not just bashing the other side. I don’t believe in that,” he said. “I believe in standing up for what we believe.”

Regardless of who is ultimately the Republican nominee, Scholten said he would run the same campaign.

“As a minor league baseball player, I didn’t care who the other team was, I pitched to my strengths. It’s kind of the same thing here,” he said.

Scholten said he sees the three top issues in the district as health care, building an economy that works for everyone and securing the nation’s Democracy.

“At the end of the day, every gas station you see has a donation box for someone who’s sick or been injured in an accident. We’re the wealthiest country in the world. Other countries have figured it out,” he said about the state of health care. “And we have to beg to pay for medical expenses. That’s ridiculous.”

Scholten said the district’s hard-working people are struggling with multiple jobs.

“That was the biggest thing we were able to talk to people all over the political spectrum about –we’ve had stagnant wages for four decades,” he said. He added farmers have faced years of low-commodity prices and have been squeezed by the monopolies in agriculture.

Scholten said there are too many special interests dictating the democracy, which is why health care is so expensive and why many of the issues facing the nation haven’t been solved.

“That’s why we didn’t take any corporate PAC money last time and we’re not going to this time, either,” he said. “We’re about people and we’re very people focused.”

The candidate said while his campaign is very savvy about social media, old-school politics of visiting all 39 counties and meeting the people was even more important.

“We don’t write anyone off — regardless of whether you’re a Democrat or Republican. We’re going to go out and try to earn your vote just like we did last time.”