Republican Lieutenant Governor Chris Cournoyer has kicked off her campaign for state auditor.
“I’m the mother of four children, I’ve run a small business for 27 years, I was in the corporate world before that,” Cournoyer said today, “and so I think I bring a lot from the private sector.”
Cournoyer has a computer science degree and she’s been a web developer. During an interview with Radio Iowa, she said artificial intelligence can be deployed to make the state auditor’s office more efficient. “Looking for those outliers and those anomalies that can be found much more effectively using A.I. and leveraging that technology,” Cournoyer said.
Cournoyer’s first campaign for public office was in 2012, for a seat on the Pleasant Valley School Board. Cournoyer served nearly six years in the Iowa Senate before Governor Kim Reynolds appointed her lieutenant governor in December. Less than a month ago, Cournoyer was planning to be the governor’s 2026 running mate, but that all changed when Reynolds announced she won’t run for re-election.
“I really started thinking about what I could do to continue in public service and best serve Iowans,” Cournoyer told Radio Iowa, “and as I thought about my background and my experience and where my talents lie and where my passions lie — really protecting the taxpayer and making government more efficient and effective, I turned towards the auditor’s office because that just seemed like a good fit.”
Governor Reynolds has endorsed Cournoyer’s bid for state auditor, calling her “a true fiscal conservative.” Over the past two years, Cournoyer led Senate debate of the governor’s bills that reduced the number of state government agencies and boards and commissions. “While we are in a very good fiscal position here in the State of Iowa,” Cournoyer says, “we’ve got a balanced budget, we’ve got a healthy surplus, really the first line of defense to protect that surplus and that balanced budget is the auditor who’s going out and rooting out waste, fraud and abuse to make sure that every dime we get from the taxpayer who has earned that money is being used effectively and efficiently,” Cournoyer said.
Democrat Rob Sand, the current state auditor, has said he intends to run for statewide office in 2026 and is considering a run for governor.