Chris Jones, the Democrat who’s running to be Iowa’s next Secretary of Agriculture, says water quality has become a major issue in the 2026 campaign.
“Back in January I was told that there were no other politicians in Iowa that even wanted to be in the same room with me and now almost every major candidate is talking about water quality,” Jones said yesterday. “…People see that what we’ve done here over the last 30 years has not worked.”
Jones says Iowa’s waterways are polluted because Iowa’s voluntary approach to the application of manure and farm chemicals is not working and he’s been calling for state regulations. Jones and about 50 supporters floated down the Des Moines River last week, starting in Palo Alto County and ending near the Birdland Marina in metro Des Moines. “We really saw first hand the condition of the Des Moines River during the trip and especially upstream the condition of the water is not good,” Jones said. “You really don’t see any minnows, you don’t see any insects, you don’t see all that many birds and the river’s almost kind of dead up the West Fork of the Des Moines up there from Palo Alto County down.”
Jones held a news conference Tuesday at a Des Moines park that’s next to the Des Moines River. He told reporters conditions improved slightly the closer the group got to the confluence with the Raccoon River in downtown Des Moines, but it is still laden with algae blooms, making it appear greenish. He said the Des Moines River is nothing like it was 150 years ago when it was a clear stream cutting through prarie with an abundance of different species of fish. “Now we tend to have a dominance of pollution-tolerant species,” Jones said. “The channel catfish can live in all our streams…because it’s not a sight-feeder, so it doesn’t need clear water to find its food whereas something like a small-mouth bass or a walleye needs to be able to see its prey.”
The millions of dollars the state is spending each year on water projects isn’t solving the problem, according to Jones. “But you don’t have to believe what I say. Just come and look for the water yourself,” Jones said. “…Does it look the way you think it should look? Does it smell the way you think it should smell? If it doesn’t, maybe we need some changes.”
Iowa Agriculture Secretary Mike Naig, the Republican who is running for re-election, has said the state has made “historic investments” in water quality initiatives during his tenure and, if he wins another term, Naig said his focus will be on expanding those efforts rather than imposing regulations that “will drive farmers out of business.”