Rob Sand, the Democratic candidate for governor, speaks with reporters at an event on Sept. 3, 2026. (RI file photo)
Rob Sand, the Democrat running for governor, says he needs to see “a lot more details” before he can say whether he supports the state incentives Governor Reynolds is recommending for a proposed southeast Iowa steel mill.
“You look at these data center deals that this administration has done over the last few years and we gave away the farm,” Sand told reporters tonight, “so I want to make sure this is a real opportunity, but also at the end of the day Iowa is getting served by it and not getting fleeced.”
The Iowa House and Senate are scheduled to meet Friday in a special legislative session to consider hundreds of millions of dollars worth of tax credits for Mesabi Metallics, a subsidiary the Essar Group, a company based in India.
“Certainly you’d want to make sure that we are not paying out up front,” Sand said. “These folks had some real problems in Minnesota and so we’d want to make sure that they’re actually making their investments of whatever money they’re bringing to Iowa before we would release, in like a stair step fashion, any benefits from the state side.”
In 2008, Essar Group announced it would build a steel mill in northern Minnesota, but plans were dropped in 2015. The company entered India’s insolvency process in 2017, then sold off its steel and oil divisions in 2019 to cover its debts. The company is back in the steel business and has acquired a thousand acres in Saudi Arabia for a steel complex. Its Iowa venture was announced Monday at the White House by President Trump. The Export Import Bank of the United States has announced it will issue up to $10 billion in financing for the project. The company said construction of the steel mill in Lee County will cost $15 billion and it would employ over 1700 people once it’s operating.