DES MOINES, Iowa – State Rep. Jon Jacobsen, R-Council Bluffs, announced he is running for Iowa Senate in Iowa Senate District 8 in 2024, but he has not made a decision about running for re-election to the Iowa House in 2022.
The newly drawn district encompasses most of Pottawattamie County except Council Bluffs and two townships in the northeast corner of the county, Harrison County, Mills County, and Fremont County.
Jacobsen was one of two state representatives to vote against the second draft of the redistricting map.
Jacobson saw his district that encompassed rural Pottawattamie County split into four different districts (Iowa House Districts 11, 15, 16, and 19) and will face State Rep. Brent Siegrist, R-Council Bluffs, in the newly drawn Iowa House District 19, that would favor Siegrist if he decides to run since he currently represents most of the new district.
“I’m a zealous advocate for Southwest Iowa. If Iowa had a panhandle, we’d be it because sometimes we are the redheaded stepchild in the state of Iowa,” Jacobsen said during floor debate on Thursday. “And unlike any other county of our size of 90,000, west of the Raccoon River, we have singularly been disembodied.”
“I have constituents that live ten miles from me, some of who now will be up in Carroll County, some who will be down in the Missouri River. And with the flooding issues that we have now, our voices further diluted, we have no at-large representation in the county as a whole. We do not have any representative who could possibly represent a majority of the people in the county,” he added.
Jacobsen noted running for Iowa Senate 8 would make for a “seemless transition.”
“I’m staying with my constituents. Super-super majority population of new Senate 8 are my constituents or business neighbors. We have an inseparable bond. It will be an aggressive campaign and a big victory,” Jacobsen told The Iowa Torch.
He said 50,000 voters in Iowa Senate District 8 are his current constituents or voters he has been able to reach through his radio program on Boomer Radio Network out of Omaha. Jacobsen said that he had also helped thousands in the region impacted by recent Missouri River flooding and helped with issues related to the Glenwood Resource Center.
Iowa Senate District 8 is currently represented by State Senator Mark Costello, R-Imogene, who is not up for re-election in 2022 after redistricting since he was re-elected in 2020 and was not placed in a new district with another incumbent.
