Zach Lahn is a farmer, father and businessman. He is one of the candidates for the Iowa 2026 gubernatorial race.
Lahn is a 6th-generation Iowan, and like most Iowa kids, he left to find something better and ended up coming right back. He has since rebuilt the Lahn family homestead board by board, where he and his wife and their seven kids live and operate the farm today. Their farm is a regenerative farm that also uses a lot of organic processes.
The four key points that Lahn is running on are: keeping Iowa’s kids in Iowa, saving the family farm, making our education system number one in the nation again and stopping the water crisis.
“I am running because I think politicians should be fighting on behalf of the people against the special interests, and I think for far too long it has been the opposite,” Lahn said.
Lahn has never been involved in government before; he calls himself an outsider, even.
“I am somebody who is genuinely here because I think there are things that we could do to make life better for the people living in the state and to prioritize their needs over the needs of any of these global companies, special interests, lobbyists, people like that that have been extracting from our state for a very long time. I think that I’m bringing a different perspective about putting Iowa first, over all these interests,” Lahn said.
Lahn’s policy ideas for higher education are to prioritize Iowa’s high school graduates, to make sure that they are getting a fair shake and a fair chance of getting into Iowa universities. He would like to have a much higher quota on the number of Iowans that schools have to enroll. Lahn would also like Iowa’s universities to focus on solving different problems that we have as a state.
“For Iowa State, I would love to see them help young farmers and current farmers work on new methods of farming, to make more money, live longer, healthier lives, build a sustainable operation and pass something on to their kids,” Lahn said.
Lahn has many ideas for the water crisis in Iowa as well. He would like to see a reduction in the chemicals that we are using on lawns, while still incentivizing practices to help farmers use less nitrogen in their application. Lahn believes that by encouraging saturated buffers and different types of application of nitrogen, we can lose less and retain more, which would benefit the water quality and also help farmers make more money and keep more money.
There is another constant issue of eminent domain in Iowa. Lahn says he believes eminent domain should be saved for certain circumstances.
“I would veto any bill that would allow eminent domain for a carbon capture pipeline,” Lahn said.
Lahn has engaged with the younger voter crowd across the state and even at ISU. The College Republicans club at ISU has endorsed his campaign.
“A lot of our messages are aimed at younger voters about affordability, about being able to buy a home and the rising costs, how we bring those down through anti-consolidation efforts and things like that. I think our message is resonating heavily with younger voters,” Lahn said.
Lahn is the first candidate to be sponsored by MAHA (Make America Healthy Again). Lahn’s goals for the healthcare system of Iowa are to focus more on preventative measures for delaying sick care or preventing sick care completely. He believes this can be done by prioritizing practices within the state that focus on healthy living and healthy food. His goal is for 80% of the food served in Iowa’s public schools to come from Iowa farms.
Lahn cares about the quality of vaccines, also. He wants to make sure that parents are thinking responsibly when vaccinating their kids and making sure that everything is being tested properly.
Lahn has many ideas for bettering Iowa. The first thing he plans to do in office is protect farmland.
“The number one thing is we need to understand who owns the farm land in Iowa, protect our farmers from out-of-state interests that are buying our land up and work very heavily on that,” Lahn said.
Lahn is in favor of the ESA program, which supplies Iowa families with extra money to take their kids to private school if they would like. He thinks that parents need to have more say over where their kids go to school and where their tax dollars are spent.
The primary election is held June 2, and then after that, there is the gubernatorial election, which will be held November 3. To learn more about Lahn’s campaign, please visit his webpage.