Poll: Most Iowa voters consider water quality a ‘very serious issue’

As water quality issues persist throughout Iowa, particularly over nitrate contamination in the state’s major watersheds, more Iowans report that clean water is near the top of their voting priority list, a new poll finds.

According to a poll commissioned by an advocacy group, nearly three fourths of Iowa voters say that Iowa’s rising cancer rate is a very serious issue and that nearly three out of five say that water quality and water pollution also is a serious matter.

“No. 1, cancer and water pollution rank among voters’ top concerns. You've got a huge amount of concern rising cancer rates,” said Jefrey Pollock, founding partner and president of Global Strategy Group, which conducted the poll for the Food & Water Action organization. “Seventy-two percent (of respondents) say that's a very serious concern. It actually outpaces cost of living as a major concern for Iowa voters. And that's pretty surprising, given that every time I sit in a focus group these days, the first thing that people want to talk about is affordability. But in Iowa, rising cancer rates is very much there.”

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A majority of Iowa survey respondents — about 58 percent — said that water quality and water pollution is a serious issue.

The poll also found that 82 percent of voters surveyed would be more likely to vote for a political candidate who makes protecting clean water and curbing water contamination from industrial agriculture in Iowa a priority.

“And this is not a partisan thing,” Pollock said. “Seventy-two percent of Republicans think it; 86 percent of independents and 92 percent of Democrats” also want it.

The poll also found that 79 percent of Iowa voters say they would support introducing mandatory requirements for industrial agriculture across the state to curb pollution.

Food & Water Action commissioned Global Strategy Group — which has its headquarters in New York — to conduct the poll. Global Strategy said it surveyed 600 registered voters Jan. 28 through Feb. 1, mostly by phone but also over text message and online surveys. It said the margin of error was plus or minus 4 percent. “Care has been taken to ensure the geographic, political, and demographic divisions of the population of registered voters are properly represented,” the pollsters reported.

A key voting issue

Food & Water Action Political Director Sam Bernhardt said the poll reflects that Iowa’s water is at a “boiling point” as state midterm elections will be coming up this November.

“It is abundantly clear that voters are fed up with the inaction they see in Des Moines and Washington,” Bernhardt said. “Iowa’s Republican trifecta and congressional delegation have looked the other way as factory farms turn waterways into cesspools and transform drinking water into a toxic chemical cocktail. Voters of all stripes agree: it is time to crack down on industry’s free pass to pollute.”

Bernhardt said the results are important as Iowa moves further toward election season because of Republicans’ “razor thin majority” in Congress. He said Iowa’s 1st and 3rd congressional districts — represented by Republican Reps. Mariannette Miller-Meeks and Zach Nunn — are vulnerable and could be flipped by more voters voting for lawmakers who have water quality issues as top priorities.

“Candidates ignore Iowa’s water crisis at their political peril,” Bernhardt said. “Embracing pollution regulations for industrial agriculture may well hold the keys to Congress.”

Food & Water Action serves as the legislative arm of the national nonprofit Food & Water Watch, which has an Iowa organizer, Jennifer Breon.

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A perpetual, statewide concern

Breon, who is based in Iowa City, said although other states have water quality issues as well, they aren’t as deep-rooted as Iowa’s.

“Iowa's factory farms produce 109 billion pounds of chemical-laden manure waste a year, 25 times that of Iowa's human population,” she said.

One of the biggest culprits for Iowa’s ongoing water quality issues is tied to nitrate in agricultural runoff.

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In August, over a dozen researchers from across the state published the Central Iowa Source Water Resource Assessment, which determined that about 80 percent of the total contribution of nitrogen to the Des Moines and Raccoon rivers’ watersheds comes from agricultural land.

About 40 percent of that comes from fertilizers applied directly to the land. Another 20 percent comes from soybeans and legumes, which pull nitrogen from the atmosphere and turn it into nitrate. The other 20 percent is from manure applied to the land, they found.

The report was published on the heels of a significant nitrate spike in Des Moines over the summer, as the Raccoon River’s nitrate levels were nearly 18.5 milligrams per liter and the Des Moines River was slightly over 17.15 milligrams per liter in June 2025, surpassing the Environmental Protection Agency’s 10 milligrams per liter limit in drinking water.

Nitrate is linked to blue baby syndrome when its levels exceed 10 milligrams per liter in drinking water. Long-term exposure to lower levels, even for adults, could lead to cancer and other negative health impacts, some emerging research suggests.

Olivia Cohen covers energy and environment for The Gazette and is a corps member with Report for America, a national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues. She is also a contributing writer for the Ag and Water Desk, an independent journalism collaborative focusing on the Mississippi River Basin.

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Comments: olivia.cohen@thegazette.com