Rob Sand will run for auditor, not governor

DES MOINES — Rob Sand will run for re-election as state auditor, eschewing a run for governor, he announced Tuesday.

Sand, a Democrat from Des Moines, was elected auditor in 2018, when he unseated the Republican incumbent. This year, he weighed a run for governor in 2022.

In a short video he posted online Tuesday, Sand said his office has worked over the past three years to save Iowa taxpayers’ money by working with local officials and operating with a staff of workers of all political stripes.

“I didn’t run for office because I love politics. I ran for office because I can’t stand it,” Sand said as he walked with his dog. “Too many people putting partisan interests ahead of the public interest, too many people protecting insiders, doing what they want instead of what they’re supposed to do. And we’re doing a good job of doing it differently.”

Sand said he not only retained workers in the auditor’s office who donated to his 2018 opponent’s campaign, he promoted some of them to senior positions.

“I think that’s the way it ought to be done,” Sand said in the video.

During the past three years, Sand has continued the office’s duties of auditing state and local government agencies, rooting out waste, fraud and abuse. Sand also has issued multiple reports that have been critical of Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds’ administration. Those audits covered the private management of the state’s Medicaid program, and Reynolds’ use of federal pandemic relief funding to fund salaries of workers in her office.

Republican Party of Iowa chairman Jeff Kaufmann issued a statement Tuesday accusing Sand of “weaponizing” the auditor’s office “to attack his political enemies.”

“Iowans want a state auditor who is serious, focused on ensuring their tax dollars are spent properly and being a watchdog over their pocketbooks,” Kaufmann said. “Rob Sand only cares about how many times his cheap and misleading attacks are retweeted.”

With Sand out of the governor’s race, that leaves two prominent candidates in the Democratic primary race: Deidre DeJear, a Des Moines businesswoman who ran for secretary of state in 2018, and Ras Smith, a state lawmaker from Waterloo.

One national political forecasting publication last week moved Iowa’s 2022 gubernatorial race from “likely Republican” to “solid Republican.” In the most recent Des Moines Register/Mediacom Iowa Poll, 53 percent of Iowans surveyed said they approve of Reynolds’ job performance, while 41 percent said they disapprove.