Sami Scheetz is a Linn County Supervisor and formerly served as a state legislator.
Before State Representative Josh Turek was sworn in with me to the Iowa House in January 2023, there was no ramp leading to the well of the chamber. In the 179 years since Iowa became a state, no member of the legislature had ever needed one. Josh did. So a ramp was built.
A few months later, I watched a group of kids in wheelchairs roll down it and sit on the floor of the people’s house. It is still one of the most vivid and meaningful memories I have from my time in the legislature.
Josh grew up in a working-class family in Council Bluffs. He was born with spina bifida after his father was exposed to Agent Orange in Vietnam, and he underwent 21 surgeries by the age of 12. At every stage of his life, Josh has faced incredible adversity and has succeeded despite these challenges. He was bullied in school because of his disability. He knows firsthand the hardships families face when making ends meet — he often retells the story of lining up at school with the wrong color lunch ticket.
But he never let any obstacle stop him: when he was cut from the U.S. Paralympic basketball team, Josh clawed his way back to win two gold medals in wheelchair basketball for the United States. And in 2022, he won a state legislative district that has trended more conservative each cycle. Then, he held it again in 2024, a year Donald Trump carried the county by twenty points.
What I saw in Josh was a rare combination of work ethic and integrity. He fought for Work Without Worry — bipartisan legislation that would let disabled Iowans hold a job without losing the health care they depend on. For Josh, the fight to protect working families and Iowans with disabilities isn’t political. It’s personal. That’s why throughout his career, he’s built coalitions with Republicans, Democrats, and independents that most people believed could not be built.
I saw that same work ethic on the doors in Council Bluffs.
In 2024, I went out knocking with Josh during his re-election campaign. I watched him work door after door. Most houses don’t have ramps, but that didn’t stop Josh. He pulled himself out of his wheelchair and climbed those porch steps because he wasn’t going to skip a single voter who deserved to be asked for their support. I’ve never seen someone work harder to represent his community than Josh did in that race. He won that Trump district through incredibly hard work, determination, and grit.
Iowa hasn’t elected a Democrat to the United States Senate since Tom Harkin won his fifth term in 2008. This month, Senator Harkin, the author of the Americans with Disabilities Act and Josh’s political hero, publicly announced his support for Josh. I can’t imagine a more fitting endorsement.
In Josh’s retirement speech from the Iowa House, he had two requests: “continue to work for the most vulnerable in society,” and keep the ramp in the chamber of the people’s house. Iowa needs a U.S. senator who has fought for working families his entire life, who can win the voters the Democratic Party has been losing, and who will go to Washington and out-work everyone in that building, too.
That senator is Josh Turek. I’m proud to support him, and I hope you will too.
Editor’s note: Bleeding Heartland welcomes guest commentaries by any Democratic candidate running for office in 2026, or by their supporters. Please read these guidelines and contact Laura Belin if you are interested in writing.