Storm Lake educator WolfTornabane enters Democratic race for Iowa’s 4th District

Ashley WolfTornabane, a Storm Lake educator and stay-at-home mother, has entered the Democratic race for Iowa’s 4th Congressional District, putting a Buena Vista County voice into a contest many Democrats see as a long-shot but newly open opportunity.

WolfTornabane, 36, lives in Storm Lake and previously worked as an instructional assistant in the Storm Lake Community School District and as director of Christian education at Lakeside Presbyterian Church. She graduated from Storm Lake High School, a background she has used to frame her campaign around the daily pressures facing working families, public schools and rural communities.

The Democratic primary is scheduled for June 2, 2026, and the winner will face Republican Chris McGowan in the general election. That race comes after Randy Feenstra, who has represented the district since 2021, launched a campaign for governor after filing exploratory paperwork in May 2025 and formally announcing on October 28, 2025.

Iowa’s 4th District was redrawn under the state’s second redistricting plan, enacted November 4, 2021, and used in the 2022 elections. It remains one of the state’s most reliably Republican districts. Democrats have not held the seat since Neal Smith, who represented the district from 1973 to 1995, and the last Democratic primary in the district was in 2018, when J.D. Scholten advanced and narrowly lost to Steve King.

At a May 4 candidate forum in Sioux City, WolfTornabane said public dollars should go only to public schools. She also called for addressing poverty’s root causes, tying the federal minimum wage to a formula based on state costs rather than a flat national rate, and tackling nitrates in water by diversifying crops. Those positions put her in line with the broader Democratic field, but they also point directly to issues that matter in Buena Vista County, where education, farm economies and water quality shape the political conversation as much as any national talking point.

WolfTornabane’s opponents include Dave Dawson, a former Iowa House member from Lawton and current Woodbury County prosecutor who specializes in child abuse cases, and Stephanie Steiner of Sutherland, a retired women’s healthcare nurse and small livestock producer. Dawson has emphasized healthcare, rural investment and higher incomes. Steiner has said her campaign grew out of personal hardship, including becoming a mother at 15 and losing her husband in 2019 to COPD complications.

The three Democrats have largely converged on health care, affordability, the environment and rural services, leaving biography, local ties and emphasis as the clearest distinctions in the primary. In a district built to favor Republicans, that may be the strongest case each candidate can make before voters decide whether to keep the contest local or let it become another test of Democratic viability in western and northwestern Iowa.