Art Cullen
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Editor The Storm Lake Times, author of the book “Storm Lake: Change, Resilience, and Hope in America’s Heartland”. Pulitzer Prize winner.
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Articles by Art Cullen
Editorials: Election relief
What a relief! The torrent of malicious TV ads faded to black with the election. Kim Reynolds will not be governor; Democrat Rob Sand will be. Josh Turek will help put a check on President Trump as part of a solid Democratic Senate majority. House Speaker Hakeem Jeffries claims history as the first Black to wield the gavel; Iowa sends a split delegation as Democrats flipped three of the four congressional districts to blue.
We dug a deep hole over a decade
It’s been a tough 10 years. Trump. Covid. More Trump. A decade of decline for Iowa — dead last in mental health beds and women’s health care. Next to last (chasing Mississippi) for economic performance. Ten years of the worst pollution in America with zilch for real action. Treading water here, captain! “I’m afraid you have cancer. Don’t feel so bad — most everybody else has it, too. Iowa is bound to lead the nation in something, and it is not education or fun.” Why so much cancer? Can’t say for sure.
Opinion: A long, strange 2026 election campaign ends
Joe Mitchell, candidate for Iowa’s 2nd Congressional District, awards President Trump the Man of the Century award while at a rally Oct. 22 in Sioux City. Cody Scanlan/Des Moines Register People lined up for a mile a couple Thursdays ago to hear President Trump’s impression of a carnival barker in a Sioux City airport hangar festooned with red, white and blue bunting.
Editorials: Endorsing moderation
Moderation is all we ask. Iowa has been under one-party rule for over a decade. It shows. We have become meaner and poorer. Our schools are weaker. Regulations are spurned as the rivers run toxic and the air smells like a hog’s back end. Enough — of the shaming, the ignorance, keeping others out. Iowa needs to find its way back to center. It took decades to groom the rut. These midterm elections will not reverse our trajectory. Income tax cuts will not be repealed. Nobody will contest our freedom to farm.
There are enough suckers in Iowa to fill an airport hangar
People lined up for a mile to hear President Trump’s impression of a carnival barker in a Sioux City airport hangar festooned with red, white and blue bunting on Thursday. He came to help gin up turnout from his base in Northwest Iowa, crucial to Ashley Hinson in particular as Republicans struggle to maintain control of the Senate. He was preaching to the choir, farmer Harlan Grau of Newell acknowledged to Radio Iowa. The ramble went on more than 90 minutes. Ilhan Omar should be arrested.
Jones smells success along rural routes
Chris Jones says he is not measuring for drapes in the Iowa Secretary of Agriculture’s office at the state capitol just yet. The Democratic challenger to Republican incumbent Mike Naig is, however, thinking seriously about assembling a staff of “high-profile people who want to affect change.” “I think I am going to win,” Jones said last week. “People are pissed.” That’s an assessment taken from packed rooms — Red Oak to Harlan to Greenfield to Denison to Kiron to Emmetsburg.
Jones smells success along rural routes
Chris Jones says he is not measuring for drapes in the Iowa Secretary of Agriculture’s office at the state capitol just yet. The Democratic challenger to Republican incumbent Mike Naig is, however, thinking seriously about assembling a staff of “high-profile people who want to affect change.” “I think I am going to win,” Jones said last week. “People are pissed.” That’s an assessment taken from packed rooms — Red Oak to Harlan to Greenfield to Denison to Kiron to Emmetsburg.
Editorials: Rural Iowa worth voting for
Posted Thursday, October 15, 2026 11:57 am We met a sharp farmer from North Central Iowa who works for an ag manufacturer, conservative politically and agriculturally. He’s into reduced tillage and cover crops. He loathes regulation, which is one of his arguments for conservation agriculture. He works with the Practical Farmers of Iowa. Boots and blue jeans sort of guy. Our new friend says he is bearish on rural Iowa. His day job subsidizes his passion for farming.
Reading signs in the sky
Gulls floated against a blue autumnal sky just off Storm Lake. Finally, combines are in the fields sweeping up corn and beans as if they might be worth the effort amid the trade bluster. It’s always something, never easy out here against the wind. An election looms, most urgent. The sun’s angle portends change. I’m not getting old. I am old. The heart and lungs checked out alright in Iowa City. Still, you never know at 69. You would like assurances that freedom will prevail.
Corporate welfare for a steel mill
Editorials from the Storm Lake Times Pilot, Oct. 9, 2026 The Republicans running things announced last week that they are locating a $15 billion steel mill in Southeast Iowa, near Keokuk and Fort Madison in hard-pressed Lee County. Knowing next to nothing except that they are facing a drubbing in November, the politicians flocked to Des Moines last Friday to approve $1.5 billion in state tax credits, for starters. These people are not conservative.
Editorials: Corporate welfare
The Republicans running things announced last week that they are locating a $15 billion steel mill in Southeast Iowa, near Keokuk and Fort Madison in hard-pressed Lee County. Knowing next to nothing except that they are facing a drubbing in November, the politicians flocked to Des Moines last Friday to approve $1.5 billion in state tax credits, for starters. These people are not conservative. They are taking our money to spend on a company that has ties to the Russian oil complex.
Iowa weather and politics are extreme
Crazy extremes. You drive through fog and drizzle — Dude, slow down! Sister, turn your headlights on! — to slop through mud at the Iowa Lakeside Lab on West Lake Okoboji. How long have we been drenched? A month. August closed with Northwest Iowa in “moderate” drought like we have been in for a few years. You worry we could drink the well dry. These days we worry about fungus, if they ever get into the fields. Extremes. A dose moderation, if you please.
Editorials: Vote for moderation
It should surprise nobody that we urge you to vote for Democratic candidates in the November elections. Republicans have done much damage to Iowa with one-party rule over the last decade. Support among loyalists for President Trump is wreaking havoc on the state and national economies, and causes people here to live in fear. We need a change in direction. A Democratic Congress would put an important check on Trump.
Editorials: Vote for moderation
It should surprise nobody that we urge you to vote for Democratic candidates in the November elections. Republicans have done much damage to Iowa with one-party rule over the last decade. Support among loyalists for President Trump is wreaking havoc on the state and national economies, and causes people here to live in fear. We need a change in direction. A Democratic Congress would put an important check on Trump.
A month out, Iowa poised for a political turn
Iowa is setting up for a course correction one month out from the November midterm elections. The Republicans’ 10-year grip over the state’s politics is slipping. Iowa is aiming to elect a Democratic governor and senator, and probably split our congressional delegation. Art Cullen’s Notebook is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
A month out, Iowa poised for a political turn
Iowa is setting up for a course correction one month out from the November midterm elections. The Republicans’ 10-year grip over the state’s politics is slipping. Iowa is aiming to elect a Democratic governor and senator, and probably split our congressional delegation. Observers from afar blame the eroding GOP position on President Trump and his low approval ratings. For sure, fuel prices are top of mind. Affordability is the word of the hour. Farmers are stressed.
Editorials: Hinson hides
Rep. Ashley Hinson has been a loyal soldier for President Trump in Congress and a tireless partisan in the Second District. This week she voted in support of the war on Iran while her Republican peers Rep. Zach Nunn and Rep. Marianette Miller-Meeks voted to assert Congressional prerogative over the war. Hinson is running for the US Senate having supported Trump’s bungled war every step of the way. Hinson avoided a rally headlined by Vice President JD Vance in Council Bluffs the same week.
Iowa is not about to go woke
If you think that pinko Rob Sand will make a hash of Iowa, rest easy buckaroo. We’re tops in cancer and rooting around the bottom in economic performance. So things are not that great after 10 years of one-party government in Des Moines. Schools are sliding and the paint is peeling near the railroad tracks. What a pity. The Republicans have had enough time to get it right, or at least make it better. Our water is getting worse and expensive. Hog dung wafts as you walk along the lakeshore.
Editorials: Clarifying foibles
President Trump’s trade wars and shooting wars help provide clarity. Oil is killing us. It keeps us stuck in a permanent war in the Middle East. The trade war with China ruined soy export markets upon which Iowa producers had become dependent. We found that when our beans got too expensive the Chinese were ready to plow up the Brazilian rain forest. Climate change will consume us sooner or later unless we cut back on burning fossil fuels. That is no hoax.
That woodpecker could bring down the house, if you can hear it Original
It’s so noisy out a fella can scarcely hear himself think. You may seek refuge in the back yard listening for the songbird, but the hedge trimmer has a job to do. The dog barks at the hedge trimmer. The neighbor starts his muscle car. Flee to the middle of Little Lake and the hum of engines and industry trails you into the cattails. Weed whippers and leaf blowers. Chain saws and trucks backing up beeping. Four wheelers and firecrackers.
Editorials: Lahn’s bad week
Last week was tough for Zach Lahn, the Republican candidate for governor. The ground trembled a bit when the Iowa Farm Bureau political action committee did not endorse the self-described Belle Plaine regenerative farmer in his campaign against Democrat Rob Sand. Farm Bureau otherwise endorsed Republicans up and down the ballot, including Ashley Hinson for Senate, Mike Naig for agriculture secretary, Chris McGowan for Fourth District Congress and Lynn Evans for state senate. Why not Lahn?
Editorials: Lahn’s bad week
Last week was tough for Zach Lahn, the Republican candidate for governor. The ground trembled a bit when the Iowa Farm Bureau political action committee did not endorse the self-described Belle Plaine regenerative farmer in his campaign against Democrat Rob Sand. Farm Bureau otherwise endorsed Republicans up and down the ballot, including Ashley Hinson for Senate, Mike Naig for agriculture secretary, Chris McGowan for Fourth District Congress and Lynn Evans for state senate. Why not Lahn?
After 30 years or so, politicians starting to catch on about water pollution
Iowa’s midterm elections remind us that all politics is local as clean water and cancer emerge as prevailing issues, unique from other battleground states. Sure, stupid, it’s the economy. Diesel is over five bucks. You have to mortgage the farm to buy a steak. Data centers loom. You could be talking about Texas or Ohio. In the Tall Corn State, people are actually paying attention to the secretary of agriculture race.
Editorials: Leading on solar
Reason and process prevailed when the Cherokee County Board of Supervisors last week reversed a moratorium on battery storage for renewable energy development. This will allow the Smith Brothers of Aurelia to develop a 200-acre solar array with attendant lithium-iron battery storage around which cattle will graze. The Smiths were able to present their own engineering expertise along with assurances from experts at Iowa State University that evolving battery technology is stable and safe.
Look ma, no hands needed! Original
Ready or not, here it comes: They’re automating the packinghouse. Marble Technologies of Lincoln, Neb., uses artificial intelligence to eliminate human labor (and error) in packaging for meatpacking plants, covering about 3% of the nation’s beef production in just three years. It is working on automation “from the ground up” — kill floor to the loading dock. It won’t be long. The implications for Storm Lake, where thousands of knives are wielded by human hands daily, are enormous.
Zach Lahn is out fishing with Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
The Iowa GOP posted this photo of a recent fishing trip for Iowa Republican gubernatorial candidate Zach Lahn and Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert Kennedy Jr. Iowa GOP Two guys roam Scheels in West Des Moines, a bromance in the brew. Zach confides to Bobby that he likes Mepps spinners. Chartreuse. Bobby goes uh huh. So cool. Just two guys, doing what they do, fishing for a good time. It’s all over the socials.
Editorials: With friends like these …
President Trump toys with tariffs at our expense. He slapped a 50% tariff on Canadian goods and services despite a standing free-trade agreement. At the same time, Trump waived tariffs and cut a deal with nations unknown to bring cheap beef to market in the USA. Cattle producers felt betrayed by their man. Canada is Iowa’s biggest customer. Our economies are interwoven: Canada supplies us feeder pigs, and we supply them finished pork.
Our politics needs a manure digester pronto
Two guys roam Scheels in West Des Moines, a bromance in the brew. Zach confides to Bobby that he likes Mepps spinners. Chartreuse. Bobby goes uh huh. So cool. Just two guys, doing what they do, fishing for a good time. It’s all over the socials. Trump’s main vaccine fighter, nephew of the former president, with the Republican candidate for governor. Zach says they are “good friends.” You can almost hear them on the way to the farm pond at St. Mary’s: “You need crawlers?” “Nah.
Our politics needs a manure digester pronto
Two guys roam Scheels in West Des Moines, a bromance in the brew. Zach confides to Bobby that he likes Mepps spinners. Chartreuse. Bobby goes uh huh. So cool. Just two guys, doing what they do, fishing for a good time. It’s all over the socials. Trump’s main vaccine fighter, nephew of the former president, with the Republican candidate for governor. Zach says they are “good friends.” You can almost hear them on the way to the farm pond at St. Mary’s: “You need crawlers?” “Nah.
Editorials: Cattle need water
Climate change is at the root of high food prices. Drought on the Great Plains, from the Dakotas down to Texas, is driving cattle producers out of business. The pressure has been building for decades. Heifer numbers are down, feeder cattle prices are high, Tyson announced last week it had enough at Joslin, Ill., Eagle Mountain, Utah, and Pasco, Wash. Tyson shut down in Lexington, Neb., in January. Tyson will concentrate on three beef hubs at Amarillo,Tex., Dakota City, Neb., and Holcomb, Kan.
Editorials: Cattle need water
Climate change is at the root of high food prices. Drought on the Great Plains, from the Dakotas down to Texas, is driving cattle producers out of business. The pressure has been building for decades. Heifer numbers are down, feeder cattle prices are high, Tyson announced last week it had enough at Joslin, Ill., Eagle Mountain, Utah, and Pasco, Wash. Tyson shut down in Lexington, Neb., in January. Tyson will concentrate on three beef hubs at Amarillo,Tex., Dakota City, Neb., and Holcomb, Kan.
Commies in the cornfields? Original
Dad wore polished black wing tips and a blue suit 24/7. He went to the Elks Lodge every day and to Mass every Sunday. He did not spit on the sidewalk. He helped to defeat Hitler, Mussolini and Hirohito. He swore by the New Deal and JFK. He was a federal crop insurance agent. I guess that made him a socialist by today’s standards. FDR and Harry Hopkins of Sioux City, that notorious progressive hotbed, cooked up Social Security in the commie closet.
Editorials: Senate fails
The Senate Agriculture Committee failed to pass its version of the five-year farm bill last week because of an argument over nutrition funding. Majority Leader John Thune, R-SD, instinctively blamed Democrats for the 10-11 vote on the legislation already at least three years overdue. If Senators Mitch McConnell and Tommy Tuberville, both Republicans, had attended the defective legislation would have prevailed. They can count cattle in South Dakota but not senators. Fortunately, Sen.
Medicare for All is a winner
Those who wish me silent six feet under may be disappointed to hear that my blood test came back last week looking pretty good. Nine months following cancer surgery at the Mayo Clinic my prostate is carved by cryotherapy (freezing of the tumor) but apparently clean. Medicare allowed me to go to Rochester. Our newspaper’s health insurance plan confines you to regional providers offering fewer solutions. Medicare is one of the few benefits of growing old.
Editorials: Half-baked solar plan Original
Cherokee County officials devised a solar power and battery storage ordinance that prepares for 1990. Too bad it is 2026 and the locals put up a half-baked and pint-size response to a request by the Smith Brothers of Aurelia to develop a solar array with complementary battery storage. Cattle would graze among the solar panels.
Forgiveness amid the confusion Original
An elderly man from Alta died after a vehicle hit him while he was walking in the Walmart parking lot. The driver was Latino. No charges had been filed; the incident was under investigation. Which caused a young local woman to declare into a cellphone what most Iowans were thinking when they voted for Donald Trump, Steve King and Kim Reynolds: Why can’t those people just go back where they came from?
Editorials: Panthers fade to black
Sad news for us old gray Panthers that St. Mary’s will throw in the towel and participate on the public school teams in any sport, Tornadoes now. Our Uncle John Murray was the coach back in the day, when the Black & White fell in the substate tournament by a whisker to Emmetsburg Catholic (long gone). They had some great days in the Panther Pit and at Memorial Field. Jim Mech. Stacey Lavin. Eric Wordekemper.
Dancing around the issue of our time
Rob Sand in Storm Lake. Times Pilot Photo by Tom Foley Rob Sand spent a lot more time talking open primaries and ranked-choice voting than he did water pollution or cancer during a packed town hall event in Storm Lake last week. Art Cullen’s Notebook is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Who needs political parties? They’re just “private clubs” that keep the game dirty. Can’t we all just get along?
Dancing around the issue of our time
Rob Sand spent a lot more time talking open primaries and ranked-choice voting than he did water pollution or cancer during a packed town hall event in Storm Lake last week. Who needs political parties? They’re just “private clubs” that keep the game dirty. Can’t we all just get along? The crowd at Smokin’ Hereford ate it up. They’re hungry for some unity. They hate the acrimony. Love one another, the Norwegian Lutheran fisherman from Decorah implored. Applause. Who doesn’t love neighborly?
Editorials: Consolidation’s toll
Iowa’s pork consolidation started in earnest about 50 years ago when swine started to move indoors. In 1976, Iowa had an estimated 60,000 hog farms producing 15 million head. Today, according to image mapping done by Environmental Working Group, the Tall Corn State produces twice as many hogs from 15,000 operations. It has long been known that the Iowa Department of Natural Resources lost track of how many hog confinements filing manure management plans exist.
The microwave popped out of a bunch of refugees
Imagine 1,500 foreigners showing up in rural Iowa who can’t speak English, are pacifists, refuse to take loyalty oaths, live communally with no pay, and shun social convention. Arrest them! Then deport them! That’s what you do these days. Fortunately for coffee drinkers and defrosters, Iowa was not such a backwards place in the long yonder past.
Editorials: Farm bill when?
With hope for the holidays in his heart, Sen. Chuck Grassley predicted — when the Storm Lake Times Pilot prodded — that a farm bill should pass by Christmas. It is three years overdue already. A new farm bill is unlikely to take shape before the midterm elections. A radical version passed the House that bogged down in the Senate, where it will be moderated.
War on Iowa will extend past November Original
President Trump and the ayatollahs blew up any hopes of taming inflation with renewed bombing of Iran and the Persian Gulf, just as fuel prices were softening. Gas jumped and stocks slumped when Trump said that the cease-fire was over, and that the Iranians are “scum” and “kuckoo” after they attacked commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz.
Editorials: Bridging the divide Original
Clean air and water should be non-partisan goals for Iowa, which has serious pollution and health issues. We’re encouraged by the discussion taking place across the state and across the political divide about how we can make agriculture more prosperous and resilient while protecting our natural resources. Zach Lahn, the Republican nominee for governor, touted himself as a regenerative farmer from Belle Plaine during his primary campaign. It resonated with conservatives.
Our outrage could redeem us
Chris Jones and his boss at the water works used to ask as they gathered daily to discuss the roiling river’s polluted water: “Where’s the outrage?” Iowans are freaking out over our leading cancer rates, chemical companies are held harmless by the Supreme Court, and it turns out Trump fleeced the world for $2 billion in just a year. “The outrage has arrived!” Jones declared at the Iowa Democratic Convention. The delegates went nuts. Nuts for a secretary of ag candidate, mind you. The outrage is why.
Editorials: Neighbors in danger
Our neighbors living here under Temporary Protected Status from places like Haiti, Cuba or Central America are in immediate danger of deportation to places of chaos and mayhem now that the US Supreme Court has ruled that the Trump Administration has the authority to deport them. The court essentially ruled that temporary does not mean permanent. Homeland Security Director Markwayne Mullin said Sunday that refugees could apply for permanent status under different avenues.
This is our Day of Deliverance; we are not Summer Soldiers Original
“I am apt to believe that [Independence Day] will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more.” — John Adams, in a letter to his wife Abigail, on July 3, 1776.
Editorials: Shielding the sun
Our region is attracting attention from renewable energy developers and opposition from suspicious neighbors. Cherokee County is trying to assemble an ordinance governing solar arrays and battery storage in the face of a request to develop such a facility on a couple hundred acres near Aurelia, combined with livestock grazing. The fire departments are eager to develop safety plans and training.
Editorials: Shielding the sun
Our region is attracting attention from renewable energy developers and opposition from suspicious neighbors. Cherokee County is trying to assemble an ordinance governing solar arrays and battery storage in the face of a request to develop such a facility on a couple hundred acres near Aurelia, combined with livestock grazing. The fire departments are eager to develop safety plans and training.
Guest Column: This old dog might catch the bumper
Clean water, healthy rural communities buoy Jones ag campaign Chris Jones fancied himself trolling for walleyes in the backwaters of the Upper Mississippi River near Lansing in his retirement. Instead, the 65-year-old found himself disembarking at Philadelphia for the NetRoots conference on his way to a goal of raising $1 million in his uphill Iowa Secretary of Agriculture campaign against Republican incumbent Mike Naig.
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