Iowa Democrat Josh Turek’s New Ad Says Taxpayers Shouldn’t Pay for Trans Care

Josh Turek’s latest Senate ad pairs a promise against discrimination with restrictions on trans athletes and health care funding. The Iowa Democrat makes both arguments in a 29-second spot, opening with a childhood photo of himself holding a basketball.

The ad went out Saturday, Oct. 24, 10 days before voters decide whether Turek or Republican Rep. Ashley Hinson takes Iowa’s open U.S. Senate seat. AdImpact posted the spot on X that afternoon. By Sunday, trans advocates were calling Turek’s stance cruel. What Josh Turek’s ad says about trans care

“I’m against taxpayers paying for sex changes too. Anyone tells you any different is lying.” That is Turek’s entire statement about health care funding in the ad. No age limit. No mention of Medicaid or a particular piece of legislation.

Turek, a state representative from Council Bluffs, speaks from a gym. He won Paralympic gold with the U.S. wheelchair basketball team in Rio and Tokyo. He uses that experience to argue for rules in sports.

The sports restriction he endorses is already law in Iowa, as he points out himself. Gov. Kim Reynolds signed the ban on trans girls and women in female school and college sports in 2022. The ad finishes with a pledge to lower costs for Iowans.

“Sex changes” is his phrase. I’d like him to explain which treatments he means, and whose coverage he would take away. The ad leaves adult care, youth care and the relevant insurance programs unspecified. Trans advocates challenge Turek’s message

“Turek’s stance is cruel, electorally misguided, and out of step with his own party,” Tyler Hack, executive director of the Christopher Street Project, told Erin in the Morning. The group backs pro-trans candidates.

Erin Reed, writing in Erin in the Morning, warned that a sweeping federal ban could reach Medicaid, Medicare, veterans’ care and federally subsidized insurance. She was describing the potential consequences of a broad exclusion. Turek did not name those programs in the spot.

For a patient relying on public insurance, losing coverage can make legal treatment unaffordable. That is why the missing details matter.

Turek isn’t alone in Iowa. Reuters reported earlier this month that Democratic governor nominee Rob Sand had endorsed restrictions on trans athletes, while House candidate Sarah Trone Garriott ran an ad opposing trans women’s access to women’s locker rooms.

“You don’t have to capitulate and use Republican talking points to win elections,” Iowa state Rep. Aime Wichtendahl told Reuters. Wichtendahl is the first openly transgender person elected to the Iowa Legislature.

There is also open disagreement within the party about whether this approach wins anyone over. At a Maine town hall, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez pushed back on the idea that trans rights are a losing issue, in response to a question from a trans student. What his Iowa voting record shows

House File 1049, the 2025 health budget bill, is the vote to look at. According to PolitiFact’s June fact-check, Turek opposed it. The measure included the Medicaid exclusion alongside many other spending decisions. His no vote doesn’t settle whether he supported or opposed that particular cut.

Iowa’s June 30, 2025, notice to providers sets out the Medicaid cut. Reimbursement for transition-related surgery and associated procedures, including hormone therapy, would end July 1.

Hinson has used trans issues against Turek throughout the race. Her post-primary attack ad accused him of supporting “sex changes for kids” while showing surgical footage. PolitiFact rated the claim False: the school law cited in the ad concerned telling parents when students ask to use a different name or pronouns. It did not authorize medical treatment.

Turek opposed that school law. He had approved leave for the separate 2023 vote banning gender-affirming medical care for minors, PolitiFact found. His campaign told the outlet he opposed gender-affirming surgeries for minors. Republican U.S. Rep. Ashley Hinson at a water quality roundtable in West Des Moines on Oct. 9, 2026. Photo: Charlie Neibergall/Getty Images.

Related | Sarah Huckabee Sanders faces backlash over an anti-trans sports ad The Iowa Senate race remains close

The seat is open because Republican Sen. Joni Ernst is retiring. Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 3, and the available polling offers little certainty about who will replace her.

Marist’s Oct. 8–11 survey put Turek at 48% and Hinson at 45% among likely voters. That three-point gap was well within the poll’s margin of error of plus or minus 6.6 percentage points for likely voters.

Those interviews preceded the ad, so they cannot measure its effect. I wouldn’t treat the poll as evidence that this message wins votes. Voters still deserve to know what Turek would actually do with the Senate seat.

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