Editorial: A campaign gift

Republican legislators are giving State Auditor Rob Sand a great campaign issue as he explores running for governor as a Democrat. The Iowa Senate voted Tuesday along party lines to allow state agencies to hire private accounting firms to conduct their annual audits required by law, instead of using the auditor’s office.

Last year, the legislature stripped the auditor of many of his investigative powers.

Sand and Democratic senators claim Republicans are trying to knee-cap the auditor. Sand says that diminishing the auditor’s role in these stages will lead to less public oversight and more corruption.

Republicans said that agencies could save money by using private certified public accounting firms. The Legislative Service Agency reported that actual charges from private companies were higher than the $85 per hour charged by the state auditor. The lowest reported private rate was $93 per hour. Some rates were twice that.

Sand is the only Democrat holding a statewide elective office. As such, it makes him a big target for the GOP. It also makes him a leading contender for governor as 2026 approaches. He will make a strong argument that Republicans are afraid of him because he stands for squeaky clean government.

The auditor has been a model of restraint, which is a point of frustration. The wholesale reform and privatization of Medicaid occurred while the auditor and attorney general largely stood aside (Tom Miller lost his job as attorney general to Brenna Bird). After the damage was done, Sand did release a report on some parts of the privatization. At the local level, we begged for a state audit of missing tax increment financing revenue. Sand said that he could not get involved because he was not properly asked to do so. The City of Storm Lake claims that it did inquire with his office. Whatever the case, no audit private or public has been performed to our knowledge. No study has been done on how tax increment financing accounted for statewide. We suspect Buena Vista County is not alone, but we will never know, especially if the Republicans emasculate the constitutional office.

Sand certainly can make the point that he never abused his authority.

Why are Republicans acting like they are afraid of Sand?

Iowans elected him because they want an adversary watching over the administration. Efforts to rein him in will only fuel his primary and general election campaigns, while setting up himself or his successor in the auditor’s office to run on the same issue. Other Democrats will run for secretary of state, treasurer and attorney general as fiscal watchdogs and saviors of democracy. Republicans are helping rebuild the shattered Iowa Democratic Party by giving them an issue that every Iowa voter can understand.