Battle For Iowa Senate Seat Heats Up

Mark Doland and his family

Oskaloosa, Iowa – Interest in the new Iowa Senate District Number 40 is heating up with Oskaloosa resident Mark Doland also considering tossing his hat into the ring of contention against fellow Republican Ken Rozenboom.

“I am in the deep consideration phases. I have made the decision, I won’t make anything formal until November,” Doland said of his intentions.

Born and raised in Altoona, Doland moved to the Oskaloosa area 6 years ago, where he is the minister at the Church of Christ.

Doland had made his decision about the seat when an earlier candidate decided that they would not seek the seat, and before he was aware of “any other contenders were in the race as serious candidates.” Doland believes this would be a wide open race and also a big primary. He believes that there will be more than 2 candidates with others coming from the more southern part of the district.

I asked Doland what would make him any different than the other Republicans that would be running for the seat. “All of us are going to be the same on issues such as economic policy, deregulation, tax reform, making Iowa business friendly for businesses to come here and open up businesses. I believe that one thing that might be different between Ken Rozenboom and I, is that in Ken, you get a good vote on marriage, you’ll get a good vote on life issues. On the social issues as I have been a champion of those issues. I’ve worked for other candidates that worked hard. I worked for Mike Huckabee back in 2008, Bob Vander Plaats in the Republican Primary against Terry Branstad. Danny Carroll, who was taken out by the Tim Gill folks.” Doland was also active in helping in the ousting of the three Iowa Supreme Court Justices in the last election cycle. Doland went on to say, “I’ve been very active in politics. Not only am I a good vote on it, these are things I will champion”.

Doland went on to explain how he believed he would make a difference if elected. “I believe that there is a outcry from the public from the people who are just common folks who believe in traditional family values, good, sound economic policy and understand workings of government, who’s been involved. The people are tired of crony capitalism. They’re tired of the establishment, and I believe that if a band of us, and I believe there is a band of people in this movement that they call the Tea Party, that will rise up and we’ll have a good voice rather than just having one or two Tea Party type in the Senate. I believe that with five or six you can get a lot more done if you vote in a block.”

Mark Doland

How would you respond to those that say you’re too conservative, and you won’t compromise to get legislation passed. “I believe that on certain issues that you can’t compromise. They’re issues of conviction that I have such as life and marriage. There are other issues that are a little bit more flexible, that I’m willing to listen to, for example, Agriculture. I don’t have a really strong background in Agriculture, but I’m willing to listen to all sides of the argument and those are places that I think that we can have some discussions.”

Doland also expressed his beliefs on the economy. “Basically I believe in a free market system. I believe that the more money the government takes from you, the less freedom you have to go purchase what ever you want with it,” Doland said, expanding more on his thoughts about being economically conservative. “I believe that freedom comes through sound economic policy. If they take more of our money, the less freedom that we have.”

I posed the question of how one person can make a difference when they are just one vote in the group. “I believe that the experience that I bring as a minister in this area. I know the woes, the economic woes of the Independents, of the Democrats. Christians are Christians. People who have lost jobs, all those types of things, I can be sympathetic to them. I can be a listening ear, and I can take my constituents’ message up to Des Moines in the Senate. I would only be one person, but I think that if everybody represents their district in that fashion, I think that government would run a lot more smoothly than having people at the state level that we’re going to vote for this year.”

I asked Doland if there was anything he would like to add that I may have not touched on during our visit. “I’m really a strong supporter of Voter ID. I believe that the Secretary of State Matt Schultz had that bill last year, it didn’t get passed. It didn’t have supporters. I’m a strong supporter of the Voter ID,” Doland said finishing up his time with us.