Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, the oldest sitting U.S. senator at 93, told Republicans he does not want a Democratic governor choosing his successor if he dies in office.
Grassley made the remarks Friday at the GOP’s annual Reagan Dinner in West Des Moines, where he spoke candidly about age, unfinished work, and the stakes of Iowa’s governor race this fall.
ABC News reported the Iowa Republican’s warning that a Democrat in the governor’s office could fill his Senate seat on a temporary basis if he died before the end of his term.
He did not dress it up. He named the risk and tied it straight to the upcoming election for governor.
Grassley is serving his eighth Senate term. That term is set to expire Jan. 3, 2029. He has not said whether he will run again in 2028.
Under the process described in the reporting, if Grassley died in the next two years, the next Iowa governor, the one voters choose this fall, would make a temporary appointment. That appointee would hold the seat until the 2028 election.
That is the mechanism. Grassley made clear he does not want a Democrat holding the pen.
He told the room:
"I don't want a Democrat governor choosing my successor,"
And he added the fuller thought in the same stretch of remarks:
"But I want to take advantage of it. But one of the reasons I'm worried about who's going to be elected governor -- I don’t plan on dying in office -- but if I did, I don’t want a Democrat governor choosing my successor."
He also spoke about the limited number of nights left like this one. At 93, he said, he does not know how many more Republican gatherings he will get.
"At 93 years of age, I don't know how many more groups of Republicans like this I’m going to have a chance to talk to,"
He celebrated that 93rd birthday on Sept. 17. Days later, on Sept. 23, 2026, he was still on the job in Washington, presiding over a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on men in women’s sports at the Dirksen Senate Office Building. He chairs that committee.
The portrait is not of a man fading out. It is of a senator still working the gavel while warning his own party about what happens if the wrong governor is in place when a vacancy hits.
The fall contest is not abstract. Democrat Rob Sand, Iowa’s state auditor, and Republican Zach Lahn are the names attached to the polling cited in the coverage.
A late June Fox News poll showed Sand leading Lahn by 9 points among registered voters. A New York Times/Siena poll from around the same period found the two essentially neck-and-neck among likely voters.
Those numbers matter beyond Des Moines. A governor’s temporary Senate appointment is short by design, but it is still a real seat, a real vote, and a real shift in who speaks for Iowa until voters get another say in 2028.
Grassley framed the worry as practical, not theatrical. He said he does not plan to die in office. He also said he is not indifferent to who would choose a replacement if that plan failed.
For taxpayers and lawful residents who expect stable representation, the point is simple. Senate power does not sit in a vacuum. It tracks elections, including the one for governor.
Grassley has outlasted most of his peers. He is the oldest sitting U.S. senator. He is still chairing Judiciary. He is still showing up at Republican dinners in West Des Moines. And he is still refusing to treat succession as someone else’s problem.
He has not locked in a 2028 decision. He has locked in a standard: he does not want a Democratic governor naming the person who would finish his work if he could not.
That is a clear signal to Iowa Republicans and to anyone who tracks how Senate seats actually change hands between elections. The governor’s race is not only about state agencies and budgets. It is about who would hold temporary power over a U.S. Senate seat that has been in Grassley’s hands for decades.
Voters can weigh the polls, the calendar, and the appointment rule for themselves. Grassley already told them what outcome he rejects.
Self-government still runs on who holds the office when the unexpected happens, and Grassley is right to treat that choice as a fight worth having now.
