Josh Turek is a two-time Paralympic gold medalist, Iowa State Representative, disability advocate, and lifelong Council Bluffs community member running for the United States Senate.
Josh was born with spina bifida after his father was exposed to Agent Orange while serving in Vietnam. By the age of 12, he had undergone 21 surgeries. He went on to become one of the most accomplished wheelchair basketball players in the country, representing Team USA at four Paralympic Games and winning two gold medals. His final Paralympic appearance ended with gold in Tokyo in 2021.
Josh grew up in a working-class family in Council Bluffs and graduated from Abraham Lincoln High School. He continued his basketball career at Southwest Minnesota State University, where he became the most prolific scorer in program history, graduated in 2002, and later earned an MBA. He has since been inducted into the halls of fame at Abraham Lincoln High School, Southwest Minnesota State University, and the National Wheelchair Basketball Association.
While playing professionally, Josh served as Volunteer Director for the Ryan Martin Foundation, which provides children with disabilities opportunities to participate in sports at no cost. He also worked with patients and physicians at a wheelchair and mobility-assistance company, helping people with disabilities obtain mobility devices and complex rehabilitation technology. That experience gave him a firsthand view of gaps in the healthcare system and helped shape his later work on disability rights and healthcare policy.
After retiring from basketball, Josh ran for the Iowa House in his hometown. He won a district Donald Trump had carried twice by just six votes, then was reelected by five points while Trump simultaneously carried the district by eight. His campaign attributes that crossover performance to his reputation as a bipartisan, common-sense legislator willing to work across party lines.
In the Iowa House, Josh has worked on issues including veterans’ benefits, disability rights, healthcare, workers’ rights, housing, public education, and support for farmers. His campaign highlights legislation to strengthen the veterans’ homestead tax credit, make wheelchair and mobility-device repairs easier, cap insulin costs, expand Medicaid dental services, protect nursing-home patients, support first-time homebuyers, limit private-equity purchases of Iowa homes, raise the minimum wage, protect organizing rights, and expand water-quality monitoring.
Josh is running for the Senate on a working-class economic agenda focused on:
- lowering the cost of housing, groceries, childcare, healthcare, and prescription drugs
- cutting taxes for middle-class and working families while closing loopholes for billionaires and large corporations
- strengthening unions and collective bargaining through the PRO Act
- protecting Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and the Affordable Care Act
- supporting rural hospitals and expanding telehealth
- defending reproductive freedom and access to contraception and IVF
- protecting public schools and opposing school vouchers
- fighting monopolies and private-equity consolidation
- supporting Iowa farmers through Right to Repair, country-of-origin labeling, and fair trade policy
- protecting clean air, water, and soil
- strengthening veterans’ healthcare and benefits
- expanding rights and opportunities for people with disabilities
- reforming immigration with both border security and an earned path to citizenship
- banning congressional stock trading and reducing corporate influence in politics.
Josh’s life has been defined by overcoming barriers and by turning those experiences into public service.
He is now running for the U.S. Senate to build an economy that rewards work, make healthcare more affordable, strengthen Iowa communities, and ensure working families have a stronger voice in Washington.
I was born an underdog. 21 surgeries by the age of 12 for spina bifida. A kid wearing goodwill hand-me-downs. I knew nothing would come easy, but I never doubted my right to the American dream.
Now, I'm running for the U.S. Senate to make sure all Iowans have a shot at theirs.