Q&A With Adam Zabner

By Tai Caputo

QUESTION: You serve on the Environmental Protection and National Resources Committees. How did you become interested in the environment? Did you have exposure to it at City?

Even when I was at City–it’s definitely grown since, and I’ve been impressed by the student actions–there was a lot of conversations and activism among the student body around environmental issues, for sure, and those were some of the issues I’m interested in working on in the legislature. It’s sort of difficult, it’s something that the majority party often does not take seriously. And if you sit through some of those Environmental Protection Committee meetings, there’s a lot of denialism about what is happening both in terms of water quality in our state, and in terms of the border international issues with climate change. But I think one of the things that’s really cool about representing Iowa City is that at the University, we have experts in these fields, and so I’ve really had the opportunity to learn a lot from those folks. And then on those communities even being in the minority, I’ve had opportunities to bring in some experts. We’ve had opportunities to hear from the University of Iowa that come from this district presenting about some of these issues, which has been a really cool thing planning to help organize those help of conversations going forward, too.

What did you learn from running other people’s campaigns?

I think the coolest thing I learned work- ing on campaigns–well, two things really: number one just how powerful a group of passionate people coming together can be. And you know when I started to work for Pete Butigeg, literally no one knew who he was, I would stand at the farmers market holding my sign, and people would ask me if I was Pete. Getting to see the group of activist volunteers and him really being launched into a successful Iowa caucus night was a powerful experience in how quickly things can change when you have a good group working really hard. I think the second thing I learned [while] talking to voters, listening to people, it’s just really special especially here in Iowa, when you’re knocking doors, talking to voters, folks are really willing to share with you some deeply personal things about the way they think about politics, the way they think about the world and which issues are important to them. And that to me is just really wonderful and I learned so much through conversations with voters not just here in Iowa City, but in some of my work all over the state and [in] some more rural areas. That really still impacts how I think about Iowa and Iowans.

Can you explain what your job is like? Was it what you expected to serve in the General Assembly as a representative?

It’s very exciting, getting to work at the Capitol every day, especially the first week, there’s a lot of pomp and circumstance, and it’s hard to believe you’re actually there, it’s been really wonderful getting to meet colleagues. We have a very large freshman class, 39 out of 100 of us, and there’s a couple that I’ve become very close with that I think are wonderful, and I’ve learned a lot from folks already on both sides of the aisle. I also think there’s been a lot of disappointment in the last five weeks. . . . Public education, for me, is one of the most important issues, and so to see these attacks on public education, to see the passage of the vouchers bill on partisan vote, to see some of these attacks on our most vulnerable students in terms of the don’t-say-gay, don’t-say-trans type of legislation that’s moving to our body is really, really disappointing. What does your day-to-day job look like?

I think one thing that surprises people sometimes is that we don’t have offices, we sit on the floor of the House, in chairs. . . I usually arrive between 7:30 and 8:00 in the morning and have opportunity to meet with different groups to talk to, legislators, about whatever issue there is to talk about, and it really changes day to day, but I serve on several committees, and so there are committee meetings, for the bills we have to sign.

This is a tough time to be a Democrat in the Iowa House of Representatives.