KDSN RADIO News
Among six top leaders in 2025 Iowa legislature, one is new to role
The 2025 Iowa legislature convenes Monday and Republicans have kept their House and Senate leadership teams in place. House Democrats will have the same leader, but there’s a new Senate Minority Leader.
Senate Minority Leader Janice Weiner is entering her third year as a state senator, representing her hometown of Iowa City.
“(I’m) a graduate of Iowa City West High School, went to college, went to law school. I decided, pretty much like my parents, that public service was a better option for me,” Weiner told Radio Iowa. “I took the test and joined the U.S. Foreign Service.”
Weiner was a U.S. diplomat for 26 years, with assignments in places like Turkey, Poland, Canada and Mexico. In 1989, Weiner was in East Berlin when the Berlin Wall fell. “It was a great career that I think gave me a lot of tools that I can bring to bear and have brought to bear in the statehouse so far,” Weiner said. “I spent my career talking to people across the political spectrum and working really hard to understand how all the pieces fit together.”
Weiner moved back to Iowa City in 2015 and served three years on the city council in Iowa City before winning a seat in the Iowa Senate in 2022. She is one of just 15 Democrats in the Iowa Senate — the fewest number of seats held by Democrats since 1970. “We recognize that we’re in the minority,” Weiner said, “and we’re not going to be the ones making policy.”
Weiner saod Senate Democrats are ready to critique Republican policies that will be proposed this year, as well as those Republicans have enacted over the past eight years as Republicans have controlled the legislative and executive branches of state government “And we won’t just do it on the floor of the senate,” she said. “We will do it when we’re home. We will do it when we’re out around the state, at listening posts, talking to other folks.”
Weiner is the fourth woman to serve as Senate Minority Leader, following Democrats Pat Jochum and Janet Petersen and Republican Mary Lundby. Three of the top six leaders for the 2025 Iowa Legislative session are women.
“That’s just the way it should be. It shouldn’t matter whether I’m a man or a woman, but can do the job?” Weiner said. “I think I can do the job and so can my colleagues.”
Amy Sinclair will continue as Senate President and Jack Whitver is entering his seventh year as Senate Majority Leader. In the House, Speaker Pat Grassley and Majority Leader Matt Windschitl are entering their fifth year in those roles. Jennifer Konfrst has been the Democratic Leader in the House since mid-2021.
