To Save Our Democracy We Have to Invest in New Leaders

Jul 17, 2025

Ben Schauer candidate for rural Iowa House district 15 and Ellen Walsh-Rosmann farmer and owner of Milk & Honey Restaurant being interviewed by Channel 7 News out of Omaha, Nebraska on July 13 in Harlan, Iowa.

Rural Iowans are ready to lead. Young Iowans are ready to lead. We do multiplication and not addition when we have new leaders like Ben Schauer who are both.

Like a lot of rural Democrats, I’m a big fan of Jess Piper. She travels around to rural communities to talk about the importance of rural Americans in our current political landscape.

I was In Nodaway, Iowa on June 29 to participate in the Rural Candidate Support PAC dinner. Jess was the keynote.

Last Sunday, I was in Harlan for the Reviving Rural Iowa Summit sponsored by Audubon, Carroll, Crawford, Harrison, Monona, and Shelby County Democrats.

Every chair in Milk & Honey was taken and people were standing around all three sides of the room facing the podium. Nearly a dozen rural and statewide Democratic leaders provided the substance with ample time for questions from the crowded room.

Jess Piper was again the keynote. She writes at The View from Rural Missouri advocating that if we want to win national and statewide races again, political leaders and the Democratic party need to invest in candidates in rural communities. Her sermons about rural Americans being ready to show up and lead rang true in both Nodaway and Harlan.

Rural people are stepping up and into the movement building that our crisis of leadership demands right now. Take a few minutes to watch this excellent coverage on Channel 7 News out of Omaha, nearly an hour drive each way from Harlan.

Big Democratic events in rural communities like Harlan led by local Democrats in counties that voted for Trump by more than 70% are news. The Channel 7 News crew was there for the entire event.

As for threats to our democracy, I wrote about that on January 26: “Cow Tipping Is Real: Democracy ain't dead yet, but we gotta act now.” I wrote that like a bloated cow on its back with four hooves in the air and gasping for breath, our nation is in crisis. We are still hooves up and every day at greater risk of losing our democracy.

The Trump administration is openly trying to break every aspect of the federal government they are allowed to break. Republicans in Congress are cheering them on.

Monday, the Roberts Supreme Court allowed the Trump Administration to fire without cause federal employees at the Department of Education.

Slate had this to say.

SCOTUS has now, in effect, allowed the president to destroy an entire agency by himself, an action that would’ve been unthinkable for most of history. The conservative justices are accelerating this administration’s lawless seizure of duties and prerogatives that the Constitution expressly assigned to Congress.

I’m still optimistic that democracy isn’t dead yet. I’m inspired by the response of rural Iowans. I’m seeing great leadership and feeling tremendous energy.

But there is something missing. One of my political colleagues a little older than me shared their disappointment that the room at Milk & Honey was filled with mostly baby boomers and some Gen Xers like me, but very few Millenials and Gen Zs.

“Where are the young people? Do they know what’s at stake?”

It’s a fair question. After all, if we don’t get democracy back on its feet and instead the United States of America becomes an authoritarian police state, they’re going to have to live with it a lot longer than the Boomers and the Gen Xers.

However, I think asking where they are and do they know what’s at stake are the wrong questions.

Here are two more important questions we should be asking. First, do we see them?

As Jess Piper rightfully rallies a cry about how the national Democratic Party doesn’t see rural voters, or take us seriously, I think that goes doubly for twenty and thirty somethings everywhere.

Second, are we ready and willing to invest in young Democrats?

On April 4, in my column “Democrats Need a Jobs Program Now: We have to invest in new leaders NOW in order to beat Republicans later” I wrote,

In order to get our nation back on track, our economy working again, and our global leadership re-asserted for good, the left needs a jobs program now to hire and resource new leaders. We especially need young Americans who have the skills, worldview, passion, optimism, commitment, and vision to lead our nation into a hopeful and abundant future.

I’m not seeing a jobs program. I’m not seeing an investment. I’m not seeing the desire to hand off the baton.

On Monday, Andrew Cuomo announced he will run as an Independent in the New York City Mayoral race. Why? Because he lost in the primary to a 33 year old who ran a brilliant race. Zohran Mamdani was loud and proud about his plans to fight to make New York a livable city for everyone, including and especially lower income and younger New Yorkers.

The National Democratic leadership has given Mamdani less than a hero’s welcome to the national stage. Many are freaking out that he scored a massive upset victory in the primary.

I was at a garden party over the 4th of July weekend and had a conversation with some fellow Gen Xers. We were talking about the progressive energy in rural Iowa right now.

They are also parents of kids in their 20s. So I asked if their Gen Z kids were getting involved politically. They aren’t.

My friends said their adult children are worried about buying a house, paying off student debt, finding jobs, and trying to get better jobs.

We can wag our fingers at them and tell them they’d better get on board, or they will never find better jobs or be able to buy a house.

And they can tell us that they’ve had enough of the likes of President Biden, Governor Cuomo, and those of us still holding onto those leaders telling them to get in line.

And they are right. The people who spent billions on telling them and all of us that we’d lose our democracy if Republicans won did almost nothing in response after losing the election.

I wrote about democracy being on its back, hooves up, gasping for air the first week of the Trump Administration. President Obama finally showed up last month. This month he’s increasing his warnings, but his actions don’t align with the crisis he is warning about.

I find it hypocritical for any of us to judge Millennials and Gen Zs for not showing up yet. Most of us are still waiting for national Democratic leaders, donors, and media darlings to have the same sense of urgency and action that many ordinary Americans have been expressing now for months.

Considering how we as rural Americans feel about how Democrats have written us off, we should have some empathy about how young people are feeling at this moment, especially as they watch Cuomo go after Mamdani egged on by many in the Democratic establishment.

On Sunday, as we feasted on homemade desserts and put bills and checks into buckets to support the six county organizing efforts, my friend was right. The absence of twenty and thirty somethings at protests and events is a concern. We can’t save our democracy without them.

We need to ask these potential new leaders “what do you need to be part of this movement?” And after we take stock of their reply, we need to follow up with “how can we make that happen?”

I realize some of us might feel that the older Gen Zs and younger Millennials expect too much and haven’t paid their dues. We can be tempted to roll our eyes and mutter under our breath that they just need to show up.

Another way to look at it is by not showing up, they are calling out the bullshit. They are holding up a mirror and maybe older Democrats don’t like what we see.

I’d bet the farm that if we ask them “what do you need and how can we invest in you,” we’d like the long term results of saving our democracy, even if the short term results of handing off the baton are hard for us to swallow.

They need jobs. They need opportunities. They are built to help lead this movement. What do we have to lose if we hand them the reins? If we don’t, we’ll keep losing elections and we’ll lose our democracy. If that happens are they to blame for not showing up? Or are older Democrats, and especially national leaders, more to blame for not investing in our future?

Speaking of future leaders, Jess Piper wasn’t the only one in both Nodaway and Harlan. Ben Schauer was also at both. I met him in Nodaway. I loved what he said to the group, but I hadn’t gotten my phone pointed at him soon enough to grab video. So he humored me by going outside and repeating much of his important message from what he learned running in 2024 for the Iowa House. He’s running again for 2026. Please take two minutes to listen to this committed young leader.

You can learn more about him at his campaign website. And like us at Coyote Run Farm you can give him some financial support, even if you won’t be able to vote for him either.

Here’s a piece of wisdom from his video that struck me as critically important for building the movement that all Americans must work together to build right now. There are so many ways to measure victory beyond just winning.

In this election cycle, challenge yourself to find young leaders you can support, even if they aren’t likely to win. Help recruit early career leaders you can encourage to run. Buy them a cup of coffee. Mentor them in movement building. Make a donation. Pass them the baton.

If you see young and early career Americans at the protests today, thank them for being there. If it seems like it’s an older crowd than the moment calls for, consider who you know that you think could have been there. Then ask them what it would take to get them involved and be ready to respond with “Let me see what I can do to help make that happen.”

Considering not just rural Americans and young Americans but across all communities and constituencies, national Democrats and their donors, influencers, and consultants must invest in people where they are, so they can help take us where we need to go.

The difference between saving our democracy and losing it isn’t whether young people will show up or not. It’s whether we’re going to invest in them or refuse to pass the baton.

Growing New Leaders: Perspectives from Coyote Run Farm

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