Sen. Chuck Grassley, the longest-serving member of the United States Senate, is not ruling out another run. The Iowa Republican told the Daily Iowan he would decide on a ninth term in roughly a year to eighteen months, and he has already filed a statement of candidacy with the Federal Election Commission.
If Grassley runs in 2028 and wins, he would be 101 years old by the time that term expires. He turns 92 in September.
The filing, reported by the Washington Examiner, does not commit Grassley to a campaign. But it does something more telling: it keeps the door wide open at a moment when Iowa's Republican bench is already reshuffling around him.
Asked directly about his plans, Grassley offered a non-answer that sounded a lot like preparation. He told the Daily Iowan:
"Ask me again in a year, maybe a year and a half."
He said the factors he weighs are the same ones he has considered before, "family considerations and whether or not I can do the job." That formulation is notable for what it leaves out. Grassley did not mention age. He did not suggest retirement. He framed the question entirely around capability and family, the same test he says he has applied through more than four decades in the Senate.
Grassley has served in Congress for over 50 years. He entered the House in 1975, moved to the Senate in 1981, and has not lost a race since. In 2022, at age 89, he defeated Democratic challenger Michael Franken with 56 percent of the vote in his eighth reelection campaign.
That margin was comfortable, but the broader political landscape in Iowa has shifted since then. Newsmax reported that Sen. Joni Ernst has signaled she will not seek reelection, making her the first Iowa Republican senator to voluntarily retire since 1968. Rep. Ashley Hinson is widely expected to pursue Ernst's open seat in 2026, which could trigger a broader Republican reshuffle, including the possibility that Iowa House Speaker Pat Grassley, the senator's grandson, enters the race for Hinson's congressional district.
Grassley has built his political brand on a ritual that most modern senators abandoned long ago: visiting all 99 Iowa counties every year, holding open question-and-answer sessions with constituents. He described the practice in straightforward terms.
"I do the same thing all six years of a term. I just travel the counties every year and have a Q&A in every county."
He said he lets voters set the agenda at those sessions. "I let them set the agenda on their Q&As," Grassley stated. What he hears, he said, is not abstract Washington politics. It is prescription drug prices. The five-year Farm Bill. E15 ethanol blending. Transportation funding. The Highway Bill and Infrastructure Bill, which he noted "runs out at the end of this year."
That list reads like a to-do list, not a farewell tour. Grassley is chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and president pro tempore of the Senate, third in the line of presidential succession. Those are not positions a man holds while quietly packing his desk.
His continued focus on federal election legislation further suggests an active agenda. Grassley is the co-author of the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, which would require voter ID at the polls and proof of citizenship when registering to vote. Asked about the bill's prospects, Grassley deferred to Senate Majority Leader John Thune.
"You'll have to ask Senator John Thune that whenever he forces the vote, and I think he's looking forward to getting it passed."
On the substance of voter ID, Grassley was blunt: "I think it's pretty simple for people that can't show the documents that you prove your citizenship."
Grassley's relationship with President Donald Trump adds another layer to the 2028 question. Trump has repeatedly claimed on social media that he secured Grassley's reelection to the Senate, saying Grassley was "down, by a lot" before Trump's intervention. The two have also been in a recent standoff over the Judiciary Committee's "blue slip" practice, which allows senators to block judicial nominees who would serve in their home states.
That tension has not stopped Grassley from appearing alongside Trump. An image caption from a July 3, 2025, event shows Grassley arriving at a Trump rally in Des Moines. And during his 2022 campaign, Grassley made no secret of his alignment with the former president. Fox News reported that Grassley publicly welcomed Trump's endorsement, citing Trump's 91 percent approval rating among Iowa Republicans.
"Anybody who's got the approval rating of 91% of the Republicans in Iowa, you surely wouldn't be stupid enough to turn down that help."
Grassley also told Fox News at the time, "I'm smart enough to accept that endorsement." The pragmatism was characteristic. Grassley has survived in Iowa politics for half a century not by chasing ideological purity but by showing up, listening, and delivering on the issues that matter to rural voters, Farm Bills, ethanol, infrastructure, and the basic mechanics of self-government.
The standoff with Trump over blue slips, meanwhile, reflects Grassley's institutional streak. He has defended Senate prerogatives on judicial nominations even when it puts him at odds with a president from his own party. That kind of independence is familiar territory for Republican senators willing to push back when they believe congressional authority is at stake.
The obvious question hanging over Grassley's 2028 deliberation is age. If he wins a ninth term, he would serve until he is 101. That is not a typo. His current term already extends to age 95.
Grassley has answered the age question the same way for years: by pointing to his schedule, his county visits, and his output. He chairs one of the most powerful committees in the Senate. He co-authors legislation. He holds town halls in all 99 counties. He won his last race by double digits.
Whether that answer remains persuasive to Iowa voters in 2028 is a different matter. But Grassley's filing with the FEC suggests he intends to make that case rather than step aside.
The broader Iowa political picture adds urgency. With Ernst likely leaving and Hinson expected to move up, the state's Republican delegation is entering a period of transition. Grassley's decision to run, or not, will shape the field for years. If he steps aside, his seat becomes the second open Iowa Senate race in a single cycle, a rare event that would test the depth of the state's GOP bench.
Grassley has also navigated internal GOP debates over congressional authority with a consistency that younger members sometimes lack. His defense of the blue slip tradition is one example. His insistence on voter ID legislation is another. These are not culture-war vanity projects. They are structural fights about how elections work and how the Senate functions.
Grassley's FEC filing is a placeholder, not a commitment. But placeholders have a way of becoming campaigns, especially for a man who has won eight consecutive Senate races and shows no public inclination to stop.
The senator's own timeline, "a year, maybe a year and a half", puts a formal announcement somewhere around mid-to-late 2026. That gives him time to assess his health, his family situation, and the political landscape. It also gives potential challengers and successors very little room to organize.
Grassley's approach to Senate oversight and committee work has always been methodical. He does not grandstand. He does not leak. He shows up, does the work, and lets the results speak. That style has served Iowa well for half a century.
Whether it can carry him to 101 is the question Iowa voters will eventually have to answer. Grassley, for his part, does not seem interested in answering it for them just yet.
In Washington, where most politicians can barely commit to a lunch reservation, a 91-year-old senator filing FEC paperwork for a race three years away is either a testament to old-fashioned durability, or a reminder that the people who show up are the ones who get to decide.
