State auditor candidate visits area

Rob Sand has a message for prospective voters who believe the ‘D’ next to his name will render him nothing more than another partisan hack intent on destroying only his political opponents: ask the former county treasurer of the Webster County Democrats if he went easy on her after she stole more than $10,000 from the organization’s coffers.
“There’s a Webster County Democrat (Diana Petraline) who lives in Fort Dodge who’s not going to vote for me this year. They’re not going to vote for (gubernatorial candidate) Fred Hubbell, they’re not going to voter for (secretary of state candidate) Deidre DeJear, and they’re not going to vote for their local Democratic congressional candidate. Do you know why?” he asked. “They’re a felon, and you know who made them a felon? Me. Because they deserved it.”
That case—along with a high-profile lottery scam that wound up in the pages of New York Times Magazine, the Iowa Film Office tax credit scandal and several other elaborate fraud schemes—has come to define Sand’s work as a prosecutor with the Iowa Attorney General’s Office, and it’s an ethos he hopes to bring to the state auditor’s chair if elected in November. He stopped by the Manly Drug Store in Grundy Center on Monday afternoon to discuss his “watchdog” mentality, his small town bona fides and why he feels that he’s a better fit for the job than current auditor Mary Mosiman. Sand also made stops at Rustic Brew in Hampton, Parkersburg and three other counties that day.
“Taxpayers ought to have somebody in that office who’s willing to stand up for them (and) who’s willing to make other people mad at them,” Sand said. “That’s a big part of what I’ve done as a prosecutor. No one likes being indicted for felonies, but I indict them anyway. It’s really that straightforward.”
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