FORT MADISON – When Jonathan Narcisse first visited Fort Madison this year, he was making a campaign stop, running in the Democratic primaries for the governor’s seat.
After a problem with petitions, He was bumped from the Democratic ticket during the primaries, but his race is far from over.
Narcisse is running for governor and will face Republican Terry Branstad and Democrat Jack Hatch on the ballot as a candidate for the Iowa Party.
“We want to focus on governance issues,” Narcisse said. “We want to be watchdogs on behalf of the taxpayers.”
Narcisse said the Iowa Party will focus on items such as judicial issues, ballot initiatives, school boards, city councils and county governments.
“Those are the folks who spend the billions and billions of dollars in tax money from different levels of Iowa,” Narcisse said.
Narcisse said the Iowa Party will not be able to defeat entrenched incumbents. He said the goal of his party will be to find quality people to run against people in elections where they will have no opposition. He said this will go for both Republican and Democratic races. Narcisse said beating powerful candidates comes when the incumbents are “on the hill.”
“It’s at that time a well trained group can go in and knock on doors,” Narcisse said.
Narcisse said it is important to him to run for office. He said this will allow him to move the Iowa Party forward. He said in doing so, he will be able to hold the feet of the seated politicians to the fire.
Narcisse, 51, was born and raised in Des Moines, where he currently lives. He graduated from Des Moines Technical High School and finished in the top 3 percent of the class of 1981.
He was on the dean’s list at Regis College in Denver, Colo.
Narcisse was employed at Intersectional United Advanced Planning Drug and Alcohol Treatment Center in the 1980s as outreach coordinator; self-employed publisher, editor and printer broker; editor-in-chief of Iowa Bystander Newspaper founded in 1894; publisher of El Comunicador and Iowa Fronteras; and a broadcaster.
Narcisse was cochair of the Polk County Democratic Party 1984-86; U.S. House of Representatives: Congressman Fauntroy 1984 and 1987; Commission on the Status of African-Americans; Des Moines school board 2007-09; and finished third out of six candidates in the 2010 gubernatorial race behind governors Branstad and Culver.
