On Tuesday afternoon, Gov. Kim Reynolds’ office sent out a news release announcing Lt. Gov. Adam Gregg was resigning “to focus more on his family.”
“It comes as no surprise that he would choose to step down to prioritize his personal life,” Reynolds said in the release.
The governor’s opinion aside, Gregg’s resignation came as a surprise. Even more surprising was the fact Gregg’s “resignation is effective today, September 3, 2024.”
“It has been a great honor to serve alongside Governor Reynolds for seven years,” the former lieutenant governor said in Tuesday’s statement. “… However, as Scripture reminds us, for everything there is a season, and there is a time to every purpose under heaven. I feel my time in public service must come to a close. This season of my life needs to be focused on my family.”
According to the governor’s office, Reynolds will appoint a new lieutenant governor “later this fall.” In the interim, Iowa Senate President Amy Sinclair will be next in the line of succession for governor. There are more than two-and-a-half years remaining in Gregg’s term.
The statement from the Reynolds’ office did not say what the “career opportunity that allows [Gregg] to focus more on his family” was. That question was answered approximately 20 minutes later when the Iowa Bankers Association (IBA) announced Gregg would become the group’s next president and CEO.
Gregg will replace John Sorensen, who is retiring at the end of the year after 38 years at the IBA. Gregg starts as the IBA on Oct. 1, “to allow time for the transition.”
“I am excited to join the dynamic team at the IBA as president and CEO,” Gregg said in the IBA’s statement.
Writing in the Gazette, Tom Barton noted that “Gregg received a base salary of roughly $103,000 set by state law, and received an annual gross pay of about $107,000 for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2023” while “the outgoing head of the state’s bankers association, received a total compensation package valued at more than $620,000 in 2022, according to the association’s most recent public tax filing.”
Adam Gregg grew up in Hawarden, Iowa. He attended Central College in Pella, and after graduating, went onto Drake University Law School. In 2012, he joined Gov. Terry Branstad’s administration, after spending three years at the BrownWinick law firm in Des Moines. Gregg served as Branstad’s legislative liaison, lobbying the Iowa Legislature on the governor’s behalf.
Two years later, Branstad and the Iowa GOP tapped the then-31-year-old Gregg as the Republican nominee for Iowa Attorney General. Longtime incumbent Tom Miller defeated Gregg in a landslide in the 2014 general election.
The month after Gregg’s loss, Branstad appointed him to head the Office of State Public Defender. The appointment received some pushback from members of the legislature who were concerned that Gregg had no experience as a criminal lawyer, making his main qualification for the office his connection to Branstad.
“It’s kind of a consolation prize,” Sen. Tom Courtney, a Democrat from Burlington, said at the time. “When somebody runs for office and gets beat, the governor puts them somewhere else.”
Gregg was still serving as State Public Defender when Reynolds selected him as lieutenant governor, after she became governor in May 2017, when Branstad resigned to become Donald Trump’s ambassador to China.
Reynolds and Gregg won the first election as governor and lieutenant governor in 2018, and were reelected in 2022.
As lieutenant governor, Gregg has been a quiet presence, never drawing attention away from Reynolds. The governor has appointed him to various positions over the last seven years. He has represented her on the State Fair Board, and has chaired the Governor’s Empower Rural Iowa Initiative and the Feeding Iowans Task Force, among other committee assignments.
“In my time as lieutenant governor, I found that for every good thing happening in our state, there was an Iowa bank backing it,” Gregg said as part of the IBA’s statement. “Now I have the great honor to represent this industry, which is so critical to Iowa’s success.”
Neither the governor’s office nor the IBA said when Gregg began negotiating the terms of his new job with the association.
