GOP attack ad backfires as woman warning about kids exposed for DUI with her kids in car

A GOP super PAC ad branding an Iowa Democrat a danger to kids has run into trouble with its own messenger.

Shellie Flockhart, a Dallas Center city council member featured in the Congressional Leadership Fund spot, pleaded guilty to child endangerment and drunken driving after police found her intoxicated with two of her children in the car in 2017, The Washington Post reported Saturday.

"When it comes to our kids, Sarah is just plain dangerous," Flockhart says in the ad targeted at state Sen. Sarah Trone Garriott, who is trying to unseat Rep. Zach Nunn (R-IA) in a Des Moines-area district. The ad identifies Flockhart only by her first name.

It features several women who accuse Trone Garriott of endangering kids based on her votes on transgender issues, including her vote against a bill barring students from using school bathrooms that don't match their sex at birth. The super PAC has put at least $1 million behind the ad, according to ad tracker AdImpact.

According to an affidavit in Dallas County court records, an officer approached Flockhart after spotting her vehicle parked in the grass beside a highway. He reported that her speech was badly slurred and that she seemed to struggle to understand his questions. Her children were 8 and 11 at the time.

A roadside breath test put her blood alcohol content at .254, more than three times the legal limit of .08, and a later test at the jail registered .192. She pleaded guilty to two misdemeanors and received a fine and probation.

Flockhart has spoken publicly about her past. On podcasts last year, she described battling drug and alcohol addiction, going through rehab and turning to faith, and said she had counseled others with similar histories.

"It's been one of the most rewarding things ever, and I don't regret that part of my journey because it's brought a lot of depth to life and it's brought me salvation," she said in a 2025 podcast appearance.

Flockhart sent the Post a statement but attached conditions the paper said would violate its editorial standards. After the ad aired, a local progressive group spotlighted her record on social media and ridiculed her role in the spot as ironic.

Torunn Sinclair, a spokeswoman for the Congressional Leadership Fund, answered the Post with a statement that criticized its reporting and did not address Flockhart's inclusion. Nunn's campaign did not respond.