Bruce Lear reflects on the federal government shutdown, drawing on 30-plus years of experience negotiating educator contracts. -promoted by Laura Belin

For some, symbols are more important than solutions. Sound bites outrank substance, and winning will trump a wall any day.

This fight isn’t about a wall. It’s about a symbol to gin a gullible base. In President Donald Trump’s mind, it’s win-win. If he doesn’t get his wall, he has the symbol of the wall. If he does, he can brag, “Look at that big beautiful wall I built for you.” It’s a narcissist’s dream. It’s the public’s nightmare.

Nine-term U.S. Representative Steve King will face at least one challenger in the 2020 Republican primary to represent Iowa’s fourth Congressional district.

State Senator Randy Feenstra announced his candidacy today, and Story County Supervisor Rick Sanders confirmed to Bleeding Heartland that he is seriously considering the race.

The moves are the clearest sign yet that Iowa’s GOP establishment is tired of King.

The new Congress is less than a week old, the new Iowa caucuses season is barely a week old, and doubtless we have many political thrills, spills and inanities ahead of us. But it doesn’t seem too early to offer some advice to our crop of newly elected Democrats in Congress and those with their hands on the presidential hats they are about to toss into the ring.

I say this while speaking from a high level of discourse, taking the high road and coming across as an adult, which most Americans say the person with the nuclear button should be. OK:

Please shut the fuck up.

Democratic Representatives Abby Finkenauer (IA-01) and Cindy Axne (IA-03) joined a long list of “firsts” when they were sworn in on January 3. Iowa had never elected a woman to the U.S. House before 2018, but now women make up half of our state’s delegation. The “most diverse Congress in history” includes record numbers of women and members of religious, racial, ethnic, or LGBTQ groups that have not previously represented their states in Washington. Finkenauer also became the second-youngest woman to serve in Congress, after Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.

The first votes in the 116th Congress involved some drama within the Democratic caucus, but Iowans did not rock the boat.

Sometimes I feel nostalgic for my “past life” covering Russian politics. Social media didn’t exist, and my colleagues and I had no information about which articles most interested our readers. Potential for clicks or shares didn’t factor into our story selection. We wrote up what seemed important to us.

On any given day, a half-dozen or more newsworthy Iowa politics stories present themselves, but I only have the capacity to cover one or two. I look for ways to add value: can I highlight events not covered elsewhere? Can I offer a different perspective or more context on the story everyone’s talking about?

Although chasing traffic will never be my primary goal, doing this for more than a decade has given me a decent sense of which topics will strike a chord with readers. But you never really know. Just like last year and the year before that, surprises lurked in the traffic numbers on Bleeding Heartland posts published during 2018 (353 written by me, 202 by other authors).

Both Senator Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst voted for a criminal justice reform bill that cleared the U.S. Senate on December 18 by a resounding 87 votes to 12 (roll call). Iowa’s senators were also part of the bipartisan majority that rejected three Republican amendments, described by one advocacy group as poison pills “aimed at gutting the substance and intent of the bill.”

Grassley wasn’t an early advocate of criminal justice reform, especially sentencing reform. As recently as March 2015, he slammed what he called the “leniency industrial complex,” which favored reducing long mandatory minimum sentences for non-violent drug offenses. But he came around about three years ago and helped build Republican support for the current bill, commonly known as the First Step Act.

In one of his final acts as Senate Judiciary Committee chair, Grassley pushed Majority Leader Mitch McConnell publicly and privately to bring the legislation to the Senate floor. After yesterday’s votes, New York Times photographer Sarah Silbiger captured images of Grassley celebrating with Democratic Senator Cory Booker, who has helped lead the charge on this issue.

Second in a series of post-election commentaries by Amber Gustafson, who was the Democratic candidate in Iowa Senate district 19. -promoted by desmoinesdem

Remember the Hippos – A Parable

Once a non-profit organization decided to “help” a poor, rural village in a country in Africa. When the fresh-faced, idealistic, young European aid workers arrived, they noticed many things right away. They noticed that the people in the village were malnourished. They also noticed that the village had no fields, no vineyards, and no orchards.

The aid workers, full of compassion, saw that what the people of the village needed was food; and more than that, they needed to be taught how to farm.

Acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker met with President Donald Trump and the president’s son-in-law Jared Kushner on the morning of December 7, hours before federal prosecutors released three briefs recounting crimes and misconduct by Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort and personal attorney Michael Cohen.

Cameron Joseph of Talking Points Memo saw Kushner and Whitaker boarding Marine One, the helicopter carrying the president, around 9:00 am. The meeting was improper because Whitaker will continue to oversee special counsel Robert Mueller for at least another month.

Eleventh in a series interpreting the results of Iowa’s 2018 state and federal elections.

David Wasserman, U.S. House editor for the Cook Political Report, planted the seed for this post when he observed last month,

If you’d told me before the election that Rs would win an average of 83% of Trump’s ’16 votes in contested House races, I would’ve told you they were probably on track to keep their majority.

But Dems are averaging 93% of Clinton’s totals & are on track for a 40-seat rout.

— Dave Wasserman (@Redistrict) November 21, 2018

Iowans Abby Finkenauer (IA-01) and Cindy Axne (IA-03) delivered two of those newly-Democratic House seats. I wondered: how did they and their opponents perform compared to their party’s last presidential nominee?

Like the remains of Thanksgiving dinner that will be with us for a while, some random thoughts to digest:

Matt Whitaker wasn’t ready for the vetting he would receive after President Donald Trump illegally appointed him acting U.S. attorney general two weeks ago.

Almost every day, new damaging information surfaces about Whitaker’s past financial dealings.

Eighth in a series interpreting the results of Iowa’s 2018 state and federal elections.

Last week, Bleeding Heartland examined votes for governor in counties containing Iowa’s mid-sized cities, which collectively accounted for roughly 15 percent of Iowans who participated in this year’s election.

Today’s focus is ten counties where more than half of this year’s Iowa voters live. Whereas Fred Hubbell underperformed in all seventeen “micropolitan” areas, the results in larger counties were a mixed bag for the Democratic nominee.

Iowa’s senior Senator Chuck Grassley will become the president pro tempore of the U.S. Senate when Congress reconvenes in January, and junior Senator Joni Ernst will join the Republican leadership team for the first time.

Dan Guild follows up on his previous analysis of Democratic chances to take the U.S. House. -promoted by desmoinesdem

In this last piece before the 2018 general election, three quick points:

A personal reflection from Ira Lacher, inspired by the tragic events of the past week. -promoted by desmoinesdem

When I was 22, I left New York and moved to America.

It’s a line I have used over the years to introduce myself. I use it in jest, and it gets a laugh. Most folks who hear it realize that New York City and the Northeast are worlds apart from the land between the coasts.

But I never realized how far apart until now.

President Donald Trump seems unable to behave appropriately in any situation, so his tone-deaf reaction to the murder of eleven people in Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue on October 27 was on brand.

Governor Kim Reynolds and Democratic challenger Fred Hubbell debated for the third and last time today in Davenport. Too bad not many viewers are likely to tune in at 8:00 am on a Sunday morning, because the discussion was yet another study in contrasts. For those who prefer a written recap, I enclose below my detailed notes. Click here and here for Bleeding Heartland’s analysis of the first two Hubbell-Reynolds debates.

As during the second debate, journalists kept the candidates on topic and within the time limit, so kudos to moderator David Nelson of KWQC-TV6 and panelists Erin Murphy of Lee Enterprises, Forrest Saunders of KCRG-TV9, and Jenna Jackson of KWQC-TV6.

Both candidates recycled many talking points from their first two meetings. My impression was that Reynolds performed about equally well in all three debates, while Hubbell improved each time. For instance, after Reynolds noted that Iowa had moved up in mental health rankings three years in a row and was now rated sixth in the country for mental health, Hubbell pointed out that the study the governor cited covered the years 2013 through 2015. That was before the Branstad/Reynolds administration closed some mental health institutions and privatized Medicaid, which has led to worse care for thousands of Iowans.

For those who prefer to watch the replay, KCRG-TV posted the video in a single file, which is the most user-friendly option. You can also find the debate on KWQC-TV (with closed captioning) and WOWT-TV’s websites, but you will have to watch a series of clips, with advertisements before each segment.

Dan Guild follows up on his earlier analysis of prospects for Democrats to win control of the U.S. House. -promoted by desmoinesdem

This is the current state of play in the House. At this writing, my projection shows the Democrats with a majority of 9 seats. The House polling has given added clarity, but the essential dynamic has not changed since February:

It would be hard to overstate how dispirited, angry, exhausted, and hopeless many Democrats felt after watching the Brett Kavanaugh nomination play out. Not only have right-wing, partisan ideologues solidified their control of the U.S. Supreme Court, millions of sexual assault survivors feel like the Republican-controlled Senate punched them in the gut.

No one would have blamed Senator Cory Booker for missing the Iowa Democratic Party’s Fall Gala on October 6. He was stuck in Washington as Republicans scheduled a Saturday afternoon vote on Kavanaugh, without a full investigation of sexual assault allegations or any acknowledgement that the nominee lied under oath repeatedly during his Senate Judiciary Committee testimony.

Booker cast his vote against Kavanaugh, rushed to the airport and made it to Des Moines in time to give the keynote speech to more than 1,000 activists. Outside the hall afterwards, I heard one sentiment over and over again: Booker’s uplifting message was just what people needed to hear on a discouraging day.

I’ve had it with Iowa’s welfare queens. Wells Fargo. Rockwell Collins. Pioneer Dupont. Chuck Grassley.

Yes, Grassley. The senator announced this week that he’ll apply for federal farm bailout money. Despite being worth $3.3 million. Despite working full-time as a U.S. senator since 1981. Despite his criticism of government assistance for the poor.

In an October 4 Des Moines Register story, Grassley said, “I would brag to you, actually, that this experience of mine — not being an absentee landlord but suffering what farmers suffer and being joyful when they are joyful — is a good experience for a senator from an agricultural state to have.”

John Grieder is a Democratic activist in Waterloo. -promoted by desmoinesdem

The president is right. There, I said it. He is. President Donald Trump said something truthful. On October 2, 2018, President Donald Trump said it’s a “scary time” to be a young man in America. I agree with him. It’s absolutely terrifying. I’m 28 years old and I have never been more concerned about my government or my nation.

Laura Hubka chairs the Howard County Democrats, is vice chair of the Iowa Democratic Party’s Disability Caucus, and is the first district liaison to the party for the Veterans Caucus. -promoted by desmoinesdem

I decided to go to Obama.org just to check it out after looking at one of President Barack Obama’s posts on Twitter (my heart jumped and sank at writing that last statement). It was full of videos from the campaign in 2008. Almost all of it from Iowa. Young people, music, chanting and all the excitement of what could be. The hope, the change, the light in the peoples faces. I had to fight back the tears.

I feel like something inside me has faded. A light inside me is dim. I am afraid that the winds of change from 2016 have blown out my candle. I keep trying to light it but it is like lighting a wet wick. I can’t seem to find a hot enough fire. My heart literally aches.

A New York Times poll of Iowa’s first Congressional district this week found Democratic challenger Abby Finkenauer leading two-term Representative Rod Blum by 51.5 percent to 37 percent. Finkenauer led by double digits in every turnout model the pollsters applied to the raw data. Blum’s favorability of 35 percent was even lower than President Donald Trump’s 39 percent approval rating among respondents.

As national Republican strategists and GOP-aligned advocacy groups write off Blum and election forecasters increasingly view IA-01 as a probable Democratic pickup, I’ve been thinking about how a Blum implosion could affect down-ballot Republicans. With no straight-ticket option for Iowa voters this year, coat-tails may be less important than they were in the past. Nevertheless, it can’t be good for GOP legislative candidates that Finkenauer’s campaign has had field organizers working across the district for at least six months to identify and turn out supporters.

Democrats need a net gain of ten Iowa House seats to win a majority in the lower chamber (currently split 59 R/41 D). At least eight potentially competitive GOP-held state House districts are located within the first Congressional district.

I wholeheartedly agree with Ed Fallon: grassroots activists are excited about the Democratic candidates for state auditor and secretary of state. -promoted by desmoinesdem

The excitement around November 6 is above and beyond what we normally experience leading up to an off-year election. Coast to coast, young, progressive candidates are fueling that excitement — as is growing discontent over President Trump’s reign of error. Even conservative voters are pulling away from the Tweeter in Chief over his:

— Escalating trade war with China,
— Support for pipelines and fracking,
— Belief that “eminent domain is a wonderful thing,” and
— Lack of a moral compass.

In Iowa, two candidates firing up voters are Rob Sand, running for state auditor, and Deidre DeJear, running for secretary of state. Check out the great story about Rob and Deidre in Politico this week — and the entertaining comparison of Rob to Robert Mueller.

“We need to use every tool we have to reclaim our country,” U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley told me during his latest visit to Des Moines. “We are at the verge of a tipping point, and maybe we’re almost past it, in which the power of the mega-wealthy is so profound that we can’t tip the balance back in to we the people.”

The senator from Oregon spent much of Labor Day weekend in central Iowa supporting Democratic candidates for the state legislature. His fifth trip here since the 2016 election won’t be his last: he will be a featured speaker at the Polk County Steak Fry later this month. During our September 2 interview, I asked Merkley about the most important matters pending in the U.S. Senate, prospects for Democrats in November, and his possible presidential candidacy.

Des Moines resident Ira Lacher noticed a striking contrast in two commentaries published this weekend. -promoted by desmoinesdem

Page 3 of the Sunday Des Moines Register opinion section told us everything we need to know about the people who are in the top positions in America.

On one hand, there was Rob Tibbetts’ heartfelt plea for decency in the wake of the murder of his daughter, Mollie.

Below it, was Donald Trump Jr.’s pathetic attempt to sustain hatred of brown people.

As signs mount that national GOP strategists are ready to let his district go, two-term Representative Rod Blum seems to be staking his political career on appealing to fans of President Donald Trump.

While some vulnerable Republicans keep their distance from an unpopular president, Blum welcomed Trump to Iowa’s first Congressional district in July and continues to praise trade policies that hurt the farm economy. More recently, he has sought attention by portraying himself as the news media’s victim.

Laura Hubka returned as chair the Howard County Democrats earlier this year after some time away from party leadership roles. She has long tried to bridge the gap between opposing factions in Democratic circles. -promoted by desmoinesdem

How many days until the mid-term election? Ask any “normal” person in Iowa and they probably could not tell you. As of today there are 83 days.

What could go wrong?

Rarely does a presidential candidate focus a stump speech on an out-of-the box idea. But in his first appearance before a large Iowa audience on August 10, Andrew Yang devoted much of his time to the “Freedom Dividend,” a proposal unlike anything I’ve heard on the caucus trail.

After the Iowa Democratic Wing Ding in Clear Lake, Yang spoke to Bleeding Heartland about how the U.S. could pay for a nationwide universal basic income plan. He also explained how he envisions selling the idea to voters who have heard politicians denigrate “hand-outs” and welfare for decades.

Jon Muller challenges a “Big Myth” about the economy, which drives some voters toward leftist candidates rather than more viable centrist Democrats. -promoted by desmoinesdem

I got wrapped up in a couple of heated arguments after this week’s special election in Ohio’s twelfth Congressional district. According to those sympathetic to the Green voters, the problem was a choice of two Republicans. This was a rehash of frustration surrounding Green Party voting in the 2016 general election in the Great Lakes states.

Whether that voting, either in 2016 or in OH-12, tipped the election is not pertinent. Rather, this is an exploration of their position and the underlying grievance. The rejection of a centrist Democrat dismisses two central realities:

Yet another special election for a U.S. House seat suggests a wave may be building. Although the Democratic candidate appears to have fallen short in Ohio’s twelfth district, the close result in what has long been a safe Republican seat should worry GOP leaders. Dan Guild noted that there are 68 Republican-held House districts where Hillary Clinton did better in November 2016 than she did in OH-12.

“[S]enior party strategists have concluded that over a dozen districts held by Republicans may already be unwinnable,” Alexander Burns and Jonathan Martin reported for the New York Times on August 8.

Iowa’s first Congressional district may be one of the places where House leaders decide to cut their losses. But no one should write two-term Representative Rod Blum’s political obituary yet.

“Tariffs are the greatest!” President Donald Trump tweeted today, adding that “All will be Great!”

A few hours later, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced “up to $12 billion in programs” aimed at helping farmers, “in line with the estimated $11 billion impact of the unjustified retaliatory tariffs on U.S. agricultural goods.”

Trump will surely talk up the assistance at his joint event with Representative Rod Blum (IA-01) in Dubuque on July 26. But the escalating trade war isn’t just affecting farmers. Steel tariffs are hurting manufacturers too. “Whirpool shares plummeted Tuesday after executives blamed rising steel and aluminum costs for diminished quarterly earnings,” Michael Sheetz reported for CNBC on July 24. Whirlpool’s refrigerator factory in Amana is the largest employer in Iowa County.

While Democrats criticized the temporary response to a “self-inflicted wound,” top Iowa Republicans reacted to the farm aid plan in three distinct ways. Blum and Representative Steve King (IA-04) unambiguously praised the president. Their U.S. House colleague David Young (IA-03) was notably more critical of Trump’s policy. Iowa’s U.S. senators, Governor Kim Reynolds, and Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig tried to thread the needle, depicting themselves as fighting for Iowa farmers and open markets without denouncing the president’s approach to trade negotiations.

Two of Iowa’s four Congressional campaigns are among the most competitive U.S. House races in the country. On July 18, the Cook Political Report moved the third district contest from “lean Republican” to “toss up,” saying Democratic challenger Cindy Axne “has developed into a serious threat” to two-term Republican incumbent David Young.

While it’s always been clear IA-03 would be in play this cycle, insiders in both parties and election forecasters have generally seen Young as less vulnerable than GOP Representative Rod Blum. Iowa’s first district has been widely acknowledged as a toss-up race for months. Even now, Young looks better positioned to survive a possible Democratic wave election than Blum.

Here’s why Democrats and Republicans have grounds to feel optimistic about IA-03:

Former Republican State Representative Ken Rizer announced yesterday that he was quitting the GOP over President Donald Trump’s “erratic and misguided leadership.” Less than 24 hours later, the post had vanished from Rizer’s Facebook feed.

Progressive political strategist and multimedia producer Greg Hauenstein takes on the astonishing events in Helsinki. -promoted by desmoinesdem

I jotted down some quick thoughts on the press conference between President Donald Trump and Russian Dictator President Vladimir Putin that has jaws dropping globally.

TL;DR version: Trump says he believes Putin & Co. didn’t mess with our elections.

This flies in the face of evidence from the CIA, the Senate Intelligence Committee, and Trump’s own Justice Department who just moments ago announced the arrest of a Russian national for “infiltrating organizations having influence in American politics, for the purpose of advancing the interests of the Russian Federation.”

The new leader of the U.S. Department of Justice Criminal Division has never prosecuted a case and recently represented a major Russian bank aligned with the Kremlin. Nevertheless, Senators Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst joined every Republican present (plus one conservative Democrat) to confirm Brian Benczkowski on July 11 as assistant attorney general.

What could go wrong?

“The U.S. soybean industry’s worst fears are coming to pass today,” the Iowa Soybean Association said in a statement as the first round of tariffs between the U.S. and China went into effect on July 6.

First-person accounts of political events are always fun to read. Thanks to Susie Olesen, a semi-retired former teacher and school administrator in southwest Iowa, for this write-up. -promoted by desmoinesdem

Senator Joni Ernst’s July 6 town hall at the high school auditorium in Shenandoah (Page County) was a well-attended, civil meeting. People who wanted to participate filled out a slip of paper, which were drawn out of a glass jar to determine who would be able to ask questions. Ernst sat at a table in front of the room.

Robert Niederklopfer, a Democratic activist in Des Moines, was inspired to draw this commentary after President Donald Trump condemned the massacre of reporters and editors at the The Capital Gazette in Annapolis, Maryland, saying, “journalists, like all Americans, should be free from the fear of being violently attacked while doing their jobs.” Trump has repeatedly called the media “the enemy of the people” and has sometimes incited supporters at his rallies to bash journalists or news organizations. -promoted by desmoinesdem

For a window onto magical thinking by top Iowa Republicans, you can’t beat Politico reporter Natasha Korecki’s dispatch from the GOP’s state convention earlier this month.