Representative Tom Latham (IA-03) told journalists in Washington yesterday that he is thinking about running for the U.S. Senate in 2014. He declined to specify when he will announce his plans, but he said he will “make my own decision” rather than be influenced by Representative Steve King (IA-04). Deirdre Walsh reported for CNN,

Pressed if he thinks a Senate bid by King could hurt the GOP’s chances of taking the seat – something other national Republicans have expressed concerns over – Latham told reporters outside the House floor that King is “a very viable member of Congress.”

If Latham wants the Senate seat, he would be advised to announce sooner rather than later. A few days ago, King told conservative talk radio host Larry O’Connor that he is “fifty-fifty” on running for the Senate seat. Click through to listen to King’s comments. In weighing his decision, he is considering “whether the energy is out there” to support his bid and “whether we can raise the money” for a statewide race. I still expect King to stay in IA-04, where he’s safe for the next decade, but he may be tempted to take on the Republican establishment.

The least likely scenario in my mind is Latham and King running against each other in a GOP primary. If one of them announces a Senate campaign, the other will stay out. A new Wenzel Strategies poll of “likely Republican primary voters” in Iowa found that King would be the early leader in a Senate primary, with Latham in second place and Lieutenant Governor Kim Reynolds third. Public Policy Polling surveyed Iowa Republicans over the weekend and found King leading among moderates as well as among respondents who described themselves as “very conservative.”

UPDATE: I missed this story at the Rothenberg Political Report last night. Latham’s changing the name of his campaign committee from “Latham for Congress” to “Iowans for Latham.”

SECOND UPDATE: Michael Devine, a talk radio host for KVFD AM 1400 in Fort Dodge, posted on Facebook today, “Congressman Steve King told us this morning the chances are ‘better than 50 percent’ he will run for the Senate.”

THIRD UPDATE: Excerpts from Public Policy Polling’s latest Iowa poll findings are after the jump.

After a dismal performance by his political vehicles in 2012, the man once known as “Bush’s brain” is working to stop unelectable Republican candidates from winning GOP primaries in 2014. Jeff Zeleny reports in today’s New York Times that Karl Rove’s super-PAC American Crossroads is creating the “Conservative Victory Project.” One of Rove’s associates confirmed that stopping Representative Steve King from becoming the GOP nominee for U.S. Senate in Iowa will be a priority.

Details and toplines from the first poll on the open IA-Sen race are below.

Iowa politics watchers continue to chew over the possibilities for the open U.S. Senate race next year. To no one’s surprise, Governor Terry Branstad ruled out a Senate bid this morning, saying he’s never been interested in leaving Iowa to serve for six years in Washington, DC. Lieutenant Governor Kim Reynolds told journalists that she is focused on the Branstad administration’s agenda for Iowa but keeping her “options open” on the Senate race. Many other Republicans are thinking about it too, and only Representative Tom Latham has the potential to clear the field.

On the Democratic side, speculation continues to center around Representative Bruce Braley, who confirmed yesterday that he is considering running for Tom Harkin’s seat. If Braley takes on the Senate race, many Democrats expect State Senator Liz Mathis to run in the first Congressional district. She is well-known among Iowans in the Cedar Rapids television market, thanks to her previous career in news broadcasting. Senate President Pam Jochum of Dubuque said today that the IA-01 race is “something to think about.” Jochum indicated that to run and serve in Congress, she would need support for her developmentally disabled adult daughter, who lives with her.

Any comments related to the reshuffle in Iowa politics are welcome in this thread. UPDATE: Also no surprise: Democratic State Senator Matt McCoy of Des Moines would consider running in IA-03 if Latham goes for the Senate seat.

SECOND UPDATE: Iowa Senate Minority Leader Bill Dix ruled out running for either the U.S. Senate or IA-01 in 2014. Dix left the Iowa House in 2006 to run for the open seat in IA-01, but finished second in the GOP primary. Further updates are after the jump.

Busy weekend in Iowa politics! I’m continuing to update the post on Tom Harkin retiring with reactions and speculation about possible Senate candidates. Here’s an open thread for anything else on your mind.

A bunch of links that caught my eye this week are after the jump.

The U.S. House approved a Disaster Relief Appropriations Act primarily aimed at Hurricane Sandy victims tonight, but Iowans Tom Latham (IA-03) and Steve King (IA-04) were among the majority of House Republicans who voted against the bill.

UPDATE: Added King’s comment below.

U.S. House Agriculture Committee Chair Frank Lucas announced today that Representative Steve King (IA-04 in the new Congress) will chair the Subcommittee on Department Operations, Oversight, and Nutrition. King has been one of the loudest critics of the U.S. Department of Agriculture in recent years. His new position will give him a more visible platform to battle policies championed by U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack–the husband of King’s most recent Congressional challenger, Christie Vilsack.

King opposed the USDA’s settlement in the Pigford case, which involved longstanding government discrimination against African-American farmers. He also objected to the hiring of a claimant in the Pigford settlement to a prominent USDA position. Though King has tried and failed to block spending on the Pigford settlement, chairing a subcommittee may allow him to investigate what he describes as “fraud” in USDA payments to African-Americans.

Regarding the USDA’s nutrition programs, King wants to spend less on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (commonly known as food stamps) than the Obama administration. He wants to overhaul the USDA’s new school lunch standards and has sponsored a bill to overturn restrictions on calories and portion sizes for children in public schools. In King’s view, “nutrition Nannies” at the USDA, led by Vilsack, have “put every kid on a diet.” Vilsack announced earlier this month that school districts will have more time to adapt to the new rules, but he defended the standards as an important weapon against the childhood obesity epidemic. I expect King to hold hearings on this issue in early 2013.

After the jump I’ve posted King’s press release about his new position. He vowed to make sure tax dollars are spent wisely in USDA programs.

Following the 2010 elections, King was expected to become chairman of the House Judiciary Committee’s subcommittee on immigration issues, but House leaders feared he was too much of a lightning rod for that job.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is paying for robocalls in Iowa’s third and fourth Congressional districts accusing Republicans Tom Latham and Steve King of “holding the middle class hostage.”

Losing a re-election contest is no fun for any state legislator, but defeated incumbents often land on their feet. Such is the case with outgoing State Senator Merlin Bartz and State Representative Annette Sweeney.

The latest voter registration numbers in all 99 Iowa counties are out, and I wanted to do one final update on the registration totals in each county, grouped by Congressional district. Statewide, Republicans had led Democrats in voter registrations since April, but that lead was almost gone by the beginning of November. Late GOTV and election-day registrants helped put Democrats a little ahead again. As of December 3, Iowa had 640,776 active registered Democrats, 636,315 Republicans, and 722,348 no-party voters.

In the tables below, I also added vote totals for President Barack Obama, Mitt Romney, and the major-party Congressional candidates in each county, to show which candidates outpolled or underperformed their party’s presidential nominee. I’m not convinced that Christie Vilsack could have beaten Tom Latham in IA-03, but Leonard Boswell finished noticeably behind the president in this district, especially in Polk County.  

A few days ago, the final recounts ended in Iowa legislative races, and the last Congressional campaign was resolved. It’s time to reveal the winner of Bleeding Heartland’s general election prediction contest.

Now that almost all Iowa precincts have reported, I’ve enclosed more detailed results from the four Congressional races after the jump. All numbers come from this page on the Iowa Secretary of State’s website.  

Polls close at 9 pm in Iowa, but there are already plenty of other election returns coming in to discuss. I’ll update this post after the jump throughout the evening. Spoiler alert: the media have already called Pennsylvanian for President Barack Obama.

10:10 pm: Iowa has been called for Obama. No path to 270 electoral votes remains for Romney.

12:34 am: Not all of the Iowa House races have been called yet, but it looks like Republicans may end up with a 53-47 majority, and several Democrats lost very close races. If the House Democrats had had the resources to contest more districts, they could have won a majority. Most of the money flowed to Iowa Senate candidates for obvious reasons.

1:09 am: Iowa Senate Democrats sound confident that they have won 26 seats. The last few results aren’t yet official on the Secretary of State’s website, however. Details are below.

WEDNESDAY: Unofficial returns show 1,558,252 Iowans cast ballots in the 2012 general election, an increase from 2008. That’s about 72 percent of the state’s eligible voters.

The campaign in Iowa’s fourth Congressional district set records for fundraising by a U.S. House incumbent and challenger in Iowa and attracted nearly $5 million in spending by outside groups. For weeks, television stations around the district have been saturated with ads for and against five-term Representative Steve King and Democratic challenger Christie Vilsack.

A final news roundup on IA-04 is after the jump, including Vilsack’s key campaign themes and King’s closing message to voters.  

To enter Bleeding Heartland’s election prediction contest, post your guesses as comments in this thread before 7 am on November 6. Predictions submitted by e-mail will not be considered. It’s ok to change your mind, as long as you post your revised predictions as an additional comment in this thread before the deadline.

No money’s at stake here, just bragging rights like those enjoyed by Bleeding Heartland users ModerateIADem (twice), American007, Johannes, and tietack. This isn’t “The Price is Right”; the winning answers will be closest to the final results, whether they were a little high or low. Even if you have no idea, please try to take a guess on every question.

Minor-party or independent candidates are on the ballot for some races, so the percentages of the vote for Democratic and Republican nominees need not add up to 100. You can view the complete list of candidates for federal and state offices in Iowa here (pdf).

Good luck, and remember: you can’t win if you don’t play.

The latest figures from the Iowa Secretary of State’s office show larger numbers of registered Democrats, Republicans, and no-party voters statewide compared to last month. Democrats and no-party voters gained more registrants than Republicans, possibly because of voter registration drives on college campuses around the state. As of November 1 (pdf), Iowa had 694,558 active no-party voters statewide, 629,443 active Republicans, and 628,043 active Democrats. That’s the smallest GOP voter registration advantage since April.

After the jump I’ve posted the latest active voter registration numbers in all 99 Iowa counties, grouped by Congressional district. Any comments about next Tuesday’s elections are welcome in this thread. Iowans can register to vote on election day by bringing photo identification and proof of residency (like a utility bill or bank statement) to their local precinct.

This thread is for any comments about Congressional races you are following, whether in Iowa or in other states. Steve King and Christie Vilsack held their seventh (!) debate tonight, but I was unable to listen, because Windsor Heights holds trick-or-treating the night before Halloween.

Democrats are starting to talk about a net gain of U.S. Senate seats, but I am not that optimistic. While some races are trending toward the Democratic candidates, others where Democrats led last month are tightening (Virginia, Wisconsin).

To me, the most amazing development in a Congressional race is President Bill Clinton campaigning for Heidi Heitkamp in North Dakota and recording a television commercial for her. Bleeding Heartland readers who are old enough to remember 1990s politics, could you ever have believed that Bill Clinton would be considered an asset to a Democratic candidate in North Dakota a week before the election?  

Iowans have requested a record number of early ballots for the general election with more than a week left to vote by mail or early in person. As of October 24, 565,986 Iowans had requested absentee ballots–more than the number of Iowans who cast early votes in the 2008 general election (545,739).  

Iowa Democrats have requested about 75,000 more absentee ballots than Republicans and lead in ballot requests in three of the four Congressional districts. On October 23, Republicans finally overtook Democrats in absentee ballot requests in IA-04, where the GOP’s voter registration advantage is more than 50,000.

After the jump I’ve posted early voting numbers from the last three presidential elections in Iowa, along with the latest tables showing absentee ballots requested by voters and returned to county auditors. I’m updating the absentee ballot totals every weekday here, using data posted on the Iowa Secretary of State’s website.

Adrian Gray, a veteran of the 2004 Bush/Cheney campaign, has been commenting on early voting trends in various states on twitter. I disagree with some of his Iowa observations and explain why below.  

It’s time for another discussion thread on any competitive U.S. House and Senate races. More detailed posts about the four Iowa Congressional districts are in progress, but after the jump I’ve posted the latest information on independent expenditures for and against the major-party candidates. Bleeding Heartland covered the third-quarter financial reports for the Iowa Congressional candidates here. Early voting totals for each of the four Congressional districts are here.

I’ve also added a few links on U.S. Senate races around the country. I’m amazed that Democrats still appear to be favorites to hold a small Senate majority. For me that has been one of the most surprising political stories of the year. Republicans could still win a majority, but they would have to run the table in the tossup races.

Twenty days before the general election, 463,219 Iowans had requested absentee ballots–more than the number of Iowans who cast early votes in the 2004 general election (460,059).

Also as of October 17, Iowa county auditors had received 284,569 completed absentee ballots, more than the number of Iowans who cast early votes in the 2000 general election (276,836).

Iowa Democrats have requested about 70,000 more absentee ballots than Republicans and lead in ballot requests in all four Congressional districts (though only barely in IA-04, where Republicans have a large voter registration advantage).

After the jump I’ve posted early voting numbers from the last three presidential elections in Iowa, along with the latest tables showing absentee ballots requested by voters and returned to county auditors statewide and in the four Congressional districts. I’m updating the absentee ballot totals every weekday here, using data posted on the Iowa Secretary of State’s website.

P.S.- There are three ways to vote early in Iowa. Voting in person at a county auditor’s office or satellite station has a lower error rate than mailing your absentee ballot.

The latest Federal Election Commission disclosure reports are out, covering money raised and spent by Congressional candidates between July 1 and September 30. Details from Iowa’s four races are after the jump, along with information on groups that have made independent expenditures in each of the districts. The latest voter registration totals in the Congressional districts are here, and I’m updating absentee ballot totals for each district on weekdays here.

Any comments about these campaigns are welcome in this thread. I’d be particularly grateful if some Bleeding Heartland reader could explain what Tom Latham has been saving his money for, and why the PAC of the Credit Union National Association is supporting both Latham in IA-03 and Christie Vilsack in IA-04.

In a few moments Representatives Tom Latham and Leonard Boswell will debate live on KCCI-TV in Des Moines. KCCI and the Des Moines Register are live-streaming the event. It’s the second debate between Boswell and Latham, who debated in Creston last night.

I taped the fifth debate between Representative Steve King and Christie Vilsack last night, but haven’t had a chance to watch yet. Nor have I been able to listen to today’s Iowa Public Radio program featuring Representative Bruce Braley and Ben Lange.

Any comments about any debates in the Iowa Congressional races are welcome in this thread.

UPDATE: Added some thoughts about the IA-03 debate after the jump.

SECOND UPDATE: The Braley-Lange debate is worth a listen. I posted my take in this news roundup on the IA-01 race.

I haven’t been an optimist about Christie Vilsack’s chances of taking down Representative Steve King, to put it mildly. But over the past month I have become convinced that King and Washington Republicans are genuinely concerned about holding Iowa’s new fourth Congressional district.

Follow me after the jump for a closer look at King’s campaign strategy, along with polling data and some other news from the IA-04 race. Later this week I will post a similar piece about the Vilsack campaign, and a separate review of outside groups’ advertising in this district.

Thirty-four days before the general election, the number of Iowans who had requested absentee ballots (292,694) already exceeds the number of Iowans who cast early votes in the 2000 general election (276,836). At this point, Democrats have requested about twice as many absentee ballots as have Republicans and have returned more than three times as many ballots to county auditors.

Looking at the daily numbers I’ve archived here, you can see that as promised, Republicans have made up ground on early GOTV since the Secretary of State’s Office started releasing absentee ballot totals on September 17.

After the jump I’ve posted the latest tables showing absentee ballots requested by voters and returned to county auditors statewide and in each of the four Congressional districts.  

The latest figures from the Iowa Secretary of State’s office show larger numbers of registered Democrats, Republicans, and no-party voters statewide compared to last month. Democrats and no-party voters gained more registrants than Republicans, possibly because of voter registration drives on college campuses around the state. As of October 1 (pdf), Iowa had 675,171 active no-party voters statewide, 622,176 active Republicans, and 611,284 active Democrats.

After the jump I’ve posted the latest active voter registration numbers in all 99 Iowa counties, grouped by Congressional district. Any comments about the Congressional races are welcome in this thread.

Following a month-long summer recess, members of the U.S. House and Senate worked for less than three weeks before adjourning in late September until after the general election. Congress will hold only “pro-forma” sessions for the next month, presumably to prevent President Barack Obama from making recess appointments.

Follow me after the jump for a review of how the Iowans voted (or did not vote) on the most significant legislation that came up during the past few weeks.  

Early voting begins today in Iowa, 40 days before the general election. Bleeding Heartland covered the three ways to vote early here and is updating absentee ballot numbers every weekday here. After the jump I’ve posted more links and news related to the early voting process.

Although the Harkin Steak Fry took place last weekend, the Jewish new year interfered with my plans to write a post immediately after the event, and the rest of the week flew by. I’ve posted some notes from the steak fry after the jump, along with other links about the featured speaker, Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley. That won’t be his last speech in front of a crowd of Iowa Democratic activists.

This is an open thread: all topics welcome.

About one-third of the 1,528,715 Iowans who cast ballots in the 2008 general election voted early. Absentee voting saved several Democratic incumbents in the state House and Senate that year. Bleeding Heartland will update these tables on weekdays until election day, using figures posted on the Iowa Secretary of State’s website (click the elections tab, then voters, then 2012 general election).

SEPTEMBER 27 UPDATE: Now adding totals for absentee ballots received by county auditors as well as absentee ballots requested each weekday.

SEPTEMBER 28 UPDATE: When an Iowan votes early in person at the auditor’s office, that counts as an absentee ballot requested by the voter and as an absentee ballot received by the auditor on the same day.

OCTOBER 21 UPDATE: Recent polls by NBC/Wall Street Journal/Marist and Public Policy Polling suggest that President Barack Obama has a 2:1 lead among Iowans who have already voted. For that to be true, the majority of no-party voters who cast early ballots would have to be supporting the president.

Early voting starts in Iowa on September 27, but candidates have been encouraging supporters to request early ballots for months. The latest figures from the Iowa Secretary of State’s office show that registered Democrats have submitted far more absentee ballot requests than have Republicans, statewide and in all four Congressional districts. Details are below.

UPDATE: Added a table with the latest numbers as of September 18. SECOND UPDATE: Will be updating the absentee ballot totals daily here.

The Siemens corporation announced today that “it will lay off 407 of the 660 workers at the blade manufacturing plant that is one of the five largest employers” in Fort Madison, Iowa (Lee County). Follow me after the jump for more details and reaction from Iowa elected officials and Congressional candidates.

The two major-party presidential candidates held rallies yesterday in Iowa’s key Republican and Democratic strongholds. Mitt Romney was in Sioux County, which has voted more than 80 percent Republican in past presidential elections. Barack Obama and Joe Biden were in Johnson County, which has delivered big margins to Democrats who won close statewide elections in the past.

The latest figures from the Iowa Secretary of State’s office (pdf) show 666,279 active no-party voters statewide, 620,868 active Republicans, and 602,636 active Democrats. That represents slightly larger gains for Democrats than Republicans since the beginning of August. After the jump I’ve posted the latest active voter registration numbers in all 99 Iowa counties, grouped by Congressional district.

Any comments about the 2012 elections in Iowa are welcome in this thread.

The Rothenberg Political Report’s latest rankings of competitive House districts does not include the IA-01 race between incumbent Bruce Braley and challenger Ben Lange. Rothenberg considers the IA-02 contest between incumbent Dave Loebsack and challenger John Archer to be “Democrat favored.” He puts the the “Toss-up/tilt Republican” label on both the IA-03 clash of incumbents Leonard Boswell and Tom Latham and the IA-04 race between incumbent Steve King and challenger Christie Vilsack. Although I haven’t seen internal polling from any of the Congressional races, I doubt that Vilsack has as good a chance of winning as Boswell. True, Boswell can’t keep pace with Latham’s fundraising. But he is an incumbent who’s represented most of the counties in IA-03 before and has outperformed the top of the Democratic ticket in previous presidential elections. He also faces a much smaller GOP voter registration advantage in his district, as you can see below.

Getting out the vote early was a major theme of President Barack Obama’s campaign rallies in Urbandale and Sioux City yesterday. Democratic candidates for other offices need a strong early vote as well, but there’s no sign the president is concerned about electing Democrats up and down the ticket.

At this time four years ago, Barack Obama’s campaign had about 30 field offices up and running in Iowa, compared to six offices for Republican presidential candidate John McCain.

Obama’s campaign has had eight Iowa field offices open this summer and is rolling out another 26 offices around Iowa this weekend. So far, Mitt Romney’s campaign has ten Iowa field offices, in addition to the unified Republican headquarters in Urbandale.

After the jump, I compare the field office locations for each presidential campaign, grouped by Iowa Congressional district. Where relevant, I’ve also noted competitive Iowa House and Senate districts near the Obama and Romney field offices, although I doubt either presidential campaign will do much for down-ticket Democratic or Republican candidates.

Democratic candidate Christie Vilsack launched her first television commercial across Iowa’s fourth Congressional district yesterday. The 30-second spot depicts the former Iowa first lady as a nonpartisan figure who’s willing to work with everyone to represent Iowa values. Follow me after the jump for the video, annotated transcript, and analysis of the Vilsack strategy.

I’ve also enclosed below the transcripts for the three radio advertisements Vilsack’s campaign has broadcast this summer. Whereas the tv spot does not mention Vilsack’s opponent by name, the radio ads paint an unflattering picture of Representative Steve King as a creature of Washington. A future Bleeding Heartland post will feature King’s campaign advertising.

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney announced his running mate this morning: Representative Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, the chair of the U.S. House Budget Committee. The two men are launching a four-day bus tour today. I don’t know what surprises me more: Romney not choosing Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, or Ryan’s willingness to give up his committee chairmanship for a shot at the vice presidency.

Democratic House incumbents and challengers have already been running against the Ryan budget. Iowa’s representatives split on party lines when the House approved this plan in April 2011, and Representative Leonard Boswell was eager to draw this contrast between himself and IA-03 opponent Representative Tom Latham. Having Ryan on the Republican ticket ensures that tax and budget issues will be at the center of the presidential campaign discourse this fall. Ryan’s approach to solving the long-term deficit problem asks virtually nothing of wealthy people but would devastate Medicaid, not to mention the Medicare program for future retirees. After the jump I’ve posted excerpts from a new report on the Ryan plan’s impact on state budgets, along the Iowa Policy Project’s comment on how the Ryan budget would affect Iowa in particular.

Any relevant comments are welcome in this thread. I will update this post with Iowa reaction and more news and links after the jump. Representative Steve King was enthusiastic about the pick.

The Iowa State Fair opens this morning and runs through the evening of August 19. This thread is for any comments about the fair or advice for enjoying what can be an overwhelming experience. I’ve posted my suggestions after the jump.

All the Democratic and Republican candidates from Iowa’s four Congressional districts are scheduled to speak at the Des Moines Register’s “soapbox” between August 13 and 17. That schedule is at the end of this post. UPDATE: Some of the speaking times have changed on the soapbox schedule, and a few new speakers have been added, including Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan and U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack.

For the fifth month in a row, registered Republicans in Iowa outnumber registered Democrats. The latest figures from the Iowa Secretary of State’s office (pdf) show 659,838 active no-party voters statewide, 620,584 active Republicans, and 598,995 active Democrats.

After the jump I’ve posted the latest active voter registration numbers in all 99 Iowa counties, grouped by Congressional district. The most evenly-split county is still Decatur in south-central Iowa, with 1,723 registered Democrats, 1,791 Republicans, and 1,751 no-party voters as of August 2.

Any comments about the 2012 elections in Iowa are welcome in this thread.  

The U.S. House responded to this year’s widespread drought by passing an agricultural disaster assistance bill yesterday with unanimous support from Iowa’s five representatives. However, not all the Iowans were enthusiastic about the effort.

Meanwhile, four of Iowa’s five House members voted against adjourning for the August recess yesterday, in large part because of unfinished work on a farm bill. Details on those and other House votes affecting the agricultural sector are after the jump.

The U.S. House voted yesterday to extend for one year all the tax rates established by the Bush tax cuts in 2001 and 2003. Without Congressional action, those tax cuts will expire at the end of 2012. Once again, three-term Representative Dave Loebsack (IA-02) and eight-term Representative Leonard Boswell (IA-03) were among a small group of Democrats to vote for a GOP bill.