In fewer than three months on the job, Secretary of State Matt Schultz has prompted the president of the Iowa county auditors association to express concern about being “dragged into a partisan fight.” Jennifer Jacobs covered Butler County Auditor Holly Fokkena’s extraordinary comments in Sunday’s Des Moines Register. Not only is Fokkena a Republican like Schultz, she is from a county that tilts strongly to the GOP. Yet she is worried about Schultz’s push to require all voters to show photo ID.

Background and recent developments on the photo ID controversy are after the jump.

Anti-abortion legislation that stalled earlier this year in an Iowa House committee appears likely to pass the lower chamber soon. House File 5 would ban abortions after the 20th week of pregnancy, using a “fetal pain” standard adapted from a similar bill in Nebraska. More than 30 House Republicans are co-sponsoring the bill, hoping to deter Omaha-based abortion provider Dr. Leroy Carhart from opening a clinic in Council Bluffs.

Recent news on House File 5 and a related “personhood” bill is after the jump.

Nine Iowa Senate Democrats have signed an open letter asking their colleagues to shelve a pro-nuclear power bill this session and to create a legislative commission “to thoroughly investigate all of the issues including the need for a nuclear power plant, the costs and impact on utility rates, financing and liability issues, safety and waste disposal issues, and renewable energy alternatives.” The senators who signed were Daryl Beall (district 25), Dennis Black (district 21), Joe Bolkcom (district 39), Dick Dearden (district 34), Robert Dvorsky (district 15), Gene Fraise (district 46), Jack Hatch (district 33), Rob Hogg (district 19) and Pam Jochum (district 14). The full text of their letter is after the jump. Excerpt:

Specifically, we have the following concerns:

* There is very little known about how much a new nuclear power plant would cost or how it would

impact utility rates, especially for seniors, working families, and Iowa businesses.

* The proposed technology – small modular reactors – is unproven and has not been approved by

the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

* There are significant safety and financial liability concerns, especially after the nuclear disaster in Japan. United States Senator Joseph Lieberman has called for “putting the brakes on” the construction of new nuclear power plants “until we can absorb what has happened in Japan.”

* There are potential issues with the creation of a permanent government bureaucracy to permit, monitor, and regulate any new nuclear power plants.

* There are unresolved siting issues about where the plant or plants would be located and how the property would be acquired for the construction of the plants.

MidAmerican Energy is only in the first of what was represented to be a three-year study on the feasibility of constructing a new nuclear power plant in Iowa. When that bill was passed, it was contemplated that Iowa would take at least three years to make any decision about new nuclear power plants. There is no rush.

Speaking to the Des Moines Register yesterday, Iowa House Speaker Kraig Paulsen predicted the bill will pass this year. Iowa’s only current nuclear power plant is in Paulsen’s district. Democratic Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal supports the bill.

MidAmerican Energy President William Fehrman is expected to attend an Iowa Senate Commerce subcommittee hearing on the bill later today. Fehrman has said the bill would help MidAmerican attract investors for a nuclear construction project. Critics point out that the legislation would lead to higher utility bills for hundreds of thousands of Iowans and would tilt the field so far in favor of expanding nuclear power that less costly energy efficiency and renewable energy projects might not be pursued.

On the other hand, even before this week’s crisis at the Fukushima facility in Japan, financing was not coming together for proposed nuclear power plant projects in the United States. So one could argue that even if this bill becomes law, MidAmerican probably won’t attract the investor support needed to build nuclear plants here. In that case, why let the company charge its Iowa customers more now to pay for anticipated future construction costs?

Meanwhile, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has ranked the 104 nuclear power plants across the country in terms of earthquake risk. Iowa’s Duane Arnold nuclear reactor is 26th on that list. Yesterday several U.S. Senate Democrats urged the head of the NRC to conduct a thorough review of all nuclear reactors in this country, especially those in earthquake-prone areas.

In Germany, political leaders have decided to temporarily shut down seven of the country’s oldest nuclear reactors in order to conduct a safety review. The prime minister of Spain has also called for a review of all that country’s nuclear power plants. A nuclear energy expert whose name I didn’t catch pointed out yesterday on CNN that baseload demand for electricity is relatively low in the spring, so it wouldn’t cause problems on the grid to shut down U.S. nuclear power plants for a month or two during a safety review.

UPDATE: Fehrman told the Iowa Senate subcommittee that “MidAmerican Energy customers would see their power bills rise 10 percent over a decade to pay for the investor-owned utility’s share of a proposed Iowa nuclear plant.” He confirmed that the plant would be completed no sooner than 2020, and that Iowa ratepayers would not get their money back, even if the construction never moved forward.

Sen. Swati Dandekar of Marion said Iowans are concerned about paying for a project that may cost more than the utility thinks, given the nation’s record on cost overruns at nuclear plants.

“There is no doubt there is a history of cost overruns in this industry,” Fehrman said. “We’ve asked for more oversight of this project, and that’s in the bill.”

MidAmerican is pushing legislation that would set some of the rate-making principles to be applied to the plant, in effect telling investors how the utility would recover its expenses.

Also on Thursday, the Iowa chapter of the Sierra Club and the American Association of Retired Persons came out against the bill.  From an AARP statement:

“AARP believes it is unfair to consumers and bad policy for the Iowa General Assembly to enact legislation that would allow utility companies to charge consumers in advance for costs of a new plant before it is in service, and require consumers to continue to have to pay even if the plant development is canceled, or goes over budget [….] AARP is concerned about this legislation, not because of the question of nuclear power, but because we oppose raising rates for consumers already struggling to afford their utility bills for a plant yet to be built, where we don’t know the actual cost to build, and may or may not even be built in Iowa.”

Still the self-styled taxpayer watchdog groups are missing in action on this bill.  

Three days into floor discussion of a bill to reduce public employee bargaining rights, Iowa House Republicans voted to cut off debate on House File 525 yesterday. At least 80 percent of more than 100 amendments proposed by House Democrats had not been discussed yet. The House proceeded to reject the remaining Democratic-proposed amendments in a quick series of votes, and the final bill passed 57 to 39. The House Journal (pdf) contains details on yesterday’s debate, including all the roll calls. Most of the votes went along party lines. I was surprised to see one House Republican (Gary Worthan of district 52) vote with the whole Democratic caucus against final passage of the bill. I wonder whether he accidentally pressed the wrong button there, because he voted with the rest of the Republicans on ending debate and lots of amendments.

House Democrats were outraged by the Republican maneuver and the fact that the House switchboard wasn’t working Friday morning (which House Speaker Kraig Paulsen said was an oversight). Jason Clayworth noted at the Des Moines Register, “Limiting debate without the prior agreement to both parties is rare but not unique. Democrats, for example, limited debate in 2009 on another union bill known as prevailing wage that would have setting standards for minimum pay and benefits on government projects.”

Paulsen said the bill “addresses the cost of government in Iowa” by “leveling the playing field for taxpayers.” I am so tired of Republicans scapegoating public employees for our budgetary constraints. Iowa is in better fiscal condition than more than 40 other states. In any event, there is “no correlation between state budget shortfalls and union negotiating laws”:

“The thing that’s driving budget shortfalls is the impact of the national economy on state revenues,” said Elizabeth McNichol of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a research group in Washington, D.C. “It’s definitely other factors driving these shortfalls,” rather than union agreements, she said. […]

Five states – Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia – prohibit public employee union negotiations. Each of those states faces budget shortfalls that cumulatively amount to almost $20 billion, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and the National Council on Teacher Quality say.

Texas, one of the states prohibiting public union negotiations, has one of the largest projected budget shortfalls for next year, figured as a percentage of the current budget.

Iowa is among states with one of the lowest projected shortfalls for next year.

Forty-five states face budget shortfalls for the fiscal year that begins July 1. Of the five states that do not face budget shortfalls, each allows some type of public employee union bargaining.

Iowa’s public employees are paid less than their private sector counterparts when education levels, experience and hours worked are taken into account. Republicans tell us modest raises (about 3 percent per year) for state employees are unaffordable because they would cost $414 million over two years (if non-contract employees get the same pay increases). Yet David Osterberg pointed out this week,

The Iowa House has proposed cutting state income taxes by 20 percent. That would cost $350 million in 2012 and $700 million per year subsequently.

The governor has proposed lowering the top rate on the corporate income tax. That would cost $130 million in 2012 and $200 million per year subsequently.

The Senate and House have proposed adopting “bonus depreciation” rules. These new breaks for business would cost the treasury between $27 million and $83 million in 2011 and $99 million and $141 million in 2012.

While Republicans are selling House File 525 as a way to control government spending, the bill appears to be designed to undermine organized labor. It would shred binding arbitration and create new incentives for state employees not to join a union. In a statement yesterday, Iowa House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said, “Like Wisconsin, Republicans in Iowa will stop at nothing to take away rights from police officers, fire fighters, state troopers, teachers, correctional officers and other hard-working Iowans. This bill to end collective bargaining is worse than the bill approved in Wisconsin earlier today.” After the jump I’ve posted excerpts from a House Democratic Research staff analysis on the bill.

Senate Democratic leaders have made clear that House File 525 is going nowhere in the upper chamber this year. If Republicans gain a majority in the Iowa Senate in 2012, they will certainly revive this kind of legislation.

Members of Congress rarely comment on news from the Iowa legislature, but both Senator Tom Harkin and Representative Bruce Braley (IA-01) released statements on yesterday’s Iowa House vote. I’ve posted those after the jump.

MARCH 14 UPDATE: Iowa Senate Labor Committee Chair Wally Horn confirmed that this bill won’t make it out of committee in the upper chamber and is therefore dead for the 2011 legislative session.

Members of the Iowa House Republican leadership team forgot that simple rule yesterday.

The video and transcript are after the jump.

Approximately 7,000 Iowans who have been out of work for at least a year have lost their chance to receive an extra 13 weeks of unemployment benefits at the federal government’s expense. The 2009 stimulus (American Recovery and Reinvestment Act) included a provision “to fund the entire cost of extended unemployment benefits through the end of 2011, rather than requiring states to pay half of the cost.” States with unemployment rates of at least 6.5 percent could qualify for 13 weeks of extended benefits, and states with unemployment rates exceeding 8 percent could qualify for 20 weeks of extended benefits.

Iowa was among nine states that did not pass enabling legislation (a “Total Unemployment Rate trigger”) to take advantage of that portion of the stimulus. Democrats in the Iowa Senate recently approved a bill on a mostly party-line vote and urged the Iowa House to act by March 10. New employment figures to be released on that date were expected to bring Iowa’s three-month average unemployment below the threshold for qualifying for the federal stimulus program. Indeed, Iowa Workforce Development confirmed that the state’s unemployment rate held steady at 6.1 percent in January, bringing the three-month average rate down to 6.1 percent.

Governor Terry Branstad didn’t advocate for the enabling legislation, and House Republican leaders decided not to move the bill:

“[T]he House Republican caucus is not interested in making it harder to be an employer in the state of Iowa,” said House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha. “What’s going on with unemployment compensation right now is making it harder to be an employer.”

I believe Republicans misunderstood the essence of this program. As the National Employment Law Project explained in a February report, the stimulus act included full federal funding for these extended benefits. Note: that report estimated that about 29,000 Iowans could potentially receive the 13 weeks of extended unemployment benefits. Iowa Senate Democrats estimated that about 7,000 would qualify. That’s a relatively small percentage of the 102,000 unemployed Iowans, but roughly $14.5 million in benefits divided among 7,000 people would have meant a lot of extra disposable income in communities with high jobless rates.

It’s lamentable that Republicans declined to act on behalf of Iowa’s long-term unemployed. In addition to helping jobless individuals, unemployment benefits have a powerful multiplier effect in local economies, because the people who receive them tend to spend the money quickly on goods and services they could not otherwise afford.

Democrats in the Iowa House and Senate share the blame for not passing the Total Unemployment Rate trigger during the 2010 legislative session. When the stimulus went into effect in 2009, Iowa’s unemployment rate was too low to qualify for that money (though state officials did secure unemployment benefits through a different part of the stimulus). But in early 2010, Iowa’s unemployment rate exceeded 6.5 percent. If the Iowa House and Senate had passed enabling legislation, Governor Chet Culver surely would have signed it, and some jobless Iowans would already have received the extra federal funding.

The Iowa House settled in Wednesday for a long floor debate on the labor bill formerly known as House Study Bill 117, now House File 525 (full text). This bill would sharply restrict collective bargaining rights and end binding arbitration for public employee unions. When the Iowa House Labor Committee considered this bill, Democrats kept lawmakers in session all night, offering dozens of amendments. House Democrats have proposed at least 100 amendments for consideration on the floor, and many legislators are speaking about each one. About six hours into the debate, fewer than ten amendments have been considered. It’s not clear whether the chamber will adjourn later tonight, but even if House members pull another all-nighter, this debate could take days. With a 60-40 majority, Republicans have the votes to pass House File 525 eventually, but it could be an exhausting experience. Senate Democratic leaders have vowed to block the bill in the upper chamber.

Meanwhile, Governor Terry Branstad traveled the state today pushing his message about how Iowa can’t afford to give public employees raises during the next two fiscal years. Statehouse Democrats say that Iowa can afford the new union contracts negotiated by former Governor Chet Culver, if Republicans give up their planned corporate and higher-income tax cuts.

Labor issues were contentious even when Democrats had the trifecta in Iowa. Culver’s 2008 veto of a bill that would have expanded collective bargaining rights caused a lasting rift between him and the state’s labor movement. The following year, six House Democrats stood with Republicans to block a prevailing wage bill, undermining the credibility of the majority leaders. Another Democrat’s opposition to “fair share” legislation prompted an unsuccessful primary challenge in 2010. Now that the political battle in Iowa has shifted to defending rather than expanding labor rights, the Democratic House caucus is more united.

Today’s unusual circumstances in the Iowa House  are nothing compared to the circus unfolding in Wisconsin. Senate Democrats left the state three weeks ago to deny Republicans the quorum they needed to pass an even more restrictive collective bargaining bill. Republicans moved to end the standoff today by supposedly removing the fiscal portions of the labor bill, making it no longer subject to the Wisconsin Senate quorum rules. The chamber then convened and passed the bill in about five minutes with no debate or amendments and only one dissenting vote. However, Democrats claim not all parts of the bill affecting the budget were removed before today’s power play; this pdf file is the Wisconsin Legislative Fiscal Bureau’s analysis of the revised bill. There will surely be a legal challenge to passing the bill without a quorum, and some union representatives in Wisconsin are even talking about organizing a general strike.

Any comments about political battles over labor issues are welcome in this thread.

UPDATE: The Iowa House adjourned Wednesday night after eight hours of debate on House File 525. The discussion resumes on Thursday; here’s a link to live video.

Senator Tom Harkin issued this statement on the Wisconsin events:

“I am appalled by the actions of the Republicans in Wisconsin.  They trampled over the democratic process, ramming through legislation taking away a fundamental right of Wisconsin’s public servants – the right to organize.  The law has nothing to do with budgets.  It is blatant political scapegoating, and it is shameful.  Our elected leaders at every level of government should be focused on helping working families succeed, not tearing them down.”

A public hearing on the collective bargaining bill under consideration in the Iowa House is likely to be one of the main political events of the week, but there’s much more going on around the state as well. Details are after the jump.

As always, post a comment or send me an e-mail to let me know of public events that should be included on this calendar.

The first all-nighter of the 2011 legislative session ended this morning around 6:05 am, as the Iowa House Labor Committee approved a bill restricting public employees’ collective bargaining rights on a party-line vote.

Details on the bill, the debate, and the fight to come are after the jump.

House File 45 heads to Governor Terry Branstad’s desk today after the Iowa House approved the “deappropriations” bill by a 95 to zero vote. The bill was the top legislative priority for House Republican leaders, but the Democratic-controlled Iowa Senate eliminated many of its controversial provisions last week. The full text of House File 45 is here, and the complete bill history is here. The Senate Journal for February 17 contains roll calls for votes on House File 45 and various amendments (pdf file). The final Senate version of House File 45 passed with 48 yes votes. First-term Republican Senator Mark Chelgren voted against the bill, and Republican Senator Sandy Greiner was absent.

Thanks to the Senate amendment, state funding for preschool, family planning, passenger rail, smoking cessation programs, and the core curriculum live to fight another day in the Iowa legislature. So do the Power Fund, the Office of Energy Independence, and the Grow Iowa Values Fund, all economic development programs long targeted by statehouse Republicans.

In addition, the Senate removed language from House File 45 that would have reduced funding for state universities, area education agencies, land acquisitions by the Department of Natural Resources and the Resource Enhancement and Protection fund.

The Senate’s version of House File 45 also did not include language creating a “tax relief fund” that would have collected surplus revenues after state reserve funds were filled.

After the jump I’ve posted an overview compiled by the Iowa House Democratic research staff on “major items eliminated” by the Senate amendment to House File 45. I’ve also listed some other significant points of divergence between the Senate and House versions of this bill, as well as key points on which the Senate left House File 45’s language intact.

Finally, I’ve posted the House Democratic research staff’s explanation of language that would create searchable databases on the state budget and tax rates.  

Republican elected officials are sending a mixed message about Iowa’s finances. Before the 2011 legislative session began, Republicans were outraged about a so-called “unaffordable” union contract that would give state workers modest raises, at a cost of about $100 million a year for two years.  Barely a week into the session, a party-line Iowa House vote approved a broad “deappropriations” bill, in which about a third of the savings came from cutting Iowa’s preschool grant for four-year-olds. The universal voluntary preschool program was expected to cost $70 million to $75 million per year (according to Legislative Services Agency estimates), or up to $90 million by some other estimates.

Since then, House Republicans have passed House File 185, which allows zero growth in K-12 education budgets for the next two fiscal years. That was an unprecedented move. In nearly 40 years, the Iowa legislature has never approved less than 1 percent allowable growth for school district budgets: not during the farm crisis, not during the recessions and budget crunches of the early 1980s, early 1990s, 2001-02 or 2009-10. Now, we are told, our dire fiscal condition doesn’t leave any room to spend $65 million to allow school districts to increase their budgets by 2 percent.

Yet on February 16, the Iowa House approved House File 194 on a mostly party-line vote. The bill would cut Iowa’s individual income tax rates by 20 percent, which the Legislative Services Agency estimates would cost $330 million during fiscal year 2012 and more than $700 million in each of the next three fiscal years.  How Iowa can afford that loss of revenue and what services would be cut to keep the budget balanced, House Republicans don’t say.

Meanwhile, Governor Terry Branstad plans to lay off hundreds of state workers to cut labor costs and sent state legislators a draft budget with no allowable growth for K-12 schools for two years. This week Branstad offered a preschool plan that would support fewer children at a lower cost ($43 million per year). He and his Department of Education director, Jason Glass, have repeatedly said Iowa cannot afford to continue the preschool program as currently structured. Yet Branstad’s plan to cut corporate taxes in half would deprive the state of at least $100 million in revenues. He has proposed about $450 million in commercial property tax cuts, with the idea that state government would reimburse local governments for much of that lost revenue. If our budget constraints are so severe, how can we afford those policies?

More context on the state budget is after the jump, along with details on the Iowa Senate’s resistance to Republican tax and education funding proposals.

Civic Skinny’s latest column at the Des Moines weekly Cityview leads with a warning for Iowa Senate Minority Leader Paul McKinley. Citing “top people in both parties,” Skinny speculates that “powerful party forces – and that’s code for Ed Failor Jr.’s Iowans for Tax Relief” want to replace McKinley with “one of their own – and that probably means Bill Dix […]”

Follow me after the jump for Skinny’s case as well as some additional supporting evidence and background on Dix, Iowans for Tax Relief, and longstanding Republican discontent with McKinley.

Excerpt from the post.culture.shock blog

When I was in middle school, I earned spare money by babysitting for a lot of the neighborhood kids. One of the parents I was employed by was Kim Pearson, one of the sponsors of the bill in the Iowa House to amend the Constitution to ban not only gay marriage, but also civil unions and domestic partnerships. This is my letter to her. (edited somewhat with the recognition that this is now going to a lot of folks who don’t know me as well as Kim did, and who likely don’t care what I’ve been up to since I spent a summer taking care of her kids)

Proud to be an Iowan. Period. Thanks Zach.

After a crowded public hearing last night and about three hours of floor debate today, the Iowa House approved House Joint Resolution 6, a constitutional amendment that would ban all legal recognition for same-sex relationships in Iowa. All 59 Republicans present voted for the amendment, as did three House Democrats who represent rural districts: Kurt Swaim, Dan Muhlbauer and Brian Quirk. The bill now goes to the Iowa Senate, where Majority Leader Mike Gronstal has pledged to keep it from receiving a floor vote.

Many of the 37 House Democrats who voted no on the amendment took to the floor to speak out against the bill. You can read excerpts from their remarks here, here, here and here. (UPDATE: Several of the House Democrats’ speeches from the chamber are on YouTube as well.)

In contrast, only a few Republicans gave prepared remarks supporting the amendment, including lead sponsor Dwayne Alons (rarely afraid to say something ridiculous) and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Rich Anderson. Anderson justified the amendment as serving the state’s interest in promoting childbearing:

“We want to drive procreation into a stable relationship and procreation only happens between a male and a female. See a male and a female can do something that a homosexual couple cannot: They can create children accidently. That’s the issue. It’s not about love. It’s not about romance. It’s about driving state policy toward responsible procreation.”

The Iowa Supreme Court addressed and rejected that argument on pages 59 and 60 of the Varnum v Brien ruling. Anderson also raised the familiar “slippery slope” concern that legal same-sex marriage would lead to state recognition of incestuous and polygamous unions. No one’s tried to do that in the other four U.S. states that recognize same-sex marriages, or in Canada or any of the European countries that do the same.

Given how strongly the Republican base supports overturning same-sex marriage rights, I was surprised more Republicans weren’t eager to explain their votes on the House floor. Tea party favorites Kim Pearson and Glen Massie even declined to yield to a question from Democrat Nathan Willems on whether the equal protection clause applies to all Iowans. House Majority Whip Erik Helland “answered” Willems’ question, but in a non-responsive way.  

It got me wondering: deep down, are they not proud of what they’re doing? Perhaps some of them secretly agree with former Republican State Senator Jeff Angelo, who has changed his position on marriage equality and now views a constitutional amendment as “government intrusion in the lives of law-abiding citizens.” Rarely do legislators vote to change the constitution, and Iowa has never before approved an amendment to limit the rights of citizens. If House Republicans believe the public interest demands putting minority rights up for a majority vote, they owe us compelling arguments.

Politically, it was probably wise for House Republicans to keep quiet during today’s debate. Many must realize that they’re on the wrong side of history, as public opinion polls show increasing support for same-sex marriage rights. A “loud and proud” statement for the public record supporting this bill could be embarrassing 10 or 20 years from now.

Still, I wonder if voting for House Joint Resolution 6 will ever become a political liability for any of today’s Republican lawmakers. During the 1980s and 1990s, decades-old opposition to school desegregation or other policies of the civil rights era occasionally became a campaign issue. I remember many politicians apologizing for things they said or votes they took in the 1960s and 1970s. During the 2008 presidential race, Republican candidate John McCain felt compelled to admit he had been “wrong” to oppose a holiday honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

After the jump I discuss a half-dozen members of the Iowa House Republican caucus who may one day wish they’d had the courage to be out in front accepting marriage equality.

Governor Terry Branstad presents his draft budget to members of the Iowa House and Senate this morning. His staff have indicated he will outline about $700 million in budget cuts, including layoffs of hundreds of workers. Branstad and Republican legislators say Iowa needs to reduce spending by $700 million to make up for the projected budget gap for fiscal year 2012, which begins on July 1.

The facts tell a different story: Iowa has a projected gap of around $263 million for the coming fiscal year. That figure was the Legislative Services Agency’s best guess as of December 2010, but it probably overstates the gap. Congress extended the Bush tax cuts for all income levels, which means higher-income Iowans will not be forced to pay more federal taxes and therefore will not have more to deduct from their state tax returns. With the Bush tax cuts in place, Iowa can expect to collect about $140 million more in state tax receipts for the 2012 fiscal year. That would be enough to cover the estimated cost of the new AFSCME contract Branstad has declared unaffordable.

The $700 million figure Branstad uses assumes Iowa will use more than $300 million from the current-year budget surplus to pay for corporate and other tax cuts. He also wants to reduce commercial property taxes, which will cost the state more money to reimburse local governments. Those are Branstad’s preferences, not policies state government is obliged to implement. It’s not that Iowa can’t afford to continue the preschool program that costs about $70 million per year, or can’t afford any allowable growth in K-12 education budgets. Republicans simply want to do other things with the public’s money.

I am curious to hear what Branstad says about transportation funding today, since he came out this week against passenger rail subsidies but for a future gas tax hike to build more roads. I also wonder whether he will propose any specific reform to tax-increment financing in Iowa. TIF was originally intended to spur redevelopment in “slum and blighted” urban areas but has become increasingly costly for state government and has created inequities in commercial property taxes.

I’ll update this post with details from Branstad’s speech and political reaction after the jump. Meanwhile, share any thoughts about the state budget in this thread.

UPDATE: IowaPolitics.com posted the prepared text of Branstad’s speech. Big surprise: he’s not planning to eliminate appropriations for preschool, just to reduce them to $43 million per year. Further thoughts are below.

FRIDAY UPDATE: At the end of this post I’ve added Senator Rob Hogg’s assessment of Branstad’s draft budget. He notes that zero percent allowable growth for K-12 schools for two years is “unprecedented in the history of Iowa’s school financing formula which was created in 1973.”

Lack of funding for various flood mitigation and watershed management programs also concerns Hogg, a Democrat representing Cedar Rapids and a leading advocate of improved flood prevention efforts in Iowa.

Iowa Republicans vowed late last year to pass new abortion restrictions modeled on a Nebraska statute which in effect bans the procedure after the 20th week of gestation. Abortions are already illegal in Iowa after the sixth month of pregnancy except if a doctor believes the procedure could “preserve the life or health” of the pregnant woman. The new bill, House File 5, asserts that an “unborn child” can experience pain after the 20th week of gestation and bans abortions after that time unless “The pregnant woman has a condition which the physician deems a medical emergency” or “It is necessary to preserve the life of the unborn child.”

Very few abortions are performed in Iowa after the 20th week of pregnancy. In 2006 just nine out of more than 6,700 abortions occurred at the 21th week of gestation or later. Of the 5,829 abortions performed in Iowa in 2009, only six were induced after the 20th week. However, Republicans want to prevent Dr. LeRoy Carhart from opening a clinic in Council Bluffs to serve women seeking abortions after 20 weeks. Carhart had worked with Dr. George Tiller in Wichita, Kansas for more than a decade but moved to Omaha after Tiller’s assassination in 2009. The new Nebraska law prompted Carhart to close his Omaha clinic. Last month he began working at a Maryland clinic.

Iowa House Republican leaders have expressed confidence about passing new abortion restrictions. They have a 60 to 40 majority with no pro-choice members of their caucus. I believe this legislation could pass the Iowa Senate, because unlike the 1980s and 1990s, there are no longer any pro-choice Republicans to cancel out the votes of Democrats supporting more restrictions on reproductive rights. Governor Terry Branstad would be eager to sign any anti-choice bill.

However, Craig Robinson reported yesterday that House File 5 lacks the votes to clear the Iowa House Human Resources Committee. Two of the most conservative first-term GOP legislators, Kim Pearson and Glen Massie, serve on that committee and oppose the bill, presumably because it would not go far enough to restrict abortions. Without their support, Republicans can count on only 10 votes in the 21-member committee. According to Robinson, Iowa Right to Life, the Iowa Catholic Conference, and the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition all support House File 5. But the FAMiLY LEADER organization led by Bob Vander Plaats and others from the Iowa Family Policy Center oppose the bill.

Pearson and Massie will face tremendous pressure to change their position. I wouldn’t be surprised if they vote for House File 5 after all. But if they resist carrots or sticks Republican leaders wave at them, the bill could be dead for the 2011 session.

Speaking of reproductive rights, no one in the House Republican caucus seems to realize that the family planning spending cuts in House File 45, which passed the chamber on January 19, would likely increase the number of early abortions performed in Iowa. It’s sadly typical for anti-choice politicians to oppose effective means to prevent unintended pregnancies.

UPDATE: The Des Moines Register’s Jason Clayworth posted a good rundown on the GOP split over this bill.

The preschool program will be at the center of Democratic opposition to a “deappropriations” bill the Iowa House Appropriations Committee approved this week. Republicans say House Study Bill 1, which has been renamed House File 45, would save $500 million over three years. Nearly a third of that total would come from eliminating the statewide voluntary preschool program for four-year-olds (estimated to cost $69.9 million in fiscal year 2012 and $75.1 million in fiscal year 2013). Click here for a summary listing the budget cuts and supplemental appropriations in House File 45.

On January 13, House Democrats launched a website to help mobilize Iowans who value the long-term benefits of preschool. Ending the program could affect 20,000 children across the state. This chart (pdf file) shows the preschool enrollment for four-year-olds and cost to the state for each school district. For instance, in the Des Moines area there are 1,335 children enrolled in the preschool program through the Des Moines Community Schools, 235 in the West Des Moines school district, 208 in Johnston, 207 in Southeast Polk, 163 in Norwalk, 147 in Urbandale, and 122 in Ankeny. In the Cedar Rapids area, 473 children are enrolled in preschool through the Cedar Rapids school district and 175 in Linn-Mar.

A public hearing on House File 45 will take place Tuesday, January 18 from 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. in the House chambers at the capitol. Only 40 people will be allowed to speak, but any Iowan can send written comments on the bill to lioinfo AT legis.state.ia.us, with “testimony” in the e-mail subject line. House Democrats are also asking members of the public to post comments at the Save Preschool site.

Statehouse Republicans and incoming Governor Terry Branstad want to replace the preschool program with a voucher system geared to low-income families. However, many middle-income families in Iowa are also unable to afford preschool, which can easily cost $700 to $800 per month. If state assistance for middle-class families disappears, many preschools could close for lack of students.

It’s unfortunate that preschool became a partisan issue in Iowa. A Pew Center on the States report published last month found, “Despite persistent budget shortfalls, the majority of state legislatures have once again made the prudent decision to protect pre-k programs.” In addition, more than a dozen states “with control of the executive and legislative branches split between the two major parties” nevertheless “protected their pre-k investments from budget cuts.”

The Iowa House Appropriations Committee passed House Study Bill 1 on January 12, by a party-line vote of 15 to 10. Republicans call the bill the “Taxpayers First Act” and claim it would save the state more than $500 million over three years, while refunding some money to taxpayers and allocating an extra $25 million for mental health services over the next 18 months. As Bleeding Heartland discussed here, the potential savings in the current budget year are far smaller. The Democratic-controlled Iowa Senate is unlikely to approve some of the big-ticket spending cuts, such as complete elimination of the voluntary preschool program for four-year-olds. The full text of the bill as introduced is here (pdf file). The Legislative Services Agency analysis of how much various provisions would cost or save is here (pdf file).

Looking through the lobbyist declarations on HSB 1, so far only Iowans for Tax Relief, the National Federation of Independent Business, and the Washington-based 501(c)4 group American Principles in Action have declared support for it. The bill’s opponents include the Greater Des Moines Partnership, the Iowa City Area Chamber of Commerce, the Iowa Association of School Boards, the Iowa chapter of the National Association of Social Workers, major labor unions (AFSCME and the Iowa State Education Association), the State Bar Association, and many organizations that advocate for public health and environmental causes. Numerous lobbyists haven’t taken a position on the bill; influential organizations still undecided include the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation, the Iowa Association of Business and Industry, the League of Cities, the State Association of Counties, the Iowa Medical Society, the Cedar Rapids Chamber of Commerce, the Iowa Chamber Alliance, and the American Association of Retired Persons.

UPDATE: The “deappropriations” bill was renamed House File 45. Click here for a bill summary.

The Iowa legislature convenes this morning for its 2011 session. Join me after the jump for clips on two of the most contentious issues to be resolved this session: proposed spending cuts and impeachment proceedings against four Iowa Supreme Court justices.

UPDATE: You can listen to opening speeches by Senate President Jack Kibbie, Senate Minority Leader Paul McKinley, Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, House Speaker Pro Tempore Jeff Kaufmann, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, and House Majority Leader Linda Upmeyer at the Radio Iowa site.

SECOND UPDATE: Lawmakers issued the official canvass of the 2010 gubernatorial election: Branstad/Reynolds 592,079 votes, Culver/Judge 484,798 votes.

When the 84th General Assembly convenes on January 10, the Iowa House will have 60 Republicans and 40 Democrats. House Republicans selected leaders and committee chairs last month, and Democrats finished choosing leaders and ranking committee members in the past two weeks.

All Iowa House leaders, committee chairs and ranking members can be found after the jump. I’ve included a link to a short biography for each state representative, as well as the year the person was first elected to the Iowa House and the district he or she represents.  

The Board of Regents unanimously approved requests last week for 95 sabbaticals in the coming year, to be taken by faculty at the University of Iowa, Iowa State University and the University of Northern Iowa. That number was way down from the 167 sabbaticals approved a few years ago. But Republicans, including the next Iowa House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, had called for a moratorium on sabbaticals to save money.

House Republicans have estimated that eliminating sabbaticals at the regents universities for a year would save taxpayers $6 million. However, “According to the regents, the 95 sabbaticals carry a $422,000 cost for replacement teachers, and last year’s sabbaticals generated $5.2 million in grants.”

Oops. The Republican savings estimate is off by more than a factor of ten. How did that happen? The Iowa City Press-Citizen explains:

[Iowa House Republicans’] projected savings apparently includes salaries that professors will earn whether they are on sabbatical or not.

Great fact-checking there on the House Republican staff. You’ve been circulating this $6 million figure for months, based on a false assumption that if universities stopped granting faculty sabbaticals, they could stop paying those professors’ salaries.

In a rational world, politicians wouldn’t try to micromanage affairs at the state universities, and would recognize their mistake in exaggerating the cost of sabbaticals. But Republicans have found an issue with a lot of symbolic punch. Like Paulsen says, “Why should the taxpayers of Iowa be paying to basically give these folks a year off from teaching?” Good universities have controls to ensure that faculty have research and publications to show for their sabbatical time, but the breaks from teaching can easily be portrayed as a big paid vacation for elitist eggheads.

Steve Kettering, who will be minority whip in the Iowa Senate, told the Press-Citizen that the regents’ vote on sabbaticals “is a thumb in their eye […] It just furthers the distance the people of Iowa feel about their universities. There is just a difference between the lives Iowans lead and the lives of the people in the university sector.” Kettering said legislators may respond either through reducing appropriations to the regents universities, or by passing a law to stop sabbaticals. I don’t think Republicans would be deterred by a Legislative Services Agency analysis showing the cost savings in the range of a few hundred thousand dollars, rather than the $6 million Republicans dream of.

Under Democratic control, the Iowa Senate probably would not pass a specific law halting sabbaticals, and senators would resist deep cuts to the regents universities’ budgets. However, if the Republican-controlled House appropriates far less to the universities, citing the regents’ failure to control costs, the final budget deal struck between the state senators and representatives could end up reducing appropriations by a lot more than the true cost of sabbaticals. The three state universities’ operating request for fiscal year 2012 is about $639 million.

A related concern is that yet again, we learn that a Republican proposal to save millions of taxpayer dollars isn’t supported by facts. Paulsen has made big promises about cutting hundreds of millions of dollars from the state budget in the current year and beyond, in order to pay for GOP tax-cutting plans. Where will that money come from? Laying off some state employees and axing a few Democratic initiatives, like the Power Fund and voluntary preschool for four-year-olds, won’t add up to enough in savings. Significant cuts to higher education may be on the way, and the Board of Regents could become the scapegoat.

LATE UPDATE: University of Iowa President Sally Mason and P. Barry Butler, the university’s interim executive vice president and provost, published a guest column in the December 28 Des Moines Register defending “career development assignments.” Excerpts are after the jump.

Iowa’s three-member Revenue Estimating Conference again raised projections for state revenues during the current fiscal year and fiscal year 2012, following another month of growing state tax collections in November. The news hasn’t deterred Republican leaders from planning mid-year budget cuts, and legislators from both parties acknowledged the end of federal stimulus funds will make the next budget year difficult. Details and proposals are after the jump.

Iowa Democrats will compete in 2012 with the same leaders who ran this year’s election program. On Saturday, the Iowa Democratic Party’s State Central Committee re-elected all five officers for the next two-year cycle: party chair Sue Dvorsky, first vice chair Michael Kiernan, second vice chair Chris Petersen, treasurer Ken Sagar and secretary Dori Rammelsberg-Dvorak. Last month, the Iowa Senate Democratic caucus re-elected Mike Gronstal as majority leader, and Iowa House Democrats chose Kevin McCarthy as minority leader. McCarthy has been majority leader and right-hand man to outgoing House Speaker Pat Murphy for the previous two election cycles.

Some might expect a few changes at the top after Iowa Democrats suffered their worst election defeats since 1994. In a December 4 statement, Dvorsky promised to “build on the lessons learned in the last election to grow the Iowa Democratic Party and advance Democratic values across the state.”

John Deeth mentions that the IDP’s field program won “national praise” (in the form of one line by Marc Ambinder). I find it hard to see how anyone can view this year’s coordinated campaign as a success. Granted, it was a tough year for Democrats in most parts of the country. Yes, a million dollars from out-of-state turned out the vote against the Iowa Supreme Court justices, which surely helped Republican candidates. Yes, Democrats were unlucky GOP power-brokers talked Terry Branstad out of retirement. If not for that, Bob Vander Plaats would have been the Republican gubernatorial nominee, Chet Culver might be gearing up for his second term, and Democrats might have held more legislative districts.

Still, we lost every competitive Iowa Senate seat plus one few people had their eyes on. We saved a few targeted Iowa House seats but suffered a net loss of 16 in the chamber, worse than almost every Democrat’s worst-case scenario before the election. We lost state House and Senate seats in every Congressional district. Even in a bad year, we should have been able to contain the losses at a lower level. Democrats have almost no margin of error for holding the Iowa Senate in 2012, and it will take at least a few cycles to get the Iowa House back.  

I don’t have the data to know whether the field program was targeting the wrong voters, not enough voters, using the wrong methods to reach voters, or just suffered from a lack of funds to execute the plan. Many of our candidates lost despite working hard and exceeding their early vote targets. The direct mail for Iowa House and Senate candidates seems to have been largely ineffective, and the television commercials (at least the ones I saw) didn’t make any case for re-electing our incumbents.

All Iowa Democrats in Congress won re-election, but can that be attributed to the IDP’s field program? Turnout compared to 2006 wasn’t up by much in the key Democratic counties in the first district, for instance. I think Democrats were lucky that the GOP’s best Congressional challenger was in the most Democratic-leaning seat. Otherwise, we could easily have lost IA-01 and/or IA-03.  

I’m not saying this is all Dvorsky’s fault, or that electing new party leaders would fix the problem. One way or another, the IDP needs to have a much better field operation in 2012. It’s dangerous to assume performance will automatically improve because more voters participate in presidential elections. The economy could (probably will) remain weak, and there’s no way Barack Obama’s campaign will generate as much excitement as it did in 2008.

Speaking of the Obama campaign, I assume his Iowa staff will take over the coordinated GOTV efforts, as they did in 2008. That didn’t work out too well for our statehouse candidates. Even Obama’s Iowa director Jackie Norris admitted that more could have been done for the down-ballot candidates. The president’s re-election team will work to maximize turnout in heavily Democratic precincts, which in most cases are not part of battleground Iowa House and Senate districts.

Share any relevant thoughts in this thread.

The Iowa State Board of Canvassers certified the statewide results of this month’s general election today. From Secretary of State Michael Mauro’s press release:

In total, 1,133,434 Iowans voted in the 2010 General Election. This accounted for a turnout of 54-percent and was the highest number of total voters participating in a midterm election in state history.

The official canvass results, including the winner’s list, can be found by visiting www.IowaVotes.gov and clicking on the link under “Election Results” or by clicking on the direct link: www.sos.state.ia.us/elections/results/index.html#9

Statewide, 68,296 more voters cast ballots in this year’s general election than in 2006 (a 6.4 percent increase in the number of voters). The growth in participation varied widely by county. I spent some time today comparing the 2006 turnout report by county with the county numbers from this year (pdf files). Some numbers that caught my eye are after the jump.

Time with extended family means less time for blogging, so I’m posting the weekend open thread early. Here are some links to get the conversation going.

Rural voters were a crucial factor helping Republicans retake the U.S. House. Of the 125 most rural Congressional districts, Republicans held all 64 seats they had going into the election and flipped 39 Democratic districts (that alone would have been enough to give them a majority). Going into the election, Democrats held 61 of the 125 most rural Congressional districts. Now they hold only 22 of those districts, including IA-01 (Bruce Braley) and IA-02 (Dave Loebsack).

Smart Politics looked at what it calls “Iowa’s Schizophrenic 2010 Electorate” and observed, “Never before in the history of Iowa elections have Republicans won a majority of seats in the Iowa House while Democrats won a majority of the Hawkeye State’s U.S. House seats.”

I listed the Iowa House and Senate Democrats before and after the election, grouped by Congressional district. Bleeding Heartland user American007 created red and blue Iowa maps showing which parties held state House and Senate districts before the election and after.

Fred Karger, a Republican political strategist and gay activist who’s exploring a presidential bid, has been running this commercial on the Fox network this week in Des Moines, Cedar Rapids, Quad Cities, Mason City, Ames, Burlington and Fort Dodge. Have you seen it? Hard to imagine a strong base of support for Karger in Iowa, but I’m glad a moderate may be running for president on the Republican side.

If Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels runs for president in 2012, some Iowa Republicans will not forgive him for supporting merit-based judicial selection in his state.

Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee said all the “right” things about Iowa judges during his recent Des Moines visit. But this week Huckabee described the controversial searches of airline passengers as a “humiliating and degrading, totally unconstitutional, intrusion of their privacy.” Uh oh! Social conservatives don’t typically acknowledge that there is a constitutional right to privacy. That dreaded “penumbra” underlies U.S. Supreme Court rulings affirming reproductive rights.

I learned this week that New Hampshire has some elected Republican officias who support marriage equality. It’s not clear whether there are enough of them to stop large GOP majorities from repealing same-sex marriage rights in that state. I wonder when (if ever) a current Republican office-holder in Iowa will defend equality.

Iowa First Lady Mari Culver says she accomplished what she set out to do during her husband’s term as governor, and her kids are excited to be moving back to their West Des Moines home full-time.

What’s on your mind this holiday weekend?  

Republicans made huge gains in the Iowa House on November 2, defeating 13 Democratic incumbents and winning four Democratic-held open seats. Republicans fell just short in several other House races, and one that puzzled me was in district 7, covering Emmet and Palo Alto Counties and part of Kossuth in north-central Iowa.

Democrat Marcella Frevert retired after representing the district for 14 years in the Iowa House. The district leans a bit Democratic in voter registration, but open seats tend to be harder for parties to hold than districts where they have established incumbents. Clearly district 7 was winnable for the GOP; the certified results put Democrat John Wittneben just 32 votes ahead of Republican Lannie Miller.

For some reason, the Iowa GOP and allied groups didn’t invest nearly as much in Miller’s campaign as in other House Republican candidates. But why?

The newly elected Iowa House Republican caucus picked a leadership team last week, and incoming House Speaker Kraig Paulsen named committee chairs this week.

Follow me after the jump for information about who will run various House committees in the 84th General Assembly. It’s notable that Paulsen passed over veteran legislators while giving chairmanships to some representatives beginning their second or third terms.

LATE UPDATE: Democratic ranking members for the appropriations subcommittees have been added at the bottom of this post.

Iowa was among only 12 states in which Democrats lost no seats in Congress on November 2. The others were mostly on the east or west coasts: California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island, Utah and Vermont. Seeking to explain the survival of Bruce Braley, Dave Loebsack and Leonard Boswell despite Iowans’ rejection of Governor Chet Culver and three Supreme Court justices, Marc Ambinder credited “a stellar, caucus-honed Democratic ground game.” Des Moines-based political consultant Jeff Link suggested the early voting was crucial.

I agree that early voting helped Braley, Loebsack and Boswell, but if the Democratic ground game were as good as it was supposed to be, we should have lost fewer Iowa House and Senate seats. Assuming recounts don’t change the results, Democrats lost six state Senate seats and 17 state House seats, gaining only one Republican-held House district for a net loss of 16 in the lower chamber.

It will take a long time to sort out why the Democratic GOTV program didn’t contain the state legislative losses at a lower level. First, it’s worth looking closely at where our statehouse candidates succeeded and failed. A list of Iowa House and Senate seats Democrats held before and after the elections, divided by Congressional district, is after the jump.

Iowa House Democrats elected Kevin McCarthy minority leader for the coming legislative session on November 15. McCarthy represents district 67 on the southeast side of Des Moines. He served as House majority leader for the last four years alongside House Speaker Pat Murphy. Murphy did not seek the minority leader position after the election shrank the House Democratic caucus from 56 members to 40. The caucus elected four assistant minority leaders today: Ako Abdul-Samad from district 66 (Des Moines), Mark Smith from district 43 (Marshalltown), Sharon Steckman from district 13 (Mason City), and Mary Mascher from district 77 (Iowa City).

The press release from the House Democratic caucus does not say whether anyone challenged McCarthy for the leadership position. Last week Dave Jacoby of Coralville and Mark Smith were rumored to be considering a run for minority leader, although Smith told the Des Moines Register he had decided against pursuing the job. LATE UPDATE: McCarthy told IowaPolitics.com that Smith did challenge him for minority leader, but declined further comment.

I’ve never been in the McCarthy fan club. He and Murphy sometimes pushed bad legislation, including the odor study bill that was a gift to CAFO operators. McCarthy is also a notorious opponent of real campaign finance reform. I’m not just talking about the VOICE act, which would have created a voluntary public financing system. I’m talking about reasonable contribution limits, which the Democratic House and Senate leadership never moved in the past four years. I doubt McCarthy will collect many five-figure checks for the House Truman Fund once Iowa has a Republican governor and a large GOP majority in the lower chamber.

While I would have preferred to see a new face for House Democrats who wasn’t part of last session’s leadership team, I wish McCarthy well. He’ll have a big job holding the Democratic caucus together and laying the groundwork for future gains.

McCarthy issued this statement today: “House Democrats are committed to strengthening our economy and helping create jobs. We will work together on the main stream, bread and butter issues that effect the every day lives of Iowans. However, if Republicans steer to more extreme policies at the expense of ordinary Iowans, we will make our voices heard.” The reality is that with 60 votes and almost no moderates left in the GOP caucus, House Speaker Kraig Paulsen and Majority Leader Linda Upmeyer won’t need to work with Democrats on any bills they want to pass, no matter how extreme.

Even though the House Democratic caucus will be much smaller next year, it still will have some new blood. Seven Democrats won open-seat House races on November 2: Chris Hall from district 2 (elected despite unusually strong GOP performance in Sioux City), John Wittneben from district 7 (Palo Alto, Emmet and part of Kossuth counties), Anesa Kajtazovic from district 21 (Waterloo), Mary Wolfe from district 26 (Clinton), Dan Kelley from district 41 (Newton and most of Jasper County), Dan Muhlbauer from district 51 (Carroll County and parts of Crawford and Sac), and Ruth Ann Gaines from district 65 (Des Moines).

LATE UPDATE: McCarthy’s comments on the election and the upcoming session are after the jump.

Politics-watchers from both sides of the aisle welcomed yesterday’s news that Charlie Smithson will be the new Iowa House chief clerk:

Smithson has been the Executive Director for the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board since 2001 and the board’s attorney since 1998. He previously served as the attorney for the Kansas Governmental Ethics Commission.

Raised in Pocahontas, Iowa, Smithson graduated from WestmarCollege in Le Mars before earning a Juris Doctorate from Washburn University School of Law in Topeka, Kansas.

Smithson has lectured and written several articles on government, ethics, lobbying, and campaign finance as well as contributed to the book,” Money, Politics, and Campaign Finance Reform Law in the United States.” He also teaches election law at the Drake University Law School in Des Moines.

The chief clerk serves as the House Parliamentarian, supervises House personnel and oversees the budget for the lower chamber’s operations.

Smithson will be a tough act to follow at the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board. Kathie Obradovich commented,

Smithson has capably led as executive director of the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board and has the right personality and reputation for fairness to have immediate credibility in the clerk’s role.

What I’m sorry about is that he won’t be at the ethics board any more. He’s been unfailingly knowledgeable, competent and accessible in a very important role. We can only hope his successor has as strong of an interest in transparency and public access to campaign records. I’m also going to miss Mark Brandsgard, whose dry wit was often the only reward for listening to hours of mind-numbing House debate.

Brandsgard became chief clerk of the Iowa House in early 2009, having held various House staff positions since 1977.

County auditors have been certifying election results this week, and the Iowa House is almost certain to be split 60-40 in favor of Republicans. Three seats were determined by extremely narrow margins. Democrat Donovan Olson does not plan to seek a recount in House district 48, where he trails Chip Baltimore by fewer than 30 votes. Republican Roger Arthur does not plan to seek a recount in House district 18, where he finished 36 votes behind Andrew Wenthe. Republican Lannie Miller has not decided whether to ask for a recount in House district 7, but John Wittneben’s margin of 32 votes is unlikely to be overturned in a recount.

The Iowa Senate is headed for a 26-24 Democratic majority. Certified election results put Democrat Keith Kreiman 12 votes behind Mark Chelgren in Senate district 47, while Democrat Tod Bowman is 71 votes ahead of Andrew Naeve in Senate district 13. If I were Kreiman, I would ask for a recount to be sure, but even a tiny margin of 12 votes (0.06 percent of the votes cast in that Senate race) probably wouldn’t be reversed.

Jennifer Jacobs reported in the Des Moines Register,

Election results show that voters angry about the Iowa Supreme Court’s gay-marriage ruling played a role in defeating Kreiman.

In 2006, Kreiman won 71 percent of the votes in his home county, Davis County. This year, 774 more Davis County residents voted on judicial retention than in 2006.

Davis County was one of seven counties where the anti-retention vote was above 70 percent.

I suspect Mariannette Miller-Meeks’ strong Congressional campaign played at least an equally important role in Chelgren’s win. Senate district 47 includes Miller-Meeks’ home base, the Ottumwa area, and she worked extremely hard all year.

Senate Republican leader Paul McKinley tried to psych out Democrats this week by saying he has “thought about” trying to convince state senators to switch to the GOP: “I think there are individuals that we know that clearly were put in tough situations over the past two or three years and might be more prone to that, but we thought about it. We’ll analyze where we are and proceed accordingly.”

Two Democrats flipping together could give Republicans a majority in the upper chamber, but I very much doubt that will happen. The moderate Democrats in the Senate caucus have more pull with Senate Majority leader Mike Gronstal than they would as junior members of a Republican majority. Also, it’s not as if McKinley could promise party-switchers a smooth ride to re-election. U.S. Representative Parker Griffith of Alabama got crushed in a GOP primary this year after deserting the Democratic Party. An incumbent in a vulnerable Iowa Senate seat would not survive a Republican primary after voting for I-JOBS and all four of Chet Culver’s budgets.

Reading up on the carnage that was last week’s Congressional elections, I noticed that two House Democrats lost their seats despite having run unopposed in 2008. The unlikely losers were Rick Boucher in Virginia’s ninth district and Phil Hare in Illinois’ seventeenth district, including the Quad Cities area (though polls had shown Hare in trouble this fall).

I wondered whether any Iowa Democrats suffered the same fate. It turns out that three of the 13 Iowa House incumbents defeated last week did not have a Republican opponent in 2008. In each case, special circumstances may have exacerbated the generally bad environment for Democratic candidates this year.

Today the Iowa House Republican caucus elected Kraig Paulsen to be incoming House speaker and Linda Upmeyer to be majority leader. The vote was no surprise, since Paulsen and Upmeyer were the top House Republicans during the previous two sessions. It’s still a historic achievement for Upmeyer; no other woman has ever served as Iowa House majority leader. James Q. Lynch wrote a nice profile of Upmeyer here. I didn’t know her late father was Del Stromer, who served in the Iowa House for 23 years, rising to the position of speaker. Upmeyer will be the “gatekeeper” who decides which bills come to a floor vote in the House.

The rest of the House GOP leadership team includes Jeff Kaufmann as speaker pro tem, Erik Helland as majority whip, and four majority assistant leaders: Matt Windschitl, Renee Schulte, Dave Deyoe and Steve Lukan. There was some speculation last year that Helland’s drunk driving arrest might cost him his leadership spot in the GOP caucus.

Republicans are likely to hold a 60-40 majority in the House next year, unless recounts change the outcome of one or more close races this week.

UPDATE: Iowa Senate Republicans re-elected Paul McKinley as their leader Monday. The Senate Republican whip will be Steve Kettering, and there will be five assistant minority leaders: Merlin Bartz, Brad Zaun, Pat Ward, David Johnson and Tim Kapucian. Johnson and Bartz have been the most visible Senate Republicans in the battle to overturn marriage equality in Iowa.

Republicans are likely to hold 24 of the 50 seats in the upper chamber, unless a recount overturns Mark Chelgren’s 13-vote lead over Democrat Keith Kreiman in district 47.  

This summer, the Libertarian Party in Iowa embarked on a “10 percent strategy,” hoping to win 2 percent of the vote for governor in order to secure major-party status in 2012. Iowa lacks a tradition of strong third-party voting like our neighbor to the north, and the unofficial results indicate that no alternative to Terry Branstad and Chet Culver cleared the 2 percent threshold in the governor’s race. Iowa Party candidate Jonathan Narcisse came closer to that mark than Libertarian Eric Cooper.

Although no third party is set up to have a larger statewide impact in 2012, minor party candidates received an unusually high share of the vote in some areas. In a few races, the votes for third-party candidates exceeded the difference between the Democrat and the Republican.

What’s on your mind, Bleeding Heartland readers?

The Iowa House will probably have a 60-40 Republican majority unless provisional and late-arriving absentee ballots change the unofficial results reported so far. The two races most likely to flip are House district 18, where Democratic incumbent Andrew Wenthe leads by 28 votes, and House district 48, where Democratic incumbent Donovan Olson trails by 26 votes.

A 26-24 Democratic majority appears to be the most likely outcome in the Iowa Senate. Democrat Tod Bowman has expanded his lead to 73 votes in the open Senate district 13. Republican Mark Chelgren has a 13-vote lead over incumbent Keith Kreiman in Senate district 47. If absentee and provisional ballots allow Kreiman to overcome that deficit, the Democrats would have a 27-23 majority in the upper chamber.

Incoming Iowa House Speaker Kraig Paulsen is acting like he believes his own propaganda about the state’s dire financial condition. This week he asked Governor Chet Culver to tell his department directors “to freeze all discretionary spending.” Paulsen claimed that step is needed “to align ongoing expenditures with ongoing revenue,” even though revenues have been coming in ahead of projections since fiscal year 2011 began. Culver’s budget director in effect told Paulsen he was full of it. Excerpt:

As you know, the current FY 2011 General Fund budget is balanced and, as Governor Culver’s Administration announced last week, the projected ending balance or surplus will be higher than originally projected. Since the end of the 2011 legislative session, we have continued to replenish the State’s Reserve Funds because we closed the books on the FY 2010 General Fund budget with a $335.6 million ending balance, also higher than originally projected. […]

As you know, discretionary spending is a very small part of the General Fund budget, and the aforementioned controls apply to discretionary spending. Governor Culver does not have the authority to freeze appropriations for programs unless there is a deficit, and there is no deficit projected for FY 2011.

Newly re-elected Representative Tom Latham showed how gullible and uninformed he is on Friday by repeating the latest foam-at-the-mouth talking point about President Obama. Naturally, there’s no truth to the rumor that the president’s visit to India is costing $200 million a day. The real cost is probably about 100 times lower than the lie right-wing media have been spreading. Latham is old enough to know better, as my father would say.

It’s never too early to start the next election season in Iowa. Some Republican county party chairs talked with Bret Hayworth about their favorite presidential prospects.

The Des Moines Register reported a strange story: Polk County prosecutors are trying to permanently ban two anti-war protesters from the Federal Building in Des Moines. They are Christine Gaunt and Elton Davis (a member of the Bleeding Heartland community), who are to be sentenced on November 12 for trespassing at that building in August. I have never heard of a citizen being permanently banned from a federal building and wonder if there is any precedent for the judge to grant that request.

This is an open thread.

NOVEMBER 11 UPDATE: In the comments, Elton Davis says Polk County Attorney John Sarcone has withdrawn the unusual sentencing request, since apparently neither Senator Chuck Grassley nor Senator Tom Harkin supported it.

Democrats suffered big losses in the Iowa House and Senate last night. Assuming no results change through recounts, the House is likely to switch from 56 Democrats and 44 Republicans to 59 Republicans and 41 Democrats. I’ve seen some online references to a 58-42 split, but that’s not how the count looks based on unofficial results posted on the Secretary of State’s website.

Democrats maintain control of the Iowa Senate, but their majority shrank from 32-18 to 27-23. Governor-elect Terry Branstad should easily be able to get his agenda through the Iowa House, and Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal may have trouble keeping his caucus united.

UPDATE: Late returns could change the outcome in two Senate seats; it’s possible the chamber could have a 25-25 split, or a 26-24 Democratic majority.

SECOND UPDATE: A few more races could switch as more absentee ballots come in. As of Wednesday evening, Democrat Tom Schueller is now trailing in House district 25 by about 150 votes.

Here’s my take on the seats that changed hands and the near-misses.

Polls close at 9 pm in Iowa, but I thought I’d post this thread early for people who can’t wait to start talking.

Maybe some poll workers in Council Bluffs think Matt Schultz is already secretary of state. According to Matt Campbell’s Congressional campaign, some voters in Pottawattamie County were (wrongly) told they had to show photo ID in order to vote today.

In Pella, some Central College students were turned away from the polls. Disgraceful.

After the jump I’ve posted some statehouse races to watch.

UPDATE: Immediately after polls closed at 9 pm, MSNBC called the U.S. Senate race for Chuck Grassley.

9:17 pm KCCI says that with 7 percent reporting, Justices Streit and Baker at 55 percent yes on retention, Ternus at 54 percent. No idea which part of the state has reported.

9:26 pm Looks like urban counties reporting first, which is bad for justices and bad for Chet Culver. He’s virtually tied with Branstad with about 8 percent of the vote in. Fox has already called IA-Gov for Branstad; KCCI not doing so yet.

10:03 pm AP called IA-03 for Boswell. So far Miller, Mauro, Fitzgerald lead statewide races.

Comic relief: when my son heard the guy on tv say Leonard Boswell, he piped up, “Too wrong for too long” (catch phrase from a Brad Zaun tv ad).

Chuck Grassley couldn’t wait until Roxanne Conlin was done giving her concession speech–he stepped up so tv cut away from Conlin.

Geri Huser may lose HD 42 (east side of Des Moines and Polk County) unless absentees haven’t been counted yet. If result holds, that’s a district we should be able to win back in 2012 with a better Democrat.

10:18 pm Whoa–Associated Press apparently expects Iowa Republicans to pick up 6 seats in the Iowa Senate. That would reduce the Democratic majority to 26-24. Not a good result going into redistricting.

Kent Sorenson defeated Staci Appel in SD 37, and HD 74 (which makes up half of that Senate district) is too close to call. I saw Dennis Black was trailing in SD 21.

10:22 pm It looks like Iowa City voters defeated the effort to overturn the 21-only bar ordinance. If the result holds, that means 19- and 20-year-olds will not be allowed in bars after 10 pm.

10:27 pm All the Supreme Court justices are losing now that smaller county results are coming in, and Branstad leads Culver 52-44 with about 42% counted. In Polk County, Judge Robert Hanson has been retained; his 2007 ruling in Varnum v Brien struck down the Defense of Marriage Act. That case was appealed to the Iowa Supreme Court.

10:30 pm All three Democratic Polk County supervisors were re-elected, which means Dave Funk fell short in his effort to unseat Tom Hockensmith.

It appears that Branstad narrowly carried Polk County, which would make it almost impossible for Culver to be re-elected.

Geri Huser lost House district 42 by about 140 votes. A write-in candidate took 432 votes in that race. All the other Polk County incumbents in the Iowa House and Senate were re-elected, and Ruth Ann Gaines easily held the open HD 65, where Wayne Ford retired.

10:35 pm The Associated Press called all five U.S. House races for incumbents: Democrats Bruce Braley, Dave Loebsack and Leonard Boswell and Republicans Tom Latham and Steve King.

10:38 pm Looking bad for Secretary of State Mike Mauro–he’s now virtually tied with Matt Schultz. Attorney General Tom Miller and Treasurer Mike Fitzgerald still lead their Republican opponents. Republican Auditor David Vaudt and Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey have big leads.

10:43 pm Associated Press says Republicans on track to win 55 Iowa House seats. Dem incumbent McKinley Bailey losing to Stew Iverson in HD 9. Donovoan Olson trails Chip Baltimore narrowly in HD 48. Mark Smith barely ahead of Jane Jech in HD 43. Nathan Reichert appears to have lost HD 80 to Mark Lofgren. In the open HD 74, Democrat Scott Ourth narrowly trails Glen Massie.

Associate Press now saying Iowa Senate could end up in a 25-25 split. That would be a 7-seat GOP gain and much worse than Iowa Democrats were expecting. There would be basically no counterweight to Governor Branstad. Rich Olive is losing SD 5 to Rob Bacon. Bill Heckroth lost to Bill Dix in SD 9. Becky Schmitz narrowly trails Sandy Greiner in SD 45. Keith Kreiman barely ahead in SD 47.

LATE UPDATE: I fell asleep and missed Culver’s concession speech and the rest of the election night coverage. Unofficial results are at the Secretary of State’s website. Highlights:

Federal races: Grassley finished at 64.4 percent, not far below his usual 66 percent to 70 percent re-election total. Conlin was at 33.2 percent, around the same share of the vote previous challengers have received when they spent almost no money and barely campaigned.

I’m surprised they called Braley’s race so early, because unofficial results show he didn’t win by much at all: 49.5 percent to 47.5 percent. I predict he will focus a lot more on fundraising these next couple of years. Loebsack won 51.0 percent to 45.9 percent. Boswell won by a very similar margin: 50.6 percent to 46.6 percent. So Miller-Meeks did almost as well as Zaun despite running in a district that leans 7 point more Democratic. Latham and King slightly improved on their 2008 margins of victory: Latham 65.7 percent, Maske 31.9 percent and King 65.8 percent, Campbell 32.2 percent.

Statewide results: Many polls this year have shown Branstad around 52 or 53 percent, and he finished right at 52.8 percent to 43.1 percent for Culver.

I feel terrible for Mike Mauro–he has done such an outstanding job, but he lost to Matt Schultz 49.7 percent to 47.0 percent. He outperformed Culver (unlike in 2006, when he underperformed Culver), but with only one term in office, he just didn’t have the name recognition to survive a 10-point win by Branstad. Alternatively, some people think a German name like Schultz is better for seeking statewide office in Iowa than an Italian name.

Treasurer Fitzgerald and Attorney General Miller hung on, just like they did in the 1994 landslide. Fitzgerald only won 52.85 percent to 47.0 percent, which suggests to me that Republicans could have taken him out if Dave Jamison had had more money to spend on the race.

Republicans moved heaven and earth for Brenna Findley, but she only got 44.4 percent of the vote compared to 55.6 percent for Miller. Will Findley go back to working for Steve King, or will Branstad give her a post in his administration?

Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey won 62.8 percent to 37.1 percent for Francis Thicke. I wish Thicke had run in 2006–the strong Democratic wave might have pulled him over the line. In retrospect, maybe the money that went into Roxanne Conlin’s campaign would have been better spent on Thicke. With an extensive television advertising campaign, he might have been able to beat Northey or at least raise Iowans’ awareness about many issues.

Auditor David Vaudt took 56.5 percent of the vote to 43.4 percent for Jon Murphy. Considering how little money Murphy had to spend on his campaign, he did quite well. Now that Iowa has a Republican governor, I think we won’t hear any more gloom and doom talk on the budget from Vaudt.

The Iowa Water and Land Legacy trust fund constitutional amendment passed easily: 62.7 percent to 37.2 percent. I don’t support a sales tax hike now, but at least if Branstad tries to move us in that direction he won’t be able to avoid giving more funds to protecting natural resources. I would like to see state legislators appropriate money directly to this trust fund.

Iowans voted down the constitutional amendment on calling a constitutional convention: 67.1 percent no, 32.8 percent yes. It’s a good thing so many Republicans were afraid to push for this one.

Sadly, the Supreme Court justices were all voted out of office. Ternus received 45.0 percent yes votes, Baker 45.75 percent and Streit 45.6 percent. It looks like all the lower-court judges were retained.

Iowa Senate races: Democrats lost five seats and only held on to two others by extremely narrow margins. That works out to 27 Democrats and 23 Republicans in the new Senate. I’ll have more details on that in a separate post. It’s really too bad Steve Warnstadt retired in district 1 (Sioux City).

Iowa House races: A few districts were decided by extremely small margins. Assuming recounts don’t change anything, Democrats lost 16 seats and Republicans lost only one (Democrat Muhlbauer took HD 51, Rod Roberts’ old seat). That would produce a Republican majority of 59 to 41, and a huge mountain to climb for Democrats in 2012, when redistricting will scramble things up. More details on those results in another thread.

A quick note on national results: it looks like Republicans will gain between 60 and 65 House seats and six to eight Senate seats, leaving a small Democratic majority intact. Republicans would probably have taken the Senate if the tea party movement hadn’t helped such weak candidates win primaries in Delaware and Nevada.

How’s your weekend going? Don’t forget to enter Bleeding Heartland’s election prediction contest if you think you know Iowa politics.

It’s Halloween and probably the last weekend for political commercials on Iowa television until Republican presidential candidates start running ads next year. Negative ads far outnumber positive ones, especially in the Iowa House and Senate races.  Judging from this blog’s traffic, a lot of people are searching for information on “Iowa heated sidewalks,” presumably because Republican House candidates are using the “heated sidewalks” canard against many Democratic incumbents. I also see references to flowerpots or trolleys in Des Moines and Iowa’s so-called billion-dollar deficit that doesn’t exist. Bleeding Heartland readers in other Iowa media markets have told me they see similar claims in ads for Republican statehouse candidates.

Many commercials feature “zombie lies,” claims that have been debunked repeatedly.  

So-called reckless spending has been one of the Republicans’ top talking points in this year’s state legislative elections. Direct mail, television and radio commercials targeting at least two dozen incumbent Democrats have decried wasteful, pork-barrel spending. A few specific spending programs come up most frequently in GOP candidates’ messaging. Bleeding Heartland already discussed the misleading talk about “heated sidewalks” here. Three other popular examples of alleged out-of-control spending are $120,000 for flowerpots in Des Moines, $690,000 for trolley service in Des Moines, and $1.8 million for kayak waterways.

Follow me after the jump for background on those appropriations.