One public worker’s response to the Republican assault on collective bargaining rights. -promoted by desmoinesdem

I’m a state employee and an AFSCME member. My husband and I moved here four years ago from another state. He worked for a not for profit organization and was the mayor of the town where we lived. I was the executive director of a statewide organization. We both have master’s degrees and have good reputations nationally in our prospective fields.

We moved to Iowa because we saw the state as a place where our education, experience and commitment to quality work would be valued and rewarded.

When I heard elections officials in Iowa’s fastest-growing county somehow failed to count 5,842 ballots from the 2016 general election, my first thought was that Dallas County Auditor Julia Helm should resign immediately, along with anyone else responsible for the “human error” that disenfranchised almost 13 percent of the county’s residents who cast ballots in the presidential election.

My second thought was that someone on Secretary of State Paul Pate’s staff should have suspected a problem much sooner when Iowa’s fastest-growing county reported only a few hundred more votes in November than in the 2012 general election.

Since Pat Rynard already covered that ground, I will focus on another concern: the Dallas County disaster could discourage Iowans from voting early in the future.

An Iowan who cares about historic preservation is raising awareness about an obscure and harmful bill, which would also drive down wages on some road projects. -promoted by desmoinesdem

I came across a post on Facebook today, initiated by an email from the Iowa Archeological Society. We need to pay attention to this! Here’s the post in its entirety:

Dear IAS Membership,

The IAS has recently learned about a proposed Iowa bill that, in our interpretation, will negatively impact historic preservation in Iowa in relation to transportation projects. And we need your help!

Democrat Monica Kurth easily won the January 31 special election to represent Iowa House district 89. The seat covering parts of Davenport (map enclosed below) became vacant after Jim Lykam won the recent special election to represent Iowa Senate disrict 45. Kurth defeated Republican Mike Gonzales by 2081 votes to 784 (72.4 percent to 27.3 percent). In effect, she won before polls opened yesterday. Absentee ballots broke 1,092 to 86 in her favor, Ed Tibbetts reported.

Kurth has been a community activist for many years and was a longtime instructor and counselor at Scott Community College. During the campaign, she promised to advocate for higher wages, good education, and retirement security, and to “keep focused on working families, not special interests.”

The total number of ballots cast in House district 89 was close to what special election guru David Beaudoin projected, based on his analysis of the district and Lykam’s results against Gonzales in December. However, Kurth’s winning margin exceeded Beaudoin’s prediction. Republicans put little effort into winning this district, which contains 7,403 active registered Democrats, 4,730 Republicans, and 8,416 no-party voters, according to the latest figures from the Iowa Secretary of State’s office. Gonzales raised less than $3,000, of which about $1,000 came from GOP county committees. He reported no in-kind expenditures by the Iowa GOP.

In contrast, Kurth raised about $24,000 for this race, of which $15,000 came from Democratic or labor organizations. The Iowa Democratic Party also spent nearly $30,000 on direct mail and advertising.

Former (and presumably future) presidential candidate Martin O’Malley came to Davenport last weekend to help Kurth’s campaign. He showed up for Lykam before the December Senate election as well.

Once Kurth has been sworn in, the Iowa House will have 59 Republicans and 41 Democrats. She will bring the number of women in the chamber to 28: nineteen Democrats and nine Republicans.

P.S.- Nine people went to the trouble of casting a ballot in this January election for a write-in candidate. I’m always fascinated by such behavior.

The Legislative Services Agency has drafted three bills fleshing out Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate’s proposals on voter ID and other changes to election administration, such as signature verification and wider use of electronic poll books. Bleeding Heartland obtained copies of the documents, which I enclose below.

Important caveats:

These drafts are not the final versions of Pate’s bills.

The voter ID plan is consistent with Pate’s comments at an early January press conference and talking points the Secretary of State’s Office distributed the following week. As far as I can tell, these drafts have not incorporated feedback from the four county auditors who testified at a January 26 Iowa House hearing. Many election administrators have reservations about signature verification requirements as well as voter ID. Legislative staff may rewrite some provisions before the bills are assigned numbers and formally introduced in the Iowa House and Senate.

Republican lawmakers will alter Pate’s bills, if they run them at all.

Departmental bills often die in Iowa legislative committees. State Representative Ken Rizer and State Senator Roby Smith, who lead the State Government Committees in their respective chambers, told Barbara Rodriguez of the Associated Press last week “they’re working together on possible changes” to Pate’s plan. Rizer described the secretary of state’s recommendations as “a starting point for an election reform bill.” I expect Pate will end up playing “good cop,” with the “bad cops” in the House and Senate passing more restrictive ID requirements as well as steps to limit early voting, which Pate has not endorsed.

These bills do not yet come with a price tag.

Eventually, the Legislative Services Agency will produce a fiscal note estimating the cost of enacting each bill. Pate initially suggested his plans would require $1 million, roughly half to make electronic poll books universally available, and half to provide voter ID cards to about 140,000 registered Iowa voters lacking a driver’s license or other valid identification. More recently, he has said only about 85,000 current Iowa voters would need a new ID card to bring to the polls, reducing the cost to the state.

As of this week, Iowa state senators are no longer able to give speeches about matters of political or personal importance at a predictable time of day, when the chamber is relatively full.

For many years, members have been allowed to offer “Points of Personal Privilege” shortly after the Senate gavels in at 9:00 a.m.

Republicans ended that tradition on a party-line vote last Thursday. GOP leaders have not explained their reasons for moving the open discussion period to the end of each session day. The rule change is likely designed to reduce the visibility of Democratic remarks highlighting controversial legislation or Branstad administration policies. A former Democratic senator decried the move as “pushing public discourse in the dark.”

Nearly three weeks after Iowa Secretary of State announced plans to push for new voter ID requirements, Pate still hasn’t produced a draft bill that would answer important questions about how his scheme would work. Skeptics including John Deeth, Gavin Aronsen, Pat Rynard, the Des Moines Register editorial board, the Quad-City Times editorial board, and I have posited that the proposal would disenfranchise a significant number of eligible voters, largely from groups that tend to lean Democratic. Pate strenuously objects, claiming that his only concerns are for the “integrity” of Iowa elections and voter confidence in the system.

In addition to arguing his case on social media and in “a public relations tour of Iowa newsrooms,” Pate has sought to enlist support from county auditors, many of whom “aren’t fans of voter ID” requirements.

I enclose below two documents the Secretary of State’s Office distributed to county auditors during the week after his voter ID rollout.

GOP lawmakers have been trying to defund Iowa’s leading provider of reproductive health care for years. Their previous efforts attracted relatively little public attention, since the Democrats in control of the state Senate would not go along.

Democrats no longer hold enough seats in the legislature to stop Republicans from enacting a plan that will require Iowa to spend ten times more, even as family planning services become less accessible.

As expected, an Iowa Senate Judiciary subcommittee advanced Senate File 2 during a January 24 meeting. The outcome was a foregone conclusion, since all 29 Senate Republicans are co-sponsoring the bill that would create a state-run family planning program, excluding Planned Parenthood as a qualified provider.

But the vast majority of Iowans support continued state funding for Planned Parenthood’s non-abortion services. Republicans weren’t prepared for hundreds of them to show up at the Capitol yesterday.

As Iowa Republicans prepare to undermine public education, reproductive rights, access to health care, collective bargaining, and much more, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed by the number of battles ahead and the prospects for Democrats to stop the onslaught.

Individuals may feel powerless, but when enough of them contact lawmakers, they can sometimes make a difference. Earlier this month, U.S. House Republicans backpedaled on a proposal to neuter the Office of Congressional Ethics after thousands of constituents jammed phone lines.

Iowa House and Senate Democratic legislators and staff have created a new way for activists to stay informed and get involved in the key battles during this year’s legislative session.

State Senator Brad Zaun’s bill to prohibit “the establishment or continuation of a tenure system” has worried many people who understand how badly that policy would harm Iowa’s state universities. Wisconsin Republican lawmakers spurred an exodus of highly-regarded faculty from that state’s top university, and the Wisconsin law to weaken tenure didn’t go nearly as far as Zaun’s bill would.

Fortunately, the bill seems unlikely to clear the Iowa House Education Committee–if it even gets that far.

Two weeks late and humbled by the results from previous efforts to foretell the future, I offer seventeen Iowa politics predictions for the new year.

I struggled to compile this list, in part because it’s harder to come up with things to predict during a non-election year. I didn’t want to stack the deck with obvious statements, such as “the GOP-controlled Iowa House and Senate will shred collective bargaining rights.” The most consequential new laws coming down the pike under unified Republican control of state government are utterly predictable. I needed time to look up some cases pending before the Iowa Supreme Court. Also, I kept changing my mind about whether to go for number 17. (No guts, no glory.)

I want to mention one prediction that isn’t on this list, because I don’t expect it to happen this year or next. I am convinced that if the GOP holds the governor’s office and both chambers of the Iowa legislature in 2018, they will do away with non-partisan redistricting before the 2020 census. I don’t care what anyone says about our system being a model for the country or too well-established for politicians to discard. Everywhere Republicans have had a trifecta during the last decade, they have gerrymandered. Iowa will be no exception. So if Democrats don’t want to be stuck with permanent minority status in the state legislature, we must win the governor’s race next year. You heard it here first.

Governor Terry Branstad and Republican leaders in the Iowa House and Senate are finally poised to eliminate Planned Parenthood’s state funding, a cherished goal Democrats had repeatedly blocked in recent years.

Branstad said during his Condition of the State address on Tuesday that his budget “redirects family planning money to organizations that focus on providing health care for women and eliminates taxpayer funding for organizations that perform abortions.” House and Senate leaders likewise depict their plan as a simple change to reimburse different health care providers, creating “better options for more women.”

What Iowa Republicans don’t broadcast: they are setting the state up to spend ten times more on family planning services, without a reliable funding stream.

Governor Terry Branstad has rarely found himself at odds with any powerful farm lobby group. In 1995 he signed a law banning agricultural zoning, which fueled explosive growth of confined animal feeding operations across Iowa. Since returning to the governor’s office in 2011, he has named several agribusiness representatives to the the Environmental Protection Commission. He signed the probably unconstitutional “ag gag” bill targeting whistleblowers who might report alleged animal abuse. He moved to protect farmers from state inspections for electrical work. He joined a poorly-conceived and ultimately unsuccessful lawsuit seeking to block a California law on egg production standards. He has consistently rejected calls to regulate farm runoff that contributes to water pollution, instead supporting an all-voluntary nutrient reduction strategy heavily influenced by the Iowa Farm Bureau.

Despite all of the above, the governor’s two-year budget blueprint contains an obscure proposal that will draw intense opposition from Big Ag. By this time next year, the fallout could cause political problems for Branstad’s soon-to-be-successor, Lieutenant Governor Kim Reynolds–especially if Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett challenges her for the 2018 GOP nomination.

While delivering his final condition of the state address to Iowa lawmakers on Tuesday, Governor Terry Branstad warned that he was offering “difficult” recommendations to cover a shortfall of more than $100 million in the current-year budget. His speech played up the good news: “My proposal does not include across-the-board cuts, does not reduce funding for K through 12 education, does not reduce property tax credits and does not include furloughs for state employees.”

The bad news was buried deep in a 196-page two-year budget blueprint. Nearly a third of the governor’s proposed spending cuts this year would fall on Iowa’s public universities and community colleges. The underfunding doesn’t stop there.

A plea for Democratic unity from an Iowan who caucused for Bernie Sanders. -promoted by desmoinesdem

We begin now.

A mentally ill carnival barker and his associates tricked our country and he will soon be President; this is not new information, but a reminder of the obstacle we (Democrats and all Americans) have blocking our way on paths of safety, peace, fairness and freedom.

The Iowa legislature’s 2017 session begins today with minor adjustments to business in the state House but massive changes in the Senate. After ten years of Democratic control, the last six with a one-seat majority, the upper chamber now contains 29 Republicans, 20 Democrats, and one independent (former Republican David Johnson).

I enclose below details on the Iowa Senate majority and minority leadership teams, along with all chairs, vice chairs, and members of standing Senate committees. Click here to find the same information from the 2016 legislative session.

Just six senators are women (five Democrats and a Republican), down from ten women serving in the chamber in 2013 and 2014 and seven during the past two years. All current senators are white. To my knowledge, the only African-American ever to serve in the Iowa Senate was Tom Mann, elected to two terms during the 1980s. No Latino has ever served in the Iowa legislature; in 2014, Nathan Blake fell 18 votes short of becoming the first to join the Senate. No Asian-American has served in the state Senate since Swati Dandekar resigned in 2011.

As a group, the members of the new majority caucus have much less legislative experience than do their Democratic counterparts. As detailed below, only three of the 29 Senate Republicans have served ten or more years in the Iowa legislature, compared to thirteen of the 20 Democrats.

Some non-political trivia: the 50 Iowa senators include two with the surname Johnson, four Marks, three Bills, and two men each named Richard (Rich and Rick), Robert (a Rob and a Bob), Dan, Tim, Tom, Jeff, and Charles (one goes by Chaz).

The Iowa House opens its 2017 session today with 59 Republicans, 40 Democrats, and one vacancy, since Jim Lykam resigned after winning the recent special election in Iowa Senate district 45. The 99 state representatives include 27 women (18 Democrats and nine Republicans) and 72 men. Five African-Americans (all Democrats) serve in the legislature’s lower chamber; the other 95 lawmakers are white. No Latino has ever been elected to the Iowa House, and there has not been an Asian-American member since Swati Dandekar moved up to the Iowa Senate following the 2008 election.

After the jump I’ve posted details on the Iowa House majority and minority leadership teams, along with all chairs, vice chairs, and members of standing House committees. Where relevant, I’ve noted changes since last year.

Under the Ethics Committee subheading, you’ll see a remarkable example of Republican hypocrisy.

Some non-political trivia: the Iowa House includes two Taylors (one from each party) and two Smiths (both Democrats). As for first names, there are six Davids (four go by Dave), four Roberts (two Robs, one Bob, and a Bobby), four Marys (one goes by Mary Ann), and three men each named Gary, John, and Charles (two Chucks and a Charlie). There are also two Elizabeths (a Beth and a Liz) and two men each named Brian, Bruce, Chris, Greg, Michael, and Todd.

What’s on your mind this weekend, Bleeding Heartland readers? This is an open thread: all topics welcome.

In the real world as well as on social media, many Iowa Democratic activists have been talking about Rich Leopold this week. Since announcing his candidacy for governor on Wednesday, Leopold has reached out to county chairs and other local leaders in a bunch of towns. I hope his early, aggressive campaign will drive other Democrats thinking about this race to start pounding the pavement sooner rather than later. I’m all for a spirited, competitive 2018 primary.

Longtime Johnson County elections office worker John Deeth wrote a must-read “deep dig” about the real-world implications of “the proposed voter ID legislation, with the Orwellian name ‘Voter Integrity,’ launched by Secretary of State Paul Pate on Thursday.” Key point: county auditors of both parties are not fans of voter ID, “because they’ve been on the front lines of dealing with the public and they know that it doesn’t solve anything and that it will make it harder for the public.” Bleeding Heartland’s take on Pate’s solution in search of a problem is here.

Des Moines Register statehouse reporter Brianne Pfannenstiel published a heartbreaking account of her mother’s terminal illness during the presidential campaign, a “sudden and devastating” ordeal that still “hurts like hell every day.”

Along with most Iowa politics watchers, I’m gearing up for the 2017 Iowa legislative session, which begins on Monday. First, let’s take care of some unfinished business from 2016. Like many political writers and a fair number of Bleeding Heartland readers, I had a horrendous year for predictions.

Becci Reedus, executive director of The Crisis Center of Johnson County, wants state and federal lawmakers to remember that “prevention almost always ends up being cheaper than treatment.” -promoted by desmoinesdem

Our politicians and policymakers will face many important decisions in the coming months. Now more than ever, those leaders need to hear from all of us about the issues impacting our community.

As executive director of The Crisis Center of Johnson County, one of my jobs is to educate our policymakers and the public about the needs of the people we serve. Our programs help thousands of people with diverse needs, but there are some common themes we see among our clients.

Following the standard Republican playbook, Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate announced a series of steps today that would make it harder for thousands of Iowans to exercise their right to vote. He produced no evidence of any fraud problems his proposals would solve, which isn’t surprising, because Iowa is already one of the most highly-rated states for electoral integrity.

One of my blogging new year’s resolutions for 2016 was to publish more work by other authors, and I’m grateful to the many talented writers who helped me meet that goal. After the jump I’ve linked to all 140 guest posts published here last year.

I encourage readers to consider writing for this site in 2017. Guest authors can write about any political issue of local, state, or national importance. As you can see from the stories enclosed below, a wide range of topics and perspectives are welcome here.

Pieces can be short or long, funny or sad. You can write in a detached voice or let your emotions show.

Posts can analyze what happened or advocate for what should happen, either in terms of public policy or a political strategy for Democrats. Authors can share first-person accounts of campaign events or more personal reflections about public figures.

Guest authors do not need to e-mail a draft to me or ask permission to pursue a story idea. Just register for an account (using the “sign up” link near the upper right), log in, write a post, edit as needed, and hit “submit for review” when you are ready to publish. The piece will be “pending” until I approve it for publication, to prevent spammers from using the site to sell their wares. You can write under your own name or choose any pseudonym not already claimed by another Bleeding Heartland user. I do not reveal authors’ identity without their permission.

I also want to thank everyone who comments on posts here. If you’ve never participated that way, feel free to register for a user account and share your views. If you used to comment occasionally but have not done so lately, you may need to reset your password. Let me know if you have any problems registering for an account, logging in, or changing a password. My address is near the lower right-hand corner of this page.

Former Republican State Senator David Johnson will remain an independent during the Iowa legislature’s 2017 session, but he will not be entirely shut out of committee work. William Petroski reported for the Des Moines Register this weekend that Democrats offered Johnson one of their positions on the Natural Resources Committee, recognizing his work on issues in that committee’s jurisdiction. In recent years, Johnson has been the leading Republican advocate for increasing conservation spending in the state budget as well as for raising the sales tax to fill the Natural Resources and Outdoor Recreation Trust Fund.

Johnson quit the Republican Party in June to protest the nomination of Donald Trump for president. He had occasionally found himself at odds with this GOP colleagues before then. For instance, he supported the unsuccessful Democratic effort to stop Medicaid privatization and later voted for a Democratic bill on stronger Medicaid oversight.

First elected to the Iowa House in 1998 and to the Senate in 2002, Johnson told Petroski he hasn’t decided whether to run for re-election in Senate district 1 next year. Zach Whiting, a staffer for U.S. Representative Steve King, announced in August that he will run in Johnson’s district, which is the GOP’s second-safest seat in the state. The latest figures from the Secretary of State’s office show Senate district 1 contains just 7,900 active registered Democrats, 21,374 Republicans, and 13,574 no-party voters. The five counties in the district voted for Trump by wide margins in November. The GOP nominee received 81.4 percent in Lyon, 78.8 percent in Osceola, 68.2 percent in Clay, 65.5 percent in Palo Alto, and 65.2 percent in Dickinson.

Despite having only one committee assignment for the coming legislative session, Johnson sounds content with his new independent status:

“I have made some votes in the past that I wasn’t comfortable with, and I don’t believe really represented the district that I am honored to represent,” Johnson told The Des Moines Register. “I am free now to really follow my conscience and my constituents. We always talk about how you should put your district first. Well, I can now because I represent everybody. I don’t represent Republicans here. That has created quite a furor among some Republican leaders, and that’s fine.”

According to legislative records cited by Petroski, an independent hasn’t served in the Iowa Senate since 1925 or in the Iowa House since 1972.

Freedom to chase any story that captures my attention is the best part of running this website. A strong sense of purpose carries me through the most time-consuming projects. But not all work that seems worthwhile is fun. Classic example: I didn’t enjoy communicating with the white nationalist leader who bankrolled racist robocalls to promote Donald Trump shortly before the Iowa caucuses.

Continuing a tradition I started last year, here are the Bleeding Heartland posts from 2016 that have a special place in my heart. Not all of them addressed important Iowa political news, but all were a joy to write.

Traffic can be a touchy subject for bloggers. Most writers know the pain of pouring a lot of effort into a project that gets little traction. On the flip side, although clicks are always welcome, seeing a post take off is not as satisfying when you are less invested in the piece. The most-viewed post in nearly 10 years of Bleeding Heartland’s existence was nothing special, just another opinion poll write-up. FYI: A good way to get the Drudge Report to link to your site is to type up a long list of negative statements about Hillary Clinton.

I’ve never compiled a year-end list like this before, but since people occasionally ask what material is most popular at the blog, I figured, why not start a new tradition? Ulterior motive: I hope more readers will be inspired to write for Bleeding Heartland in 2017 after learning that guest authors wrote some of this year’s most-viewed posts, including the one at the very top.

Follow me after the jump for the sixteen posts that generated the most traffic in 2016. Some of the results surprised me.

Voters in some Davenport precincts will choose a new state senator today in a special election that Governor Terry Branstad set at the worst possible time.

Democratic State Representative Jim Lykam appears to be on track to succeed the late Senator Joe Seng, despite the governor’s efforts to engineer even lower turnout than for a typical election to fill an Iowa legislative vacancy.

Progressive advocate Ruth Thompson warns how much Iowans have to lose if “Obamacare” is repealed. -promoted by desmoinesdem

With the new Administration and Republican led congress, The Affordable Care Act (ACA) is in peril. Republican leadership plans to use the Budget Reconciliation process to repeal at least parts of the ACA. They are expected to hold a vote in January that may include language to do just that. If this doesn’t happen in January, it will almost certainly happen by September, 2017.

The nonpartisan Urban Institute estimates that the partial repeal of the ACA would cause almost 70 million people Americans to lose health insurance. In 2016, 55,089 Iowans enrolled in health insurance coverage for 2016. US Census data show that the uninsured rate in Iowa in 2015 was 5 percent as compared to 9.3 percent in 2010.

In 2016, of the Iowans who signed up through the Health Care marketplace, 85 percent of them were eligible for an average tax credit of $303 per month and 70 percent could obtain coverage for $100 or less.

As to the impact to employers, the Kaiser Family Foundation reports that employer-sponsored health plans grew just 3.4 percent in 2016, extending a period of unusually slow growth since 2010. The White House Council of Economic Advisers reports that the average family premium in Iowa was $3,500 lower in 2016 than they would be if premiums had grown at the same rate as the pre-ACA decade.

What a way to begin the holiday season: Governor Terry Branstad’s administration is negotiating new employment contracts on the assumption that health insurance benefits will no longer be subject to collective bargaining.

Judging by past experience in Iowa and other states, the 59 incoming House Republicans and 29 Senate Republicans will rubber-stamp the new policy, gutting a collective bargaining law that has served this state well since 1974.

Iowa Senate Democrats unanimously chose Rob Hogg today to serve as Senate minority leader during the upcoming legislative session. Amanda Ragan will be the new minority whip, and the incoming assistant leaders will be Bill Dotzler, Liz Mathis, Rita Hart, Joe Bolkcom, Matt McCoy, and Herman Quirmbach.

Six Democratic senators lost their re-election bids this month, including Mike Gronstal, who had served as either minority or majority leader of the caucus since 1997. Pam Jochum, who was Senate president for the past four years, will not be on the new leadership team. Ragan, Dotzler, and McCoy were among last year’s assistant majority leaders, while Bolkcom served as majority whip.

Erin Murphy reported for the Quad-City Times,

Hogg said Senate Democrats will speak on behalf of Iowans “who need state government to work” and attempt to prevent Republicans from implementing policies that could damage the state’s economy or adversely affect its residents.

“I’m hopeful we can stop Republicans from going down a knee-jerk, partisan pathway,” Hogg said.

I see no realistic chance to stop Republicans from using their large majorities in both chambers to head down that partisan pathway. Among their likely top priorities: cutting taxes so that most of the benefits go to corporations and higher-income individuals, gutting Iowa’s 42-year-old collective bargaining law, restricting abortion rights, ending state funds for Planned Parenthood’s non-abortion services, adopting the gun lobby’s wish list (“stand your ground,” “constitutional carry,” and/or open carry), and making it harder for Iowans to vote. Republicans will almost certainly need to reduce funding for education and a variety of social net programs, such as Medicaid and child care assistance, to pay for those tax cuts.

All Democrats can accomplish these next two years is to warn ahead of time how such policies will hurt the majority of Iowans, and to “document the atrocities” after Governor Terry Branstad signs the various harmful bills into law.

I enclose below a news release with more comments from Hogg. O.Kay Henderson’s profile of Gronstal for Radio Iowa is worth reading.

Another one for the “elections have consequences” file: The Iowa Supreme Court unanimously ruled on November 10 that Governor Terry Branstad “did not exceed the scope of his constitutional authority” when he vetoed funds state lawmakers had approved to keep open mental health facilities in Mount Pleasant and Clarinda.

A large group of Democratic legislators, joined by the president of the public employee union AFSCME, filed suit soon after Branstad vetoed the funding in July 2015. Their lawsuit contended that Iowa Code contains language requiring the state to operate Mental Health Institutes in Mt. Pleasant and Clarinda. But last November, a Polk County District Court held that “Existing statutes are not conditions on appropriations” and “cannot limit the Governor’s item veto authority.” Bleeding Heartland published excerpts from Judge Douglas Staskal’s decision here.

Last week’s Iowa Supreme Court opinion by Justice David Wiggins affirmed Staskal’s ruling but found that the District Court “failed to address” a matter of constitutional law raised by the plaintiffs. After additional analysis of the legislative intent behind language designating the facilities in Mount Pleasant and Clarinda as “state hospitals for persons with mental illness,” the high court reached the same conclusion as Staskal: the governor had the power to veto funds earmarked for operating facilities he had closed. I enclose below excerpts from the opinion.

Branstad’s spokesperson Ben Hammes did quite the spin job in his statement:

Today’s unanimous Supreme Court decision affirms the Governor’s action by allowing more Iowans to have access to quality mental health care and substance abuse treatment than ever before. The State’s mental health care redesign allows Iowans to access treatment in a community-based setting and through more modern means. Gov. Branstad is committed to putting patients first, improving care, increasing access and modernizing the delivery of mental health services. In fact, there are currently at any time 60-100 psychiatric inpatients beds open across the state. Iowa now maintains a robust level of access to mental health beds that are more efficiently delivered.

Nice try, Hammes. In reality, the justices did not assess either the merits of Branstad’s decision to close the in-patient facilities or the quality of mental health care and substance abuse treatment in Iowa. In reality, Iowa “consistently ranks in the bottom five of all states in every single category of mental health programs and services.” In reality, Iowa “ranks dead last in the country for state psychiatric beds per capita.” In reality, “many Iowans with serious mental illnesses are being marooned” for weeks or months in hospitals, for lack of adequate facilities or services to monitor their care.

Today the New York Times published short lists for every position in Donald Trump’s cabinet, “using information from the Trump transition team, lawmakers, lobbyists and Washington experts.” The leading names for secretary of agriculture are Kansas Governor Sam Brownback, Texas Agricultural Commissioner Sid Miller, former Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue, and Chuck Conner, CEO of the National Council of Farmer Cooperatives.

Six Iowans were among more than 60 people on the “Agricultural Advisory Committee” Trump’s campaign announced in August. Governor Terry Branstad has never expressed interest in a federal government job. Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey is widely expected to run for governor in 2018, unless Branstad seeks a seventh term. Sam Clovis is under consideration for deputy chief of staff for policy. Former State Representative Annette Sweeney, who leads a public policy group called Iowa Agri-Women, doesn’t have the stature for a cabinet position. The same goes for Ron Heck, a farmer and past president of the American Soybean Association.

Then there’s Bruce Rastetter, who made a fortune building factory farms and another fortune in the ethanol industry. Often described as a “kingmaker” despite the mixed results for candidates he has favored, Rastetter may soon need a new gig for throwing his weight around politically. His term on the Iowa Board of Regents, where he is nominally president but de facto the decider for the nine-member board, expires at the end of April 2017. Even after last week’s devastation, Democrats have enough votes in the Iowa Senate to block Rastetter’s confirmation, assuming Branstad renominates him to the governing board for the three state universities.

Trump is reportedly considering quite a few corporate executives for cabinet positions, so why isn’t Rastetter on the short list? He may be a casualty of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie’s declining influence in Trump’s inner circle. Rastetter has long been on good terms with Christie, but the governor was replaced as leader of Trump’s transition team soon after the election. (A source told Deadspin that “Trump had just picked Christie as transition chair nominally, as everyone had assumed the New Jersey governor would never actually have to do any work.”)

What will be Rastetter’s next political move if no federal job is forthcoming, and the Iowa Senate declines to confirm him to another term on the Board of Regents? Spin your own scenarios in this thread.

P.S.-Searches on the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board’s website indicate that Rastetter gave less money to Iowa Republican candidates and political committees during the 2016 cycle than he had during the previous several elections. His only five-figure gifts in 2015 or 2016 were $10,000 to Kim Reynolds for Lieutenant Governor, $25,000 to Iowa Senate Minority Leader Bill Dix’s committee, and several gifts totaling $40,000 to House Speaker Linda Upmeyer’s committee. That’s a significant drop from Rastetter’s large contributions to GOP candidates and committees during the 2014 and 2012 election cycles. He hasn’t given any money to Nick Ryan’s Team Iowa PAC since 2012, when his donations to that PAC alone totaled $120,000. The Team Iowa PAC ceased to be a major player in Iowa legislative races after the 2012 election. The American Future Fund 501(c)4 group, for which Rastetter provided “seed money” in 2007, spent less to influence federal elections in 2014 and 2016 than it had in 2012.

UPDATE: Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner is reportedly behind the “purge” of Christie loyalists from Trump’s transition team. When Christie was a U.S. attorney, he put Kushner’s father in prison.

Although the Republican takeover of the Iowa Senate was a bigger headline, the November 8 results were also devastating for Iowa House Democrats. Going into this campaign down 57 seats to 43, Democrats had realistic hopes of winning back the House majority, thanks to a half-dozen Republican retirements in the eastern half of the state, where Democrats have done well the last two presidential election years. With fewer open seats on the ballot in 2012, Democrats had a net gain of seven Iowa House seats and fell just a hair short in several other districts.

By October, an eight-seat gain looked out of reach, as Donald Trump had built a lead in state polling, and GOP candidates were outspending Democrats in most of the contested districts. Still, early vote totals looked promising for Democrats in some key legislative races shortly before election day. However, on Tuesday Democrats lost every race against a House Republican incumbent and every race in a GOP-held open House district. State Representative Patti Ruff was the only incumbent in the lower chamber to lose. The party lost one Democratic-held open House district as well, giving the GOP a net gain of two seats and a 59-41 majority for the next two years.

Despite the disappointing election, House Democrats re-elected Mark Smith as minority leader in Des Moines on Saturday. His four assistant minority leaders will be Bruce Bearinger, Liz Bennett, Brian Meyer, and Helen Miller. I was surprised to see Meyer’s name on the list, because one of the worst-kept secrets in Iowa Democratic circles is that he and Smith don’t get along. (Meyer was not a ranking member on any House committee during the last legislature.) All power to those who can put past grievances aside. The caucus can’t afford to be divided during what will likely be a distressing two years at the statehouse.

Not mentioned in the press release I enclose below: Miller challenged Smith for the leadership position, according to sources close to the legislature. I don’t have details on the vote count. Miller and Smith were both elected for the first time in 2002, Bearinger in 2012, Meyer in a 2013 special election, and Bennett in 2014.

None of the assistant minority leaders during the last legislative session (Ako Abdul-Samad, Mary Gaskill, Sharon Steckman, and Todd Prichard) are on the incoming leadership team. Abdul-Samad and Gaskill have had some health issues this past year. I don’t know whether Steckman and Prichard wanted to continue serving as assistant minority leaders.

All but one of the 29 Republicans who will serve in the Iowa Senate for the next two years elected their leaders on Friday, changing little from the group that led the minority caucus during the last legislative session.

Bill Dix moves from Senate minority leader to majority leader.

Jack Whitver moves from minority whip to Senate president.

Jerry Behn, who preceded Dix as minority leader but hasn’t been in leadership since 2012, will become Senate president pro tem. He’s the longest-serving current Republican senator.

My own state senator, Charles Schneider, moves from an assistant minority leader position to majority whip.

Dan Zumbach and Randy Feenstra will be assistant majority leaders, having been assistant minority leaders during the last legislative session. The other two assistant majority leaders are new to leadership: Michael Breitbach and Amy Sinclair, the only woman in the 29-member incoming GOP caucus.

After the caucus meeting, Dix spoke only in general terms about the new majority’s plans.

The non-partisan organization 50/50 in 2020 has set a goal of electing 25 women to the Iowa Senate and 50 women to the Iowa House by 2020. Yesterday’s elections will bring a lot of new voices to the state capital. However, chambers that were already less diverse than most other state legislatures will become even less representative of the state’s population.

LATE UPDATE: The new Iowa House will in fact have one more female member than the chamber did in 2015 and 2016, following Monica Kurth’s victory in the special election to represent House district 89.

Some Iowa statehouse Republicans are more extreme, more ignorant, more unhinged, more dishonest, or more mean-spirited than Peter Cownie.

But few lawmakers make less effort than Cownie to demonstrate that they deserve to be in a position of power.

A television commercial in heavy rotation on Des Moines stations doesn’t name even one legislative accomplishment from Cownie’s eight years in the Iowa House, including two years leading the State Government Committee and two as Commerce Committee chair. Cownie has rarely if ever knocked doors to talk to his constituents in West Des Moines. He doesn’t show up at many local public forums. He doesn’t consistently answer e-mails. He doesn’t follow through on some of his promises.

Recent campaign disclosure forms show the Iowa GOP has spent more than $300,000 on tv ads promoting Cownie or trashing his Democratic challenger, my friend Claire Celsi. Tens of thousands more went toward direct mail to benefit Cownie’s campaign.

Why did Republicans hit the panic button?

Iowa Republicans have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars this fall on television commercials and direct mail highlighting supposedly wasteful spending by Democratic state lawmakers. For the fourth election cycle in a row, many of these attacks repeat zombie lies from the 2010 campaign about money spent on “heated sidewalks” and a “trolley for lobbyists.”

As Bleeding Heartland explained here, Iowa House and Senate Democrats never approved money for heated sidewalks. They simply rejected a GOP amendment to a 2010 appropriations bill, which would have prohibited using state funds for “geothermal systems for melting snow and ice from streets or sidewalks.” The amendment was pointless, because planners of the award-winning streetscape project in question had already ruled out heated sidewalks in favor of porous pavement.

What about the Republican hit pieces claiming Democrats spent money on a “trolley for lobbyists”?

Iowa is blessed with an unusually large number of competitive state legislative districts, thanks to our non-partisan redistricting process. Most election years, at least half a dozen Iowa Senate seats and twice as many House seats are in play. Campaign finance reports showing where candidates and party leaders are spending the most money provide the best clue on which legislative races are worth watching.

That said, most years at least one little-noticed candidate pulls off a big upset in an Iowa House or Senate district neither party was targeting. Now-disgraced Kent Sorenson won his first race in 2008, taking a House seat that had been considered safe for Democrats. Two years later, Kim Pearson got no help from GOP leaders en route to winning a House seat where the Democratic incumbent had been unopposed the previous election. Republican Mark Chelgren won an Ottumwa-based Senate district for the first time by ten votes. That seat had been considered so safe that the Democratic incumbent was knocking doors for a colleague in another district during the final weekend. I learned later that internal GOP polling had Chelgren almost 20 points down a couple of seeks before the election.

I can’t shake the feeling that in this strange campaign with two unpopular presidential nominees, something weird will happen in a down-ballot race no one is watching. So before I get back to Bleeding Heartland’s last few battleground Senate and House race profiles, a few words on why I feel a race in Iowa’s southeast corner could produce a shocking result.

Fighting for his political life in a district that’s trending away from him, Iowa House Majority Leader Chris Hagenow has approved hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign spending on television commercials. Two spots have trashed his Democratic challenger Jennifer Konfrst over accounting errors that led to some overdue taxes. The first Hagenow hit piece was blatantly false. The second ad, now in heavy rotation on Des Moines stations, is more narrowly focused on a tax lien put on Konfrst’s home more than a decade ago.

Republican Party of Iowa Chair Jeff Kaufmann portrayed Konfrst as unfit to serve because she made a mistake calculating child care expenses. After hiding from early media inquiries about his commercial, Hagenow defended the ad last week, telling the Des Moines Register, “One of the biggest jobs we deal with (in the Legislature) is spending taxpayers’ dollars […] And our focus has always been to handle that as responsibly as possible.”

So why did House Republican leaders give their blessing for the Iowa GOP to spend more than $93,000 promoting Shannon Lundgren, a House candidate with a much larger federal tax liability that “remains unpaid”?

Governor Terry Branstad has done it again. The master of promising to raise family incomes while opposing specific policies to achieve that goal caused a stir this morning by hinting he might be open to raising Iowa’s minimum wage, last increased in January 2007.

Don’t be fooled. Branstad is not committed to a higher minimum wage. He’s angling to shut down local efforts to establish a livable wage.

Erin Miller shares her family’s experience with a rare medical condition at the Abram Mayhem blog. You can find her past contributions to Bleeding Heartland here. -promoted by desmoinesdem

This blog is specifically regarding medical cannabis and what happened during the recent debate in Iowa House district 19 between State Representative Ralph Watts and his opponent, Bryce Smith. Please watch the enclosed video first, then read the following story.

The massive racial disparities in Iowa’s criminal justice system have long been recognized as among the worst in the country, spurring calls to action not only by advocacy groups but also by Iowa Supreme Court Chief Justice Mark Cady and even Governor Terry Branstad.

Yet a new report by the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch shows that African-American adults in Iowa are seven times more likely than whites to be arrested for drug possession–an imbalance second only to Montana.