The latest cattle call of GOP presidential contestants — sans former President Donald Trump — mainly maintained Iowa nice, a departure from last month’s first fiery primary debate and a similar Christian conservative event in July hosted by conservative talk show host lightning rod Tucker Carlson.
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Every candidate declared victory after Wednesday night’s first Republican presidential debate — even some who didn’t take the stage.
But what’s next for these self-proclaimed winners on the road to the Republican Party nomination?
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Political outsider Vivek Ramaswamy is heading back to Iowa this week with a lot of momentum and a big target on his back in the Republican Party presidential nomination chase.
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In closing the nationally watched Family Leadership Summit late Friday afternoon, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis ratcheted up the political rhetoric and sounded more fired up than he’s been at some of his previous campaign trips to Iowa.
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He’s young. He’s successful. And he’s extremely confident. Some might say cocky.
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At least 20 states have either restricted or banned transgender procedures for minors, with many of them facing lawsuits and temporary blocks by courts as a result, while future litigation is possible in states considering adopting such laws.
The states that have enacted legislation against such procedures are: Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and West Virginia – essentially all conservative-leaning.
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U.S. Senator Tim Scott made it official Monday, launching his campaign for president in the North Charleston, SC, hometown that informed his core belief: That the United States of America is “the land of opportunity, not a land of oppression.”
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Indiana scored the latest school choice victory with nearly all, save for 3.5 percent of families with school-age children, qualifying for the state’s new voucher program, The Wall Street Journal editorial board noted last week.
“The hits keep coming on school choice in Republican-run states,” The Journal editors observed, detailing:
The new law raises the income cap to 400% of the free- and reduced-price lunch income level, which is now about $220,000 for a family of four. The bill also removes the other criteria for eligibility so that any family under the income limit can apply. Tens of thousands of additional students could qualify, and a legislative analysis projects that some 95,000 students might use the program in 2025, up from about 53,000 in 2023.
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Two polls showing Florida Governor Ron DeSantis “running more competitively” against former President Donald Trump in first-in-the-nation nominating states Iowa and New Hampshire are missing some key data, raising questions about the validity of the surveys.
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Vivek Ramaswamy went from “strongly considering” to a headlong plunge into the race for the White House.
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Live from Des Moines Tuesday morning on The Simon Conway Show with Matt Kittle – broadcast on Des Moines, Iowas, 1040 WHO (4p-7p weekdays) or in the Quad Cities on 1420 WOC (4 p.m.-6p.m. weekdays) – guest host Kittle welcomed former Arizona Governor candidate Kari Lake to the show to promote her upcoming event in Iowa and America First policies.
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The Democratic National Committee has approved a calendar that makes South Carolina the party’s first primary for the 2024 election.
The move follows an endorsement from President Joe Biden, whose win in the state’s 2020 Democratic primary was integral to his securing the Democratic nomination.
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Half of the states in the U.S. no longer require residents to hold a concealed carry permit to carry firearms in public after Alabama, Indiana, Georgia and Ohio passed laws in 2022 removing permit requirements.
On Monday, Alabama began enforcing its permitless carry law, becoming the 25th state to do so, while Indiana, Georgia and Ohio also passed laws this year allowing residents to concealed carry firearms without a permit. Over the last two years 10 states have moved to permitless carry, including Utah, Montana, Iowa, Tennessee, Arkansas and Texas.
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Following South Dakota GOP Gov. Kristi Noem’s lead, nearly half of U.S. states have put restrictions on or banned the use of Chinese-based social media app TikTok.
At least 19 states have banned TikTok on government-issued devices – Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Idaho, Iowa, Maryland, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utha, Virginia and West Virginia.
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Minnesota and Wisconsin placed in the top 10 of a recent nationwide prosperity index while Iowa and Michigan trailed behind, at 12th and 29th, respectively.
Wisconsin placed third and Minnesota placed eighth in the American Dream Prosperity Index that the Milken Center for Advancing the American Dream produced with Legatum Institute. The index measures prosperity through three domains: Inclusive Societies, Open Economies and Empowered People. The domains contain 11 pillars of prosperity that are built on 49 actionable policy areas and more than 200 indicators.
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Google agreed to a $391.5 million settlement with 40 states after an investigation found that the tech giant participated in questionable location-tracking practices, state attorneys general announced Monday.
Connecticut Attorney General William Tong called it a “historic win for consumers.”
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A school district in Baxter, Iowa, is reportedly teaching a “Social Justice in Literature” course in violation of state law, and attorneys with America First Policy Institute’s Constitutional Litigation Partnership are demanding the district stop.
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An Iowa judge ruled has ruled that Democratic candidate and former Rep. Abby Finkenauer cannot run in her party’s June 7 primary to unseat seven-term incumbent GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley.
Polk County district Judge Scott Beattie said late on Sunday that Finkenauer lacked the valid signatures she needed on her nominating petition. The judge said Finkenauer failed to submit a petition with enough signatures after two Republicans challenged her signature collection.
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On Mar. 3, Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds signed House Bill 2416, which bars men from competing against women in sports at “all school levels.”
“The bill also requires that only female students, based on their sex, may participate in any team, sport, or athletic event designated as being for females, women, or girls,” the new legislation reads.
“This is a victory for girls’ sports in Iowa,” Reynolds said on Mar. 3, surrounded by a room of female athletes as the bill was officially enacted. “No amount of talent, training or effort can make up for the natural physical advantages males have over females. It’s simply a reality of human biology.”
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Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate announced Thursday the creation of a statewide alliance of businesses to end human trafficking.
The Iowa Businesses Against Trafficking coalition is open to businesses and nonprofits that are promoting both awareness of human trafficking and the Iowa Safe at Home confidentiality program for survivors of human trafficking and other violent crimes, a news release from Pate’s office said. The office is administering the coalition and the Iowa Safe at Home program and inviting all businesses to join the mission, Pate said in the release.
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Iowans are waiting for the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision on the COVID-19 vaccine mandate for businesses with at least 100 employees. In the meantime, they’re moving ahead with actions of their own.
Iowa Department of Education Communications Director Heather Doe told The Center Square in an emailed statement that since Iowa is a state-plan state, the Iowa Division of Labor typically enforces workplace safety in Iowa instead of the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration. The state is required to notify OSHA whether it will adopt a given Emergency Temporary Standard or provide notice it will not adopt it because its standards are as effective as the new federal standard. Iowa needed to respond to the standard by Jan. 7.
Iowa Labor Commissioner Rod Roberts did so, saying that the Hawkeye State will not adopt or enforce the mandate.
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The state of Iowa on Friday sued the city of Sioux City regarding discharge of wastewater.
In the lawsuit, the state asks the Iowa District Court for Woodbury County to make the city pay up to $5,000 per day of violations of state wastewater treatment regulations (Iowa Code section 455B.186(1), 567 Iowa Admin. Code 64.3(1)) and the city’s National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit. It seeks a permanent injunction preventing Sioux City from further violations of these state laws and the treatment permit requirements.
The state said that for periods between March 15, 2012, and June 8, 2015, Sioux City’s treatment facility would only properly disinfect water discharges on days it collected and submitted samples for E. coli contamination to the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, the lawsuit said.
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Iowa Senate leaders have decided press will no longer have seating at the press bench at the front of the Senate chamber floor.
Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, most state legislatures allowed access to the chamber floors, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures April 2019 state-by-state report on media access and credentialing.
“Media access to the people who make laws is a critical component of representative government,” the Iowa Capitol Press Association said in a statement Friday. “Primarily for this reason, the Iowa Capitol Press Association is extremely disappointed in the Iowa Senate’s decision to move reporters out of the press work stations on the chamber floor and into the upstairs gallery.”
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Iowa should make a few public policy changes to improve telehealth services, which have become more common during the COVID-19 pandemic, policy analysts said in a report Reason Foundation released Wednesday.
Cicero Institute and Pioneer Institute Senior Fellow Josh Archambault and Reason Foundation Policy Analyst Vittorio Nastasi co-authored the state-by-state report, “Rating the States on Telehealth Best Practices: A Toolkit for a Pro-Patient and Provider Landscape.”
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Black Hills Energy’s base rate for natural gas will increase Jan. 1, the Iowa Utilities Board ruled this week.
Non-gas costs on residential customers’ bills will rise from $0.13625 per Therm to $0.13905 per Therm. The typical monthly increase in base rates for residential customers will be $1.45, the IUB said in a news release Dec. 28.
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Hogs born Jan. 1, 2022, or later are subject to California’s Prop 12.
Some Iowa agricultural leaders have criticized the law, which prohibits the sale of pork from hogs that are the offspring of sows that were raised in pens with less than 24 square feet of usable floorspace per pig.
California accounts for about 15% of the U.S. pork market, the National Pork Producers Council said in a September news release. The NPPC is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to determine Prop 12’s constitutionality.
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Nearly one-third (32%) of Iowa adults said they are “mostly doubtful or “very doubtful” that, “across the country,” votes in the 2022 general election will be counted as voters intended in a November Des Moines Register/Mediacom poll.
The remainder were very confident (26%), mostly confident (37%) or not sure (6%) votes would be counted properly. Selzer & Co. conducted the poll of 810 randomly selected Iowan adults between Nov. 7 and Nov. 10.
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