Vivek Ramaswamy went from “strongly considering” to a headlong plunge into the race for the White House.
Read MoreSeven Questions for ‘Capitalist and Citizen’ Vivek Ramaswamy as He Jumps Into the Race for President
Tag: Iowa
Simon Conway Guest Host Matt Kittle Talks to Kari Lake About Upcoming Event in Iowa and America First Policies
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.
Read MoreSouth Carolina Moves to Take the Top Spot in Democratic Presidential Politics
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.
Read MoreHalf of the US No Longer Requires a Permit for Concealed Carry
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.
Read MoreTennessee, Georgia, and Virginia Among 18 States Banning Social Media App TikTok from State Devices
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.
Read MoreMinnesota, Wisconsin, Connecticut Rank in the Top 10 Most Prosperous States as Michigan and Iowa Lag
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.
Read MoreGoogle Agrees to Nearly $400 Million Settlement with 40 States over Location-Tracking Probe
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.”
Read MoreAmerica First Attorneys Demand Rural Iowa School Stops ‘Indoctrinating’ Students with Critical Race Theory
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.
Read MoreDemocrat Running for Grassley’s Iowa GOP Senate Seat Removed from Primary for Lacking Signatures
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.
Read MoreIowa Is Second State in 2022 to Ban Men from Women’s Sports
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.”
Read MoreIowa Launches Statewide Business Alliance to End Human Trafficking
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.
Read MoreAwaiting Supreme Court Decision, Iowa OSHA Blocks Vaccine Mandate for Businesses
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.
Read MoreIowa Attorney General Sues Sioux City, Seeking Permanent Injunction, Civil Penalties Regarding Wastewater
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.
Read MoreIowa Capitol Reporters Lose Access to Senate Press Bench
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.”
Read MoreReason Foundation Report Recommends Iowa Reduce Regulations in Telehealth Policy
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.”
Read MoreIowa Utilities Board Approves Black Hills Energy Increases
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.
Read MoreIowa Farmers Prepare for California’s Prop 12
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.
Read MoreNearly One Third of Iowa Voters ‘Doubtful’ Their Vote Will Be Counted Properly in 2022
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.
Read MoreCommentary: The Data Mining of America’s Kids Should Be a National Scandal
As U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland sat down for his first hearing before the House Judiciary Committee, denying a conflict of interest in his decision to investigate parents for “domestic terrorism,” there is a mother in the quiet suburb of Annandale, N.J., who found his answers lacking. And she has questions she wants asked at Garland’s hearing with the Senate Judiciary Committee this Wednesday.
On a recent Saturday night, Caroline Licwinko, a mother of three, a law school student and the coach to her daughter’s cheerleading squad, sat in front of her laptop and tapped three words into an internet search engine: “Panorama. Survey. Results.”
Read MoreIowa State University Student Turns Himself In after Allegedly Assaulting Pro-Life Classmate as a ‘Form of Protest’
The Iowa State University Police’s event report detailing a leftist’s documented attack on a Young America’s Foundation student member confirms that on September 3, the “suspect vandalized the [pro-life] sign and part of the sign hit the victim in the shoulder.”
Campus Reformed obtained the report via a public records request following YAF’s report on the incident earlier this month, which ended with the suspect turning himself into police after “trying to break it before disposing of it into a waste bin.”
Read MoreStates Banning Mask Mandates Could Face Civil Rights Probes, on Biden’s Directive
President Biden is ratcheting up opposition to Republican governors blocking COVID mask mandates in schools, putting in charge the Education Department, which is raising the possibility of using its civil rights arm to oppose such policies.
Biden on Wednesday ordered Education Secretary Miguel Cardona to “assess all available tools” that can be used against states that fail to protect students amid surging coronavirus cases.
Read MoreFour States to Slash COVID-19 Unemployment Aid Saturday
Four states will be cutting pandemic unemployment increases three months early, ending the supplemental $300 in federal aid.
Alaska, Iowa, Missouri, and Mississippi will end pandemic-related unemployment relief on June 12. An additional 21 Republican-led states will slash federal aid before it expires on Sept. 6, according to Business Insider.
Conservatives continue to advocate an end to the increased benefits, saying they are no longer needed now that the pandemic is contained and speculating that the high payouts are discouraging would-be workers from returning.
Read More13 States Sue Biden Administration, Demand Ability to Cut Taxes
Thirteen states sued President Joe Biden’s administration over an American Rescue Plan provision prohibiting states from cutting taxes after accepting coronavirus relief funds.
The 13-state coalition argued that the provision included in the Democrats’ $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package preventing states from cutting taxes if they accept relief from the federal government is unconstitutional. The coalition, led by Republican West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, filed the federal lawsuit Wednesday evening in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama.
“Never before has the federal government attempted such a complete takeover of state finances,” Morrisey said in a Wednesday statement. “We cannot stand for such overreach.”
Read MoreIowa GOP Rep. Steve King Falls to Primary Challenger Randy Feenstra
Republican Iowa Rep. Steve King lost his primary against Republican state Sen. Randy Feenstra Tuesday night.
Feenstra will advance as the Republican nominee for Iowa’s 4th Congressional District, which consists of the largely rural northwestern part of the state.
Read MoreTrump Campaign Bashes Democrats’ Iowa Chaos While Celebrating Booming Economy
President Donald Trump’s campaign celebrated the United States’ booming economy while bashing the chaos of the Iowa caucuses.
Read MoreButtigieg in First After (Some) Iowa Caucus Results Released: ‘Did They Just Make Things Worse?’
After a disastrous caucus night, the Iowa Democratic Party has finally released the results of Monday night’s contest, but not all of them.
Read MoreDemocrats Mocked for Disastrous Iowa Caucus
Someone won Monday night’s Iowa caucuses — we just don’t know who, yet.
The Iowa caucuses have been the first nominating contest in the nation since 1972 with 41 national delegates up for grabs.
Read MoreRashida Tlaib Apologizes for Encouraging Bernie Crowd to Boo Hillary
Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI-13) issued an apology after encouraging a crowd at a campaign event for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) to boo Hillary Clinton Friday night.
Read MoreNAACP, Black Lives Matter Activists Call on Klobuchar to Drop Out Because of Record as State Prosecutor
Activists from the NAACP and Black Lives Matter called on Sen. Amy Klobuchar to end her presidential campaign Wednesday after a report exposed her involvement in the conviction of a black teen who maintains his innocence.
Read MoreBiden, Sanders Lead Field in New Poll Ahead of Monday’s Iowa Caucuses
NEW YORK – Former Vice President Joe Biden and U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders are leading a crowded field of candidates days before Monday’s Iowa caucuses, the first contest in the process of picking a Democratic presidential candidate, according to a poll released on Wednesday.
Read MoreSanders’ Field Organizer Kyle Jurek Bailed Out After Arrest, Still No Comment from Campaign Over ‘Gulag’ Rants Caught on Camera
by Debra Heine In the latest Project Veritas sting video, Kyle Jurek, the self-proclaimed anarcho-communist Soviet Gulag fan who is a field organizer for the Bernie Sanders Campaign in Iowa, admits that he was recently arrested for “weed” after knocking on doors for the campaign. Jurek told the Veritas…
Read MoreCommentary: Democrat Debate Shows Worst Place to be on February 3 Is in Iowa
Cory Booker, Julián Castro, Tulsi Gabbard and Michael Bloomberg weren’t there with the rest of the viable Democrat candidates on Tuesday night, but did anyone notice… or care? (Note: Booker, Castro and Marianne Williamson (!) bailed out of the race in recent weeks.)
Read MoreJim Larew Commentary: Making the Iowa Caucuses What They Are Not
There is a time-tested method to gain disproportionate national press attention by a presidential candidate whose Iowa caucus campaign is on the ropes. To create an impression of uncommon political bravery, that candidate need only make a series of frontal assaults while in Iowa on the Iowa caucuses themselves.
Read MoreButtigieg Maintains Iowa Lead, Sanders Jumps to Second
South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg continues to lead the field of Democratic presidential hopefuls in Iowa, according to the latest polling, but the rest of the top tier has reshuffled a bit.
Read MoreButtigieg: Separated Migrant Families Deserve ‘Compensation’ From US
Speaking at an Iowa town hall event, Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg said migrant families separated by the U.S. government deserve “compensation.”
Read MoreLeading Schools Series: Iowa’s Rocket Manufacturing, a Student-Run Business
Like Cardinal Manufacturing in Strum, Wisconsin, Rocket Manufacturing in Rock Valley, Iowa takes “hands-on learning” to a whole new level. Both programs run actual manufacturing businesses with real clients, providing students with work experience in the trades before they even graduate from high school.
Read MoreIowa College President Lori Sundberg Has Zero Regret for ‘Decision to Remove’ Antifa Prof Jeff Klinzman
The president of the Iowa community college that faced nationwide backlash after one of its professors declared his support for Antifa is speaking out about the school’s “decision to remove” him from the classroom, just days before the start of the new school year.
Read MoreBannon Says Biden Is Making ‘Happy Talk’ to Hide His Financial Ties to Chinese Communist Party
Joe Biden is “a useful idiot” for the Chinese Community Party, Steve Bannon told The John Fredericks Radio Network. The full interview with Bannon is available here. Bannon, with Citizens for the American Republic, has long said it is globalists like Biden who are managing the decline of economies…
Read MoreUS Ambassador to China Visiting Tibet This Week
Reuters U.S. Ambassador to China Terry Branstad is scheduled to visit Tibet this week, a U.S. embassy spokesperson said, the first visit to the region by a U.S. ambassador since 2015, amid escalating trade tensions between Washington and Beijing. The visit follows passage of a law in December that…
Read MoreUS Records 71 New Measles Cases Last Week as Outbreak Spreads
Reuters The United States recorded 71 new measles cases last week, a 13 percent increase as the country faces its second-worst outbreak of the disease in almost two decades, federal health officials said on Monday. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said it had recorded 626 cases…
Read MoreTim Ryan Says It Is ‘Intellectually Dishonest’ to Call Obama-Turned-Trump Supporters ‘Racist’
Ohio’s Rep Tim Ryan (D-OH-13) once again went against traditional Democratic talking points by saying it is “intellectually dishonest” to call 2016 Trump voters “racist.” The Presidential hopeful made these remarks in a recent appeal to people in Iowa who were Obama and Trump supporters, according to the Iowa Gazette. “I…
Read MoreTim Ryan Goes After Trump, NRA at Iowa Event Alongside 2020 Dems
Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH-13) was a panelist Saturday at the Heartland Forum in Iowa, and was the only speaker at the event who hasn’t officially declared candidacy for president. The event, sponsored by Huffington Post, Open Markets Action, and the Iowa Farmers Union, featured panelists such as Sen. Amy Klobuchar…
Read MoreCNN Airs Video of Sherrod Brown Endorsing Positions That He Called the President ‘Racist’ for Supporting
The man who many Democrats consider to be the best hope to defeat President Donald Trump may have more in common with him than he’d like to admit. On Monday, during CNN’s OutFront with Erin Burnett, Ohio Senator, and 2002 presidential hopeful, Sherrod Brown was shown a short montage that…
Read MoreIowa Poll Shows Trump Trouncing Kasich In A Potential Head To Head 2020 Match Up
by Chris White Former Vice President Joe Biden remains the best option Democrats have at beating President Donald Trump heading into the 2020 election, according to a poll of Iowa voters published Saturday. Biden would beat Trump in a squeaker, pulling in 51 percent of the vote to the…
Read MoreOhio Senator Sherrod Brown Makes Early Moves for 2020 Presidential Bid
The only Ohio Democrat to hold or win office in the 2018 midterm elections appears to have his sights set on the White House. Tuesday, Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown announced that he will tour four early, and key, presidential primary states. His team refers to the trip as the “Dignity of…
Read MoreElizabeth Warren Looped Video of Line Outside Iowa Rally to Create ‘Overflow’ Impression
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) campaigned in Iowa over the weekend after announcing an exploratory committee for a 2020 presidential campaign. Her first stop was in Council Bluffs where she posted a video of an “overflow line” of supporters gathered outside the event. The video, however, was sped up and looped,…
Read MoreIowans Prepare for Surge in Visits from Democratic Party Presidential Hopefuls
The race to challenge President Donald Trump in November 2020 kicked off in earnest Saturday, when the first major Democratic Party hopeful to announce her candidacy visited with voters across Iowa. A larger-than-usual deluge of candidates — possibly up to two dozen — are expected to hit the state within…
Read MoreElizabeth Warren Admits She’s ‘Not a Person of Color’ at Iowa Campaign Rally
The 2020 race for the White House began in earnest Friday when Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) hosted multiple campaign rallies in Iowa, the first in the nation caucus state. On Saturday morning, Warren continued her campaign across the state, but was asked about her infamous DNA test during a Sioux…
Read MoreNew Poll Shows Good News for Trump in Iowa
by Molly Prince President Donald Trump currently has the support of an overwhelming majority of Iowa’s Republicans, according to a Des Moines Register/CNN/Mediacom Iowa poll released on Sunday. The poll shows that two-thirds of Republicans in Iowa say they would “definitely vote to re-elect Trump” if the general election…
Read MoreIllegal Immigrant Charged With Murder Of Iowa College Student Mollie Tibbetts
by Evie Fordham A Mexican national illegally residing in the U.S. has been charged with first degree murder in the disappearance and death of Iowa college student Mollie Tibbetts, officials said at a press conference at Poweshiek County Sheriff’s Office in Iowa Tuesday afternoon. Christian Bahena Rivera, 24, was…
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