CAPITOL NOTEBOOK: Iowa AG joins lawsuit against EPA waters rule

DES MOINES — Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird has joined the multistate lawsuit challenging the Biden administration’s implementation of a rule that regulates the nation’s waterways.

The Environmental Protection Agency in December finalized a rule that broadened the waterways regulated under the “waters of the United States” designation of the Clean Water Act to include streams and wetlands that feed into larger lakes and rivers.

The rule restores the regulations to where they were before a 2015 Obama-era change. Former President Donald Trump’s administration applied the rule only to more permanent bodies of water, but a federal judge struck that down in 2021.

Republicans and farm groups criticized the new regulations as putting unnecessary burdens on farmers and ranchers.

In a news release this week, Bird, a Republican, argued the rule would extend federal regulation over farmland and retail development in Iowa. She also said it would usurp some of Iowa’s state-level regulations and conservation efforts.

“We’re taking the Biden administration to court to protect the rights of farmers and other Iowans. A farmer shouldn’t have to hire a lawyer to farm their land,” Bird said, saying she’ll continue to fight the administration’s “unlawful power grab.”

The move comes as the U.S. Supreme Court is considering a case over the scope of the Clean Water Act that could weaken the EPA’s authority to regulate wetlands.

Twenty-four states have signed onto the lawsuit, which Bird will help lead along with attorneys general in West Virginia, North Dakota and Georgia.

Senate axes retail birth control from health care bill

Iowa Senate lawmakers on Thursday advanced a pared-down version of Gov. Kim Reynolds’ wide-ranging health care bill without the provision that would make birth control available without a doctor’s prescription.

The bill includes $2 million in funding for crisis pregnancy centers, which are non-medical facilities that offer counseling and other pregnancy services and discourage abortion. It also provides between one and four weeks paid parental leave for state employees and funds four family medicine obstetrics fellowships in the state, among other provisions.

Democrats on the Senate Health and Human Services Committee on Thursday criticized the funding going to the crisis pregnancy centers, saying there is lax state oversight of the centers and little regulation of the services they provide.

A House version of the bill — which does include the section allowing birth control without a prescription — is expected to go through committee next week. Reynolds said Thursday she hopes the final bill from both chambers will include that measure.

“That helps eliminate unwanted pregnancy and abortions, so I think it’s really important that we’re able to do that,” Reynolds told reporters Thursday. “We’re going to be working with the House to keep that intact and we’ll send it back over to the Senate and hopefully get that to my desk as well."