Pipelines offer Iowa Democrats an opportunity

Iowa Democrats have been wandering in the political wilderness in recent years, wondering what strategy or issue could help them regain some footing in smaller cities and some rural areas where the party was once competitive. The Democratic brand has become as toxic as a manure spill in rural Iowa.

Emma Schmit believes the debate raging over carbon pipelines is that issue.

Schmit is a member of the Democratic State Central Committee and is Democratic Party chair in Calhoun County, where Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds won 62 percent of the vote in 2018 and former President Donald Trump collected 66 percent of the vote in 2020.

Iowans in northwest Iowa and elsewhere are agitating against the prospect that land could be seized through eminent domain to accommodate carbon pipelines. The pipelines will sequester liquid carbon dioxide from ethanol plants and, according to backers, carry it to deep underground storage. The projects are being sold as a way to make ethanol production greener, reducing the industry’s greenhouse gas emissions and helping sustain a market for the corn-based fuel.

Two of the pipelines, one proposed by Summit Carbon Solutions and another planned by Navigator, would crisscross northwest Iowa. Summit is asking Iowa utility regulators to allow the company to use eminent domain powers to take property from reluctant landowners.

“These carbon pipelines have been a huge deal around here,” Schmit told me this past week. “They’re talking about these pipelines, and they want to see the Iowa Democratic Party take a stance.”

So last weekend, Schmit introduced a resolution at a virtual state central committee meeting calling on the Democratic Party to oppose the pipeline projects. She had been encouraged by behind-the-scenes discussions with elected officials and other Democrats who seemed supportive.

But before the resolution could be debated and voted on, a procedural objection was raised. A majority of central committee members supported the objection and tabled the resolution, effectively killing it.

“Before we could even talk about, you know, what inspired the need for the resolution, or anything to do with carbon pipelines, it was dismissed and will not be taken up again,” Schmit said.

“My favorite is right after the vote was announced there was a hot mic. Somebody forgot to put themselves back on mute. And their response was ‘Jesus, what a failure,’” Schmit said.

So what happened? Without an actual debate and vote, it’s tough to say exactly. Schmit thinks opposition may have come from labor unions, a core Democratic constituency that has backed pipelines in the past and the construction jobs they create. Maybe pushback came from Democrats who buy into the claims of pipeline promoters that the projects are climate friendly.

Iowa Democratic Party leadership isn’t wading into the debate.

"The Iowa Democratic Party is made up of numerous passionate and active grassroots individuals who are involved in their diverse communities. We support and encourage a broad coalition of groups who uphold our Democratic values and candidates,” IDP Communications Director Erin Moynihan said in an email statement

I reached out to Democratic gubernatorial candidate Deidre DeJear’s campaign to get a sense of her stance on the pipeline issue. As of deadline, I hadn’t received a response.

But maybe it’s just the power politics of ethanol, which has long been supported by both parties in Iowa due to its widely touted importance to the agricultural economy. Democrats’ rural outreach has been anchored in issues such as biofuels and broadband. Meanwhile, the state has become redder and redder.

Among backers of the Summit pipeline are Republican megadonor Bruce Rastetter, former governor and ambassador to China Terry Branstad, former Kim Reynolds chief of staff Jake Ketzner and Jess Vilsack, son of former governor and current U.S. Agriculture Sec. Tom Vilsack. Ethanol has always had friends in high places in Iowa.

A bill sponsored by a Republican lawmaker in the Iowa Senate that would have prohibited the use of eminent domain for private projects was abruptly killed last month by GOP leadership before it could be debated in committee. Nobody wants to debate this stuff, apparently.

But Democrats are missing a golden opportunity.

Democrats claim to be supportive of cleaning up Iowa’s dirty water. But sustaining the ethanol industry, which uses half of the corn grown in Iowa, is only going to make Iowa’s water quality problem worse. The intensive row crop farming ethanol demands is the primary culprit behind nitrate and phosphorus pollution flowing into Iowa’s waterways and on to the gulf dead zone.

These projects will need billions of dollars in federal tax credits to succeed. From the standpoint of addressing climate change, which Democrats also support, these are resources that could be better spent on other measures, such as truly clean energy projects. Ethanol has already received a mountain of government support as it’s tried to gain an economic foothold.

A University of Wisconsin study released last month found that the carbon emissions from using land to plant corn erases ethanol’s environmental advantage over petroleum.

Democrats should be the party of our energy future, not proponents propping up the past.

Property rights are a potent political issue in Iowa. If Democrats are really going to stick up for Iowans, they should oppose allowing wealthy pipeline promoters to grab their land.

“I think it’s just this great bipartisan issue that really could open up doors that have been closed in rural areas for years now to Democrats and kind of start being able to rebuild that trust in rural areas and bring those voters back. Because we need them,” Schmit said. “It’s crucially important that Democrats find something to rebuild their brand … And this is it.”

Listen to Emma, Democrats. She’s the future of the party. Take a stand. After losing so much, what do you have to lose?

(319) 398-8262; todd.dorman@thegazette.com