Gazette endorsement: DeJear for Iowa governor

Iowa’s two major party candidates for governor, Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds and Democrat Deidre DeJear, are offering two very different versions of the state’s future.

DeJear, 36, would make new investments in education with the goal of improving the state’s public schools, community colleges and universities. She favors expanding access to preschool and wants to address the shortage of child care and affordable housing that have worsened Iowa’s persistent workforce shortage. She supports reproductive rights, would stand up for the civil rights of LGBTQ Iowans and would seek to improve Iowa’s underfunded mental health system.

Reynolds, 63, has attacked the state’s public schools as bastions of liberal indoctrination, filled with “pornographic” library books and “drag shows” as she pushes for publicly funded scholarships for private schools. She contends expanded preschool isn’t affordable, even as the governor and the Republican Legislature have socked away a $1.9 billion surplus. Instead of using those dollars to improve schools, the mental health system and to address other pressing priorities, Reynolds would use the surplus to cover the budgetary hole left by waves of tax cuts primarily benefiting wealthy Iowans. The governor will continue to side with powerful agricultural interests as the state’s waters remain impaired and polluted by cropland runoff.

It's a choice between an Iowa where many can benefit versus a state where only the governor’s partisan allies and donors will reap the rewards of their grip on power. Our endorsement goes to DeJear, and her positive vision for Iowa’s future.

This was not a difficult call, given how our editorial board has been repeatedly critical of Reynolds’ version of governance. She has failed the transparency test again and again, with her administration throwing up barriers to public records access while the governor offers few opportunities to be questioned by reporters. Reynolds operates with precious little oversight, as the GOP Legislature has abdicated its role in providing a check on the executive branch.

A prime example of Reynolds’ governing style came this past summer when she held a closed-door meeting with parents and others opposed to Linn-Mar’s transgender support policies. Only one school board member was invited to attend. No school officials or parents with a different view of the policy were welcome. Reynolds only wanted to hear from a narrow cross-section of district residents who share her world view. Reynolds would rather plot in secret than provide leadership.

She signed legislation barring transgender girls from competing in sports on teams that correspond with their gender identity, despite showing zero evidence their participation is a problem in Iowa. She accused unemployed Iowans of lazily relaxing in a “hammock” as she slashed unemployment benefits.

Reynolds and Republicans addressed the child care shortage by increasing staffing ratios and allowing 16-year-olds to care for kids without supervision, while ignoring the low pay and benefits that are driving staffing shortages. She raised the income threshold for child care subsidies, but then signed a bill allowing child care providers to ask families to make up the difference between subsidies and the full cost of care.

The governor has gone to court with hopes of reviving a bill she signed banning abortion in Iowa after six weeks of pregnancy, when most women don’t know they’re pregnant. She presided over a restructuring of mental health funding in Iowa and the creation of a children’s mental health system, but has provided too little funding to provide expanded access to care. University funding has continued to stagnate under her watch, with more of the burden being passed down to students paying higher tuition.’

One of Reynolds’ finest moments came in 2020 when she signed a policing reform bill unanimously approved by lawmakers and pushed by protesters in the wake of George Floyd’s murder by police in Minneapolis. But that moment faded the next year when she signed “back the blue” legislation leveling harsher penalties at protesters.

She has squandered an opportunity to be a transformational leader for all Iowans. Instead, she takes pride in being endorsed by Donald Trump.

DeJear, a Des Moines business woman who advises small businesses, would bring Iowa a far less divisive brand of leadership. She would reset Iowa’s priorities, upholding Iowa’s tradition of putting public education front and center. She’s traveled the state for months, listening to Iowans, and not just her political supporters.

Her election would be a refreshing change at a Statehouse where Republicans accuse educators of having a “sinister agenda” for harming children, legislation is bulldozed to passage with little public input and consensus and compromise have been replaced by extremism.

We need a governor who is aspirational rather than confrontational. DeJear can be that governor. Iowa’s future depends on it.

(319) 3898-8262; editorial@thegazette.com