Fact Checker: ‘No such thing as book banning in Iowa’

State Rep. Cindy Golding warmed up the crowd at a Cedar Rapids rally last weekend for former President Donald Trump by talking about two hot-button issues in her first term in the Iowa Legislature.

“There is no such thing as book banning in Iowa,” Golding said.

A few minutes later, the Republican who represents a district to the north and east of Cedar Rapids told the crowd of more than 2,000 gathered at the DoubleTree by Hilton Convention Complex she was surprised to hear some education-related topics being discussed in the Iowa House.

“It never dawned on me that we would be deciding whether or not school employees could take children to get medical procedures and medications that would change their gender for life without telling the parents,” she said.

Analysis

Senate File 496, signed May 26 by Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds, says Iowa school libraries may contain only “age-appropriate” books and other materials. The bill defines “age-appropriate” as excluding “any material with descriptions or visual depictions of a sex act as defined by section 702.17.”

Because that code’s definitions of “sex acts” includes sexual intercourse, any book that describes or shows intercourse could be interpreted as off limits.

Book banning is a shorthand way many people refer to legislation that restricts access to some materials in libraries or classrooms. But what is a book ban?

Britannica defines it this way: “Book banning, the practice of prohibiting or restricting the reading of certain books by the general public or by members of a local community or religious group.”

The Free Speech Center at Middle Tennessee University says book banning is when “private individuals, government officials, or organizations remove books from libraries, school reading lists, or bookstore shelves because they object to their content, ideas, or themes.”

The American Library Association says when books or other library materials are banned, they are removed from the curriculum or library.

But Golding, who Fact Checker reached out to for this article, said she doesn’t consider SF 496 to be a book ban.

“A book ban is when books are not allowed to be sold or owned in Iowa,” she said. “What we've said is these materials are not appropriate for education.”

While SF 496 didn’t ban specific books in schools, it was intended to result in the removal of books lawmakers found offensive. Since the law was enacted, school districts have removed books — in some cases hundreds of titles — from their collections. The way the law was written and the lack of guidance provided by the state to school districts likely will result in more books being pulled than if lawmakers banned specific titles.

Using the “book ban” definitions provided by reputable sources, SF 496 is a de facto book ban in public schools. It’s not banning books throughout Iowa, because students still can access these materials in other locations, such as community libraries, bookstores or online, but it may make it harder to get them.

Grade: We give Golding an F on this claim.

Now moving on to Golding’s statement that Iowa lawmakers earlier this year were “deciding whether or not school employees could take children to get medical procedures and medications that would change their gender for life without telling the parents.”

The Iowa Legislature passed Senate File 538, which prohibits Iowa doctors from prescribing puberty blockers or hormone therapy to transgender kids under age 18. It also bars surgeries on minors to affirm a gender that doesn’t match their sex at birth.

This bill is focused on health care providers and doesn’t say anything about school employees.

House File 9, proposed by House Republicans, including Golding, prohibited school employees from “encouraging, pressuring, or coercing a student to undergo any medical procedure, treatment, or intervention that is designed to affirm the student’s gender identity if that gender identity is different than the sex listed on a student’s official birth certificate.”

That bill passed out of committee, but went no further.

Golding said she heard from parents and students who told her, in private conversations, about school employees facilitating gender-affirming care, such as helping the students get puberty blockers. Golding did not see documentation of this, such as medical forms signed by a school employee.

The public record does not provide any accounts of school employees taking students to get gender-affirming care or medications. Many public districts can’t even dispense a Tylenol without parental permission.

“The only circumstances under which school employees can get students medical care is when there is an emergent health issue, (life and death emergency) and parents can't be reached,” said Margaret Buckton, executive director of the Urban Education Network of Iowa, which includes Iowa’s largest school districts.

“I have never heard of an incident of school employees taking children to get gender affirming surgery or medications at all, let alone without parent permission,” she said.

Even before SF 538, Iowa Code required parental consent and months of comprehensive treatment before teens were offered any kind of gender-affirming care, Dr. Katie Imborek has told reporters and the Iowa Legislature. Imborek is a family medicine physician who operates the University of Iowa’s LGBTQ Clinic in Iowa City.

So the idea that school employees — or any one else for that matter — would have been able to help teens get puberty blockers or other gender-affirming care without parental consent was already prohibited by law.

Lawmakers did not draft a bill this year that would prohibit school employees from taking students without parental consent in for gender affirming care — which indicates they didn’t “decide” anything about it.

Grade: F

Conclusion

It’s typical for local officials who speak at campaign rallies to talk about issues that energize the base before the headliner takes the stage. That was what Golding was doing at the Trump rally. The problem is, both of these statements mislead Iowans about what actually is happening in Iowa schools and at the Legislature.

We give Golding an F overall.

Criteria

The Fact Checker team checks statements made by an Iowa political candidate or officeholder or a national candidate/officeholder about Iowa, or in advocacy ads that appear in our market.

Claims must be independently verifiable. We give statements grades from A to F based on accuracy and context.

If you spot a claim you think needs checking, email us at factchecker@thegazette.com.

Members of the Fact Checker team are Tom Barton, Elijah Decious, Erin Jordan and Vanessa Miller. This Fact Checker was researched and written by Erin Jordan.