Articles Tagged: Zach Wahls

A campaign has been launched to show legislators there is broad support for Iowa to join other states in reforming marijuana laws

On one side are investors who want to deliver CO2 from Iowa ethanol plants to sequestration sites in other states. In an unusual pairing, they’ve been joined by some labor unions. On the other side, are “unusual bedfellows” — environmentalists, farmers, landowners and property rights advocates as well as opponents of large-scale farming and ethanol — calling for the Iowa Utilities Board to reject eminent domain for pipeline construction.

Previously, the House passed its own version, which differs in many key ways

The Ankeny Republican will run for re-election this year in the newly drawn Iowa Senate District 23, which encompasses the rural, northern areas of Polk County outside the city of Ankeny.

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds was the perfect choice to tell Iowa’s story to the nation because she can talk about tax cuts and moving faster than most to re-open businesses and schools during the COVID-19 pandemic. Or she was the wrong choice because she has overseen a national, political agenda that is unfriendly to Iowans. It’s all in the eye of the beholder.

Most Iowa workers would pay a 3.9 percent state income tax — a large reduction for the state’s highest wage earners and a modest decrease for low-income workers — under a new proposal that is likely to become law soon.

Proposed income tax cuts are on the move, and work on the next state budget has started earlier than normal.

Republican leaders in both the Senate and House have said they expect to move quickly on the legislative process for their respective plans, likely starting each next week.

Jack Whitver, the Republican Senate majority leader from Ankeny, said he believes the proposal aligns with the tax plan that Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds’ proposed earlier this month.

Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds’ campaign reported raising nearly $4.8 million in donations in 2021. Her highest profile Democratic challenger, Deidre DeJear, reported raising nearly $287,000.

Educators in Iowa have been relaying their concerns with opening-day remarks made by Republican Iowa Senate President Jake Chapman, who accused teachers of having a “sinister agenda” regarding books in school libraries, Democratic legislative leaders said Thursday.

Judging by the opening-day remarks delivered Monday by leaders in the Iowa Legislature, Republicans and Democrats have decidedly different views about how to attract more workers and people to Iowa, whose population has been stagnant for a decade.

“I think there's going to be an effort to push for everything that's on the agenda,” University of Northern Iowa political scientist Chris Larimer said. “I think they're going to push on tax cuts, maybe more easing of gun restrictions and kind of waiting and seeing what they're going to do on abortion” in anticipation of a United States Supreme Court decision on a Mississippi abortion law.

Along the way, however, there are any number of ideas and issues that can disrupt, delay and derail the familiar routine of a legislative session. Often, they are the same issues from year-to-year: abortion; gun rights; traffic cameras; gambling.

Democrats repeated the party’s demand last week that Gov. Reynolds reverse her earlier decision to reject $95 million in federal funds that could be used for COVID-19 mitigation in schools.