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Bleeding Heartland
It's what plants crave.
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Iowa GOP 
Wed May 22, 2013 at 11:15:00 AM CDT
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Time for another discussion thread on the race for Iowa's open U.S. Senate seat. Recent news on the campaign is after the jump.
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Sun May 19, 2013 at 19:30:00 PM CDT
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Kirsten Anderson lost her job on Friday afternoon as communications director for the Iowa Senate Republicans. Today she went public alleging that she was fired after documenting sexual harassment by GOP state senators and staffers. WHO-TV broadcast Dave Price's exclusive interview with Anderson Sunday morning, and I recommend watching the whole clip at their website. After the jump I've posted highlights from Anderson's claims and a denial from Ed Failor Jr., a top staffer for Senate Minority Leader Bill Dix.
As a bonus, I enclose below your laugh for the day: a screenshot from the official Iowa Senate GOP website as of 7 pm on Sunday. The front page includes a link to the Des Moines Register's blog and the headline, "Iowa Senate GOP staffer claims she was fired for protesting sexual harassment; Dix aide issues strong denial." I wonder whether Anderson was the only person on that staff who knew how to update the website. It's also possible that the Des Moines Register political blog headlines automatically feed into that box on the front page, and no other Senate GOP staff checked the site over the weekend.
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Fri May 17, 2013 at 07:10:00 AM CDT
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It's time for a new thread on the open first Congressional district seat. So far former Iowa House Speaker Pat Murphy is the only declared Democratic candidate. Former State Senator Swati Dandekar formed an exploratory committee last week. State Senator Jeff Danielson of the Cedar Falls/Waterloo area has said he's keeping his options open. I expect a decision relatively soon after the legislative session wraps up.
Cedar Rapids City Council member Monica Vernon "is nearly ready to announce" her candidacy, Rick Smith reported. She was first elected to the council in 2007, switched parties in 2009, and was re-elected in 2011. Cedar Rapids plaintiff's attorney Dave O'Brien may also run, Jennifer Jacobs reported. O'Brien's background is similar to Bruce Braley's before his first campaign in 2006.
State Representative Tyler Olson, who also chairs the Iowa Democratic Party, hasn't ruled out running for Congress, but some Polk County Democrats believe that if he runs for higher office next year, it will be against Governor Terry Branstad.
On the Republican side, Cedar Rapids business owner Steve Rathje and Dubuque business owner Rod Blum are already seeking the nomination in IA-01. Once the legislature adjourns for the year, my hunch is that a Republican lawmaker will join the race. State Representative Walt Rogers of the Cedar Falls/Waterloo area confirmed earlier this year that he's thinking about it.
The Iowa Republican's Kevin Hall reported last month that former Secretary of State and Cedar Rapids Mayor Paul Pate is "90 percent" likely to run for office in 2014. I think Pate would be a strong general election candidate but might have trouble winning an IA-01 GOP primary. It's also possible that he may run for Secretary of State again if Matt Schultz goes for the open U.S. Senate seat.
Current Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett is running for re-election and seems to have ruled out the IA-01 race, judging from his recent comments to Todd Dorman.
After the jump I've posted the latest voter registration numbers for the 20 counties in IA-01. Linn County is the largest by population, but it doesn't dominate the district. About 30 percent of the registered Democrats, 28 percent of the Republicans, and 27 percent of the no-party voters in IA-01 live in Linn County.
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Thu May 09, 2013 at 10:20:00 AM CDT
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Nice scoop by the Des Moines Register's Jason Noble yesterday: Mark Jacobs, the former president and CEO of Reliant Energy in Texas, may seek the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in Iowa. Jacobs moved to West Des Moines last year and recently founded an education reform advocacy group called Reaching Higher Iowa.
I've posted Jacobs' short bio after the jump, along with initial thoughts on his strengths and weaknesses as a candidate.
CORRECTION: The Register's Jennifer Jacobs was the first to report yesterday that Mark Jacobs might be a Senate candidate. In addition to other potential candidates Bleeding Heartland has discussed before (Matt Whitaker, Matt Schultz, A.J. Spiker, Joni Ernst, Rod Roberts, Bob Vander Plaats, and David Young), her piece also mentioned West Des Moines Mayor Steve Gaer, orthopedic surgeon Stuart Weinstein, McDonald's franchise owner Kevin O'Brien, and business owner Ron Langston, who served "as national director of the U.S. Department of Commerce's Minority Business Development Agency under President George W. Bush."
SECOND CORRECTION: I missed that The Iowa Republican speculated about Jacobs as a Senate candidate a couple of weeks ago.
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Thu May 02, 2013 at 10:28:00 AM CDT
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I've been watching for signs that Republican State Senator Sandy Greiner might retire rather than run for re-election in 2014. Although she has more legislative experience than most of her GOP colleagues and was an early backer of Bill Dix's effort to become minority leader, she didn't join the Republican leadership team after Dix became head of the caucus last November.
If Greiner seeks another term in the Iowa Senate, I believe she would be favored to hold what looks like a swing district on paper. But in the last few days I've been wondering whether she might run into trouble during a Republican primary. I've posted some thoughts on this scenario after the jump, along with a map and the latest voter registration totals from Senate district 39.
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Sat Apr 27, 2013 at 18:28:00 PM CDT
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Senator Chuck Grassley's chief of staff, David Young, "has reached out to Hawkeye State donors and GOP power brokers to gauge support" for a U.S. Senate campaign, Alexander Burns reported at Politico today, citing unnamed Republican sources.
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Fri Apr 26, 2013 at 14:20:00 PM CDT
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Former U.S. Attorney Matt Whitaker expressed interest in Iowa's Senate seat on the day Senator Tom Harkin announced his retirement plans, and it appears the Republican is close to launching a campaign. WHO-TV's Dave Price noticed today that there's a MattWhitaker.org website. For now, the only content is a picture of Whitaker, an announcement that "MattWhitaker.org is coming soon," and a link you can click to sign up for e-mails.
Whitaker likely won't clear the Republican primary field, but he should have no trouble raising a lot of money for a Senate campaign. A former University of Iowa football player, he served as U.S. attorney for the southern district of Iowa during George W. Bush's administration. He is now a managing partner in the Des Moines law firm Whitaker Hagenow & Gustoff LLP. The other senior partners are Iowa House Majority Whip Chris Hagenow and William Gustoff, whom Governor Terry Branstad tried to appoint to the State Judicial Nominating Commission. Branstad's legal counsel Brenna Findley joined the Whitaker Hagenow law firm in 2010, while she was campaigning for Iowa attorney general.
Earlier this month, Whitaker sparred with Democratic Senate candidate Bruce Braley's campaign manager Jeff Link on Dave Price's Sunday morning television show. He said he was getting a lot of encouragement to run for Senate from Republicans all over Iowa.
UPDATE: Republican blogger Craig Robinson predicts that in a GOP primary, Whitaker's "decision to represent Zach Edwards [...] could come back to haunt him." In early 2012, Edwards was arrested and charged with attempting identity theft against Iowa Secretary of State Matt Schultz. He ended up pleading guilty to a misdemeanor. Schultz is also thinking about running for the U.S. Senate seat.
SECOND UPDATE: Here are Whitaker's statistics as a football player.
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Fri Apr 26, 2013 at 08:40:00 AM CDT
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Republican Steve Rathje announced this week that he has hired staff for his campaign in Iowa's first Congressional district. The press release enclosed below contains background on campaign manager Doug Wagner and field director Taylor Nelson. Rathje also rolled out a steering committee of "30 people from all walks of life" who "either live in the 1st District, have employees who live here, or do business and serve people here." Those names are after the jump as well.
Hiring staff more than a year before the 2014 Republican primary is risky for Rathje. His campaign raised about $51,500 during the first quarter, but more than half of that total came from six donors who each contributed the maximum $5,200 ($2,600 for the primary election and $2,600 for the general election). Rathje's campaign reported $31,082.87 cash on hand as of March 31, but $15,600 of that amount is restricted for use during the 2014 general election campaign. He can't spend that money trying to defeat Rod Blum and/or other Republicans who may declare in IA-01 later.
Rathje will either need to broaden his donor base or loan his campaign lots of money in order to keep paying staff for the next 13 months. Since Blum had a strong showing in the 2012 GOP primary to represent IA-01, Rathje should save some resources for direct mail, radio or television advertising next spring too.
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Thu Apr 18, 2013 at 13:00:22 PM CDT
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(Rhetoric like this is one reason voter ID laws undermine public confidence in the integrity of elections. - promoted by desmoinesdem)
Does any other Secretary of State agree with Iowa's Matt Schultz--that abortion and gay marriage are legal because cheating determines election outcomes? Or is our Secretary of State saying Iowa has the worst elections in the nation?
In an astonishing, passionate speech to the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition April 15, Shultz said the group could not advance its agenda because its opponents "cheat" at the polls. His solution?Voter ID cards, of course.
Schultz offered no evidence of such cheating. He charged that
we have a lot of forgetful Democratic Senators in the state of Iowa. They just don't get it. . . . Why would somebody be against voter ID? WHY? It's time to call a spade a spade. . . This about honesty and integrity--I'm an Eagle Scout--I think it's important we have an Eagle Scout be Secretary of State.
Calling a spade a spade apparently means being ready to say Democrats win by cheating, which he soon said.
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Wed Apr 17, 2013 at 16:01:00 PM CDT
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State Senator Dennis Guth demonstrated today that he merits strong consideration in any search for the most clueless Iowa legislator.
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Fri Apr 12, 2013 at 17:25:00 PM CDT
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Republicans thinking about running for Iowa's open U.S. Senate seat next year are still in a holding pattern, waiting for Representative Steve King to make up his mind. Bret Hayworth of the Sioux City Journal just dropped his "King Meter" from 63 to 58, reflecting only a slightly better than 50-50 chance that King will run for Senate. If Bleeding Heartland had a King Meter, it would have started at zero and stayed there.
Today former GOP gubernatorial candidate Doug Gross predicted that neither King nor two other prominent Iowa Republicans will run for the Senate in 2014.
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Fri Mar 29, 2013 at 11:15:00 AM CDT
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Seventy-six countries around the world have a higher percentage of women in their national legislatures than the United States. Iowa is one of very few states that has never sent a woman to Congress. The open seat in Iowa's first Congressional district is a perfect chance to leave Mississippi in the dust. Yet so far, no women have announced plans to run for the seat Bruce Braley is vacating. Three men are in the race for sure: Pat Murphy, Steve Rathje, and Rod Blum. Steve Sodders is strongly considering it and visited Washington last week to talk with Democrats about the race. UPDATE: Sodders has ruled out running for Congress.
The last time IA-01 was open, four Democratic men and three Republican men sought to replace Jim Nussle. Are we looking at a repeat?
For years, academic researchers have shown that "when women run for office, they perform just as well as men." But they don't run for office as often as men do for lots of reasons. A new study suggests that from a young age, women are less likely than men to consider running for office someday (full report here).
Iowa Democratic Party leaders should be working to recruit a top-tier female candidate in IA-01, a Democratic-leaning seat that presents the best opportunity of my lifetime to send a woman to Congress. But that's not going to happen when party chair Tyler Olson is thinking about running for Congress himself. Republican Party of Iowa leaders should also be looking for a strong woman candidate to capitalize on Democrats' strategic error. I doubt that "liberating" thought would ever cross the minds of the "Liberty" gang running the Iowa GOP.
Sisters are going to have to do it for ourselves. Whether that's the "50-50 in 2020" organization co-chaired by former women elected officials and candidates or some informal group of political activists, it's time to identify and encourage women to step up to the plate in IA-01--before the early declared candidates get a large advantage in fundraising and endorsements.
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Thu Mar 28, 2013 at 07:10:00 AM CDT
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Yesterday Dubuque-based business owner Rod Blum formally announced his candidacy in the Republican primary to represent Iowa's first Congressional district. The same day, he received the endorsement of the Liberty Iowa PAC, formed two years ago by supporters of Ron Paul's presidential campaign. Both announcements are after the jump, along with my first thoughts on how much the Liberty movement could help Blum in the GOP primary.
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Tue Mar 19, 2013 at 12:09:00 PM CDT
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Former U.S. Senator Rick Santorum will be the main speaker at a pro-life lunch event in Des Moines on April 15, WHO-TV's Dave Price reported today. Price notes that Santorum "is the national spokesman for the John Paul II Medical Research Institute in Iowa City led by Kim Lehman, the former Republican National Committeewoman and Santorum 2012 backer." Lehman's group advocates for adult stem cell research only, rather than fetal stem cell research.
In other 2016 presidential contender news, Republican Party of Iowa Chair A.J. Spiker announced today that U.S. Senator Rand Paul will headline the Iowa GOP's Lincoln Day Dinner in Cedar Rapids on May 10. Paul just won the straw poll at the annual CPAC conference, a major event for conservative activists from around the country.
Supporters of Ron Paul's presidential campaign are strongly represented on the Iowa GOP's State Central Committee and in the party's four district committees. However, attempts by "Paulinistas" to win leadership posts in the Scott County and Polk County Republican Party recently failed.
Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker has agreed to headline the Polk County Republican Party's spring fundraiser on May 23.
Any comments related to the next presidential campaign are welcome in this thread. I had to laugh when U.S. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell hinted with a joke that Hillary Clinton is too old to run for president. She will celebrate her 68th birthday in 2016. Mitt Romney just turned 66. Senator John McCain was 71 when he became the GOP's presidential nominee in 2008.
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Mon Mar 18, 2013 at 16:40:00 PM CDT
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The Republican National Committee released a so-called "autopsy" on the 2012 election results today. You can read the full report on the "Growth and Opportunity Project" here. I've posted a few excerpts, links and thoughts after the jump.
Any comments about the GOP's rebuilding and rebranding effort are welcome in this thread.
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Mon Mar 18, 2013 at 11:30:00 AM CDT
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Anyone who follows the Iowa legislature has frequent occasion to wonder how someone that ignorant got elected to the Iowa House or Senate. But every once in a while, a spectacularly clueless act grabs our attention. Last week a little-known first-term state representative made himself a contender for the title of Iowa's most clueless lawmaker.
UPDATE: Not so fast--see today's news, added at the end of this post.
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Thu Mar 14, 2013 at 11:23:00 AM CDT
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It's been a while since I posted about the 2016 Iowa caucus campaign. Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker agreed to headline the Polk County Republican Party's spring fundraiser in May. According to Kevin Hall's report for The Iowa Republican blog, Governor Terry Branstad helped make arrangements for Walker's appearance. Like Branstad and unlike eight other GOP governors around the country, Walker opted against taking federal funding to expand Medicaid in his state.
Hall reports that retired insurance executive Cameron Sutton "played a key role in securing Scott Walker's appearance" as well. Sutton was one of seven Iowa Republican donors from the business community who flew to New Jersey in May 2011 to urge Governor Chris Christie to run for president. (Christie's star has fallen in Republican circles since he praised President Barack Obama's handling of Hurricane Sandy and later agreed to expand Medicaid in New Jersey.) Sutton endorsed Newt Gingrich for president before the Iowa caucuses but wasn't pleased with the way Gingrich bashed Mitt Romney during the GOP primaries.
Any comments about the next presidential campaign are welcome in this thread.
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Mon Mar 11, 2013 at 14:55:00 PM CDT
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State Senator Brad Zaun announced today that he will not run for the open U.S. Senate seat in 2014 (hat tip to WHO-TV's Dave Price).
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