Former State Representative Renee Schulte of Cedar Rapids has decided against running for Congress in Iowa’s first district, she confirmed by telephone this morning. She said it’s “the right time to stay and continue to work” on implementing the mental health reform that was one of her key priorities as a state lawmaker. Schulte is helping to write new administrative rules as a consultant for the Mental Health Division of the Iowa Department of Human Services. Her contract runs through December.

Schulte added that while considering a Congressional bid, she was “not excited by the gridlock and lack of solutions at the federal level” and determined that she can “get more accomplished here” in Iowa. Who can argue after watching the government shutdown unfold last month?

Three candidates are already seeking the GOP nomination in IA-01: Cedar Rapids-based businessman Steve Rathje, Dubuque-based businessman Rod Blum, and State Representative Walt Rogers of the Waterloo/Cedar Falls area. One other Linn County candidate, former State Senator and Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate, is expected to join the race as well.

For the second year in a row, I’m ending Bleeding Heartland’s wildflower series with pictures of asters. They are often the last wildflowers you see’ll in the fall, as some species continue to bloom even after several frosts, when most other plants have turned brown. The pictures after the jump were taken in late September, but within the past few days I’ve seen some white asters still in flower.

Iowa wildflower Wednesday will resume in the spring, whenever I manage to take some pictures of early bloomers such as skunk cabbage, trillium, or pasque flower.

This is an open thread: all topics welcome.

It may surprise many that in 2013, in some places in America, you can still be fired from your job simply because of who you are or who you love. But it’s

true. And because of dysfunction and backwards thinking in Washington, that injustice may continue.

On Monday, the U.S. Senate overcame a procedural hurdle and set up a crucial vote to pass the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) later this week – 17

years after it was first introduced. In an era when the two parties agree on nothing, to have both Democrats and Republicans voting yes on ENDA in the

Senate should send a message that we all agree it’s time for this injustice to end. But incredibly, Speaker Boehner and the House Republicans vowed to

continue the fight against what’s right.

Five years ago, we passed a very similar law in Iowa, and it is time the rest of the country caught up. Believe me, I know the process can be messy, but I

offer this look back on how we passed the civil rights expansion in 2007 as proof that our shared faith in the right to equality is a powerful thing, and

the fight is worth it.

Yesterday’s election results were ideal for New Jersey Governor Chris Christie’s presidential ambitions. He won re-election by an enormous 60.5 percent to 38 percent margin.

In a state where Democrats outnumber Republicans by over 700,000, Mr. Christie won decisively, making impressive inroads among younger voters, blacks, Hispanics and women – groups that Republicans nationally have struggled to attract.

The governor prevailed despite holding positions contrary to those of many New Jersey voters on several issues, including same-sex marriage, abortion rights and the minimum wage, and despite an economic recovery that has trailed the rest of the country.

Meanwhile, hard-right Republican Ken Cuccinelli lost the Virginia governor’s race to a very unappealing Democrat, Terry McAuliffe.  

Mainstream Republicans and pundits will draw the obvious conclusion: to have a shot at winning the presidency in 2016, the GOP needs someone who doesn’t put social issues front and center, someone who can win in a blue state. Christie will lead the Republican Governors Association next year, giving him more access to big donors across the country. He’s already got a fan club among prominent Iowans on the GOP’s business wing.

My hunch is that despite yesterday’s elections, the GOP base will still demand someone more conservative than Christie in the 2016 presidential primaries. If he does become the nominee, I wouldn’t jump to the conclusion that he could win electoral votes in blue states. His opponent in the governor’s race was third-tier. At least two exit polls taken yesterday indicated he would lose his own state to Hillary Clinton in a presidential contest. He didn’t have any coat-tails, as New Jersey Democrats held all their state Senate seats.

What do you think, Bleeding Heartland readers? UPDATE: Added comments from Bob Vander Plaats below. SECOND UPDATE: Added comments from other social conservatives below.

THURSDAY UPDATE: Added comments from Representative Steve King. He and Christie go way back.  

Polls closed at 8:00 pm across Iowa. What local elections are you following tonight, Bleeding Heartland readers?

Polk County voters appear to have approved Public Measure A to fund improvements to the county court system. UPDATE: With all precincts reporting, “yes” on A has 21,702 votes (67 percent) to 10,611 votes (33 percent) for “no.”

With 65 of 71 precincts reporting, Des Moines at-large City Council member Skip Moore has 7,720 votes, while challenger Chris Diebel has 4,725 votes. Incumbent Chris Hensley has been re-elected in the third ward, and in the open first ward, Bill Gray has a lead over Sean Bagniewski, the candidate preferred by many progressives and labor activists.

UPDATE: Windsor Heights results are in: for the first time I can remember, all of the candidates I supported won! Longtime city council member Diana Willits won the open race for mayor (Jerry Sullivan retired). Diana is one of the few Republicans I’ve consistently voted for over the years. Unofficial results for city council indicate that the winners were incumbent Betty Glover (whom I didn’t support) and candidates Steve Peterson and Tony Timm (for whom I voted). Peterson is a former city council member and was the Joe Biden precinct captain in Windsor Heights 2 in 2008. Timm is the executive director of the largest homeless shelter in Des Moines.

SECOND UPDATE: By a 2-1 margin, Iowa City voters upheld the city ordinance keeping 19 and 20-year-olds out of bars. The Iowa City council results will be a disappointment to those who were hoping to elect more progressives in the “people’s republic.”

THIRD UPDATE: Looks like the incumbents were re-elected in Coralville, a big loss for the Koch brothers’ group Americans for Prosperity.

FOURTH UPDATE: Two local officials who are running for the state legislature as Republicans lost yesterday. Royce Phillips was a city council member in Tiffin and is a candidate for the open Iowa Senate district 39. Mark LeRette was a city council member in Muscatine and is a candidate for the open House district 91.

Cedar Rapids voters re-elected Mayor Ron Corbett. An ten-year extension of the local-option sales tax also passed easily in the Cedar Rapids metro area.

I can’t remember a local race that’s been more divisive for central Iowa Democrats than the Des Moines at-large City Council contest between Skip Moore and Chris Diebel. (That includes Ed Fallon’s challenge to Leonard Boswell in the 2008 Democratic primary to represent IA-03. In that race, the whole local establishment was on Boswell’s side.) I’ve been meaning to post an update on the city council race for the past week, but frankly, I wanted to avoid sparking a flamewar like some of the Facebook threads I’ve seen.

The early returns tonight indicate a big victory for Moore.

After the jump I’ve posted examples of positive and negative messages from the Diebel and Moore campaigns, along with one of the direct-mail pieces the National Association of Realtors Fund sent to Des Moines residents. The realtors’ group appears to be polling voters to gauge whether their mailing and radio ads have helped Diebel. During the last couple of days, several of my acquaintances in Des Moines have received telephone polls that asked them why they were supporting the candidate of their choice, and whether Diebel’s mail or the realtors’ mail affected their vote.  

Local elections take place across Iowa today. Polls opened at 7 am and will be open until 8 pm. If you have an absentee ballot, don’t put it in the mail today: hand-deliver it to your county auditor’s office, or it won’t count.

The mayoral and city council elections in Coralville have drawn national attention because of spending by Americans for Prosperity, a Koch brothers operation. John Deeth has posted about the Coralville and Iowa City contests, particularly Iowa City’s vote on repealing an ordinance that prohibits 19- and 20-year-olds from hanging out in bars.

The at-large Des Moines City Council race between Skip Moore and Chris Diebel has turned into the most divisive local election I can remember for Democrats here. Later today I have a post coming on that campaign.

Polk County residents will vote today on Public Measure A, a Public Safety & Judicial System Bond to fund courthouse renovations and other improvements. After the jump I’ve posted a few reasons to vote yes on this ballot measure.

UPDATE: The bond passed by 67 percent to 33 percent according to unofficial returns. 60 percent was needed for passage.

Little-known fact: the deal that ended the government shutdown in mid-October did not technically involve a Congressional vote to raise the country’s debt ceiling. Rather, it allowed President Barack Obama to suspend the debt ceiling until February 7, unless both chambers of Congress passed motions disapproving of the action. The compromise enabled Republicans to put themselves on record opposing any further increase in the debt limit without pushing the U.S. into default. As Susan Davis explained in USA Today, even if a disapproval motion cleared the House and Senate, the president “would presumably veto it, putting the burden on Congress to find veto-proof majorities to override it – a near-impossible outcome […].”

Last week both chambers considered identical disapproval resolutions, drafted by Republicans. Supporters of the resolution asserted that they were not voting for default, just trying to send a message that “We have to get our debt under control.” When the Senate considered the resolution on October 29, all 45 Republicans present voted yes, including Iowa’s Chuck Grassley. But it failed to pass as all 54 members of the Democratic caucus voted no, including Iowa’s Tom Harkin.

The House took up the resolution the following day and passed it by 222 votes to 191 (roll call). Only a few representatives crossed party lines on the vote. Iowa’s House members split as one would expect: Republicans Tom Latham (IA-03) and Steve King (IA-04) went on record against “the President’s exercise of authority to suspend the debt limit,” while Bruce Braley (IA-01) and Dave Loebsack (IA-02) opposed the resolution. I have to laugh at Latham’s faux-statesmanship, voting for the deal that averted default before turning around and voting against the presidential action that averted default.

I’m with those who would make this phony “disapproval” exercise a permanent replacement for Congressional votes to raise the debt ceiling. A symbolic gesture is a small price to pay to avoid future hostage-taking scenarios.  

Catching up on news from last week, the U.S. House voted 292 to 122 to undermine part of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law. Cheyenne Hopkins reported for Bloomberg that H.R. 922

would upend the 2010 law’s pushout provision by allowing trades of almost all types of derivatives by lenders with access to deposit insurance and discount borrowing. […]

Lawmakers included the original measure as a way to limit risk-taking by banks that got federal bailouts during the 2008 credit crisis. The pushout provision was faulted by banks and also by regulators including Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke, who expressed concern that it could drive swaps trading to less-regulated entities.

All but three Republicans present voted for this bill, joined by 70 Democrats. Iowa’s Tom Latham (IA-03) was a yes, while Steve King (IA-04) did not vote. Meanwhile, Bruce Braley (IA-01) and Dave Loebsack (IA-02) voted against the bill, as did most of the Democratic caucus. I did not see any public comment on this bill from any of Iowa’s four representatives. During the floor debate on October 30, Democrat Collin Peterson of Minnesota warned,

“This bill would effectively gut important financial reforms and put taxpayers potentially on the hook for big banks’ risky behavior,” Peterson said. “The provision is a modest measure designed to prevent the federal government for bailing out or subsidizing bank activity that is not related to the business of banking.”

Peterson also noted that under current law, banks can still perform about 90 percent of the swaps hedges they were able to perform before Dodd-Frank.

Sounds like Braley and Loebsack made the right call. A White House statement argued against the bill as “premature” and possibly “disruptive,” but did not threaten a presidential veto.

LATE UPDATE: Iowa’s representatives also split on party lines when the House approved the so-called Retail Investor Protection Act on October 29.

The bill prevents the Department of Labor from issuing rules under the Dodd-Frank financial reform act that describes when financial advisors are considered a fiduciary, which means they must must work in their clients’ best interest. Under the bill, Labor would have to wait until the Securities and Exchange Committee (SEC) acts first in this area.

Alicia Munnell explained here why that Republican-backed bill was “fundamentally misconceived.”

Senator Tom Harkin promised Iowa Democrats Saturday night that the U.S. Senate would soon approve the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) to protect the workplace rights of LGBT Americans. Today a fifth Republican senator indicated that he will vote for the ENDA. Those five plus the 55 members of the Democratic caucus (including newly sworn-in Cory Booker of New Jersey) will give supporters the 60 votes needed to break the inevitable Republican filibuster. President Barack Obama has called on Congress to pass the law.

Passing ENDA was a priority for Senator Ted Kennedy, the longtime chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor & Pension committee Harkin now leads. In 1996, an earlier version of this legislation fell just short of passage on the Senate floor. Harkin voted yes, while Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley voted no. In recent years, most Congressional Democrats have supported a version of ENDA that protects transgender employees as well as gays, lesbians, and bisexuals. Such a bill passed the U.S. House in 2007 but died in the Senate.

More details on the current bill’s provisions are after the jump. House Speaker John Boehner opposes ENDA and would be unlikely to put it to a vote in the lower chamber.

UPDATE: On Monday night the Senate approved a motion to proceed with debating the bill by 61 votes to 30 (roll call). Grassley was one of the 30 Republicans who attempted to filibuster. After the jump I’ve posted a video of Harkin’s floor statement supporting ENDA, which he called “another step in the direction of opening America up and making our society more inclusive rather than exclusive.”

What’s on your mind this weekend, Bleeding Heartland readers? This is an open thread.

The Iowa Democratic Party’s Jefferson-Jackson Dinner was an entertaining affair. I’ve posted some highlights after the jump. The “news” of the evening was Senator Chuck Schumer of New York endorsing Hillary Clinton for president, but for my money that wasn’t the most interesting part of his speech.

Jon Neiderbach announced this morning that he will seek the Democratic nomination for Iowa state auditor in 2014. An attorney, Neiderbach served a term on the Des Moines School Board and worked in state government for many years, first at the Legislative Fiscal Bureau and later at the Iowa Department of Human Services. I’ve posted more background on Neiderbach after the jump, along with the introductory post from his campaign website, Realtaxpayerswatchdog.com. In that post, he praised the work of longtime Republican State Auditor Richard Johnson but argued that “recent State Auditors have violated our trust.”

They have myopia, looking only at what is close to them: how money is handled. Of course money handling is very important, but they ignore the larger and even more critical issues the State Auditor is required by law to address.

Our recent State Auditors have not examined the quality of management, the efficiency of operations, or the effectiveness of programs. They have allowed theft and fraud to go undiscovered for years, using clearly inadequate auditing procedures. And to make matters worse, recent State Auditors have gotten involved in politics: they have become spokespersons for Governor Branstad’s policies and rubber stamps for the political cronies he has appointed.

Neiderbach is referring to Johnson’s successor David Vaudt, who served as state auditor from 2003 through April of this year, and to Mary Mosiman, whom Governor Terry Branstad appointed after Vaudt resigned.

Neiderbach will discuss his campaign to become “Iowa’s Chief Accountability Officer” with people at the Iowa Democratic Party’s Jefferson-Jackson Dinner in Des Moines on November 2. He is encouraging voters to call him at (515) 984-0021 or contact him via e-mail: realtaxpayerswatchdog AT gmail.com.

I am not aware of other candidates planning to challenge Mosiman next year. In 2010, Jon Murphy did not enter the race against Vaudt until after the Democratic primary.  

This summer, Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. Senate reached an informal deal to allow presidential nominees to be confirmed more smoothly without any new limits on the minority’s filibuster powers. The deal held for a while, allowing a bunch of stalled nominations to move forward. But filibuster reform may be back on the agenda soon, because today Republicans including Iowa’s Senator Chuck Grassley blocked the confirmation of two more presidential nominees today: Patricia Millett for the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, and Representative Mel Watt to be the Federal Housing Finance Agency director. All the Senate Democrats, including Iowa’s Tom Harkin, voted for the cloture motions on the Millett and Watt nominations.

Millett is highly qualified for the judgeship, so instead of pretending to have a substantive case against her, Grassley says the D.C. Circuit doesn’t have a large enough caseload to justify more judges. That didn’t stop him or other Senate Republicans from voting to confirm all of President George W. Bush’s nominees for that court, as Judith E. Schaeffer explained in this excellent background piece on the controversy. Other analysts have discussed the many problems judicial vacancies are creating in the federal court system. As the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Grassley helps set the tone for the GOP on these confirmations.

After the jump I’ve posted Grassley’s Senate floor statement on the Millett nomination, comments from the Iowa Fair Courts Coalition, and an excerpt from Schaeffer’s post on Grassley and the D.C. Circuit. I haven’t seen any comment from Grassley on the Watt nomination but will update this post if he explains why he opposed him. According to Peter Schroeder of The Hill, “GOP lawmakers argued Watt lacked the experience to oversee Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.”

Yesterday was a big news day for two Democratic candidates seeking to unseat Governor Terry Branstad. Iowa’s largest labor union endorsed State Representative Tyler Olson, while State Senator Jack Hatch released a major tax reform proposal. Details are after the jump.

UPDATE: Added excerpts from Danny Homan’s November 2 guest editorial for the Des Moines Register below.  

Happy Halloween to the Bleeding Heartland community! I don’t have any scary nature photos to share. Instead, to mark the holiday, this week’s featured Iowa wildflower is a mystery I haven’t been able to identify. I hope a native plants expert will be able to tell me which kind of blazing star (Liatris) it is. Some have suggested rough blazing star (Liatris aspera) or dotted blazing star (Liatris punctata). I thought rough blazing star looked more like these plants, but I’m not sure.

This is an open thread: all topics welcome.

Today members of the U.S. House and Senate began conference committee negotiations on the farm bill. The last five-year farm bill expired in 2012, and the latest extension of most federal farm programs (except for some related to conservation and sustainable agriculture) lapsed on September 30. Two Iowans are on the 41-member conference committee: Democratic Senator Tom Harkin and Republican Representative Steve King (IA-04).

One issue is likely to dominate the Congressional talks: funding levels for nutrition programs, especially the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps. This summer, both Harkin and Republican Senator Chuck Grassley voted for the Senate farm bill, which cut SNAP by about $4 billion over 10 years. Iowa’s four U.S. House members split along party lines when the House approved a Republican bill with $39 billion in cuts over the same time frame. Keep in mind that regardless of what happens in the farm bill talks, all SNAP recipients–including an estimated 1 million veterans and approximately 421,000 Iowans–will see their food assistance reduced as of November 1. Click here for a detailed report on those cuts, which will occur as extra funding from the 2009 federal stimulus bill runs out.

After the jump I’ve posted the latest comments about the farm bill from Iowa politicians.

UPDATE: Added King’s opening statement from the conference committee meeting below.

SECOND UPDATE: Added new comments from Harkin.

If President Barack Obama said it once, he said it a hundred times: Americans who liked their health insurance would be able to keep their health insurance. Now, on top of a website that still doesn’t work properly, the president is dealing with the fallout from this reality: millions of Americans will not be able to renew their current health insurance policies.

In order to win an Iowa Senate majority, Republicans need to defeat at least one Democratic incumbent next November. One of the likely targets, three-term Senator Daryl Beall, got his first Republican challenger earlier this month in Iowa Senate district 5.

Follow me after the jump for my first take on Tim Kraayenbrink’s chances against Beall. I’ve enclosed a district map and the latest voter registration numbers, along with background on both candidates.

Via the On Brief blog, I saw that yesterday the Iowa Supreme Court made public proposed changes to rules about electronic media coverage of its proceedings. I’ve posted the full press release after the jump.

The new rules are based on recommendations by a Committee on Expanded Media Coverage, appointed last December. Iowa Supreme Court Justice Bruce Zager chaired that committee, which included journalists as well as court officials and submitted its final report in August 2013. You can view the proposed rule changes here; words to be removed are crossed out, while suggested new language is underlined. Instructions on submitting a public comment on or before January 6, 2014, are here. People may submit their comments in person, by regular mail, or via e-mail.  

Judging from the reception he got in Des Moines and Le Mars on Friday and Saturday, U.S. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas is still a hot property for conservative Iowa Republicans. I’ve posted links and highlights about Cruz’s latest visit after the jump. Any comments about his impact on Iowa politics or his potential as a presidential candidate are welcome in this thread.

I see Cruz as a showboater who will peak long before the 2016 Iowa caucuses, as people tire of his over-promising. Granted, many Republicans savor the fantasy that everything would go their way if the evil establishment only listened to “constitutional conservatives” like Cruz. Nevertheless, I expect Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker will have a winning message during the next caucus campaign. He can claim to have delivered on more conservative dreams than members of Congress like Cruz, Senator Rand Paul, or Representative Paul Ryan. I would love to be wrong and see the GOP nominate Cruz for president, though.