Advocacy groups and some Iowa lawmakers are challenging the Iowa Department of Transportation’s policy against issuing driver’s licenses or other identification cards to those granted Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals status by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Iowa Supreme Court Chief Justice Mark Cady delivered the annual Condition of the Judiciary speech to Iowa House and Senate members yesterday. As he did in 2011 and again last year, Cady appealed to lawmakers to fund the judiciary at an adequate level. Highlights from his case are below.

Today President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden revealed a list of proposals designed to reduce gun violence. The full transcript from the press conference is here. It’s embarrassing that we needed a presidential order to allow the Centers for Disease Control to study this issue.

After the jump I’ve posted excerpts from the president’s remarks and a statement from Representative Steve King (R, IA-04). I also included some comments from Iowa legislators about possible state legislation related to guns or gun violence. I will update this post as needed with more comments on these issues. UPDATE: Added Senator Tom Harkin’s comments.

SECOND UPDATE: Added comments from Representative Dave Loebsack (D, IA-02).

The National Republican Congressional Committee released a memo today outlining a strategy to “stay on offense” during the 2014 electoral cycle. No Iowa district is among the top seven NRCC targets, but the districts currently represented by Bruce Braley (IA-01) and Dave Loebsack (IA-02) are on the long list of 45 seats Republicans see a chance to pick up.

The U.S. House approved a Disaster Relief Appropriations Act primarily aimed at Hurricane Sandy victims tonight, but Iowans Tom Latham (IA-03) and Steve King (IA-04) were among the majority of House Republicans who voted against the bill.

UPDATE: Added King’s comment below.

Iowa is one of the states where Michelle Rhee, ALEC, and a Republican Governor have joined forces in support of an agenda of education “reform” that is all about funneling public dollars to corporate welfare. Governor Terry Branstad announced Round #2 of the fight over education reform in a January 14th press conference.  Round #1 ended in a compromise bill in May 2012, which scaled back the Governor's initial proposals. With the beginning of the legislative session, the battle resumes.

More below the fold.

Governor Terry Branstad just finished delivering his annual Condition of the State speech to Iowa House and Senate members. He unveiled a new property tax reform plan, which would cut commercial property taxes by 20 percent over four years. Previously the governor had called for cutting commercial property taxes by 40 percent. Branstad also urged legislators to approve the key points of education reform proposals he released yesterday. Finally, he outlined three policies that, in his view, would help Iowa become the healthiest state in the country.

Links and more details are after the jump. I will update this post later with more information and reaction. The video of Branstad’s speech will be available on IPTV.org and will be broadcast statewide on Iowa Public Television at 6:30 pm on January 16.

The Iowa House and Senate began their 2013 session yesterday with the usual welcoming speeches from legislative leaders and the ritual of choosing desks for each lawmaker in the chambers. Judging from this photo, returning legislators get first dibs.

As was the case in 2012, social issues like abortion and same-sex marriage were absent from the opening-day speeches. Republican leaders emphasized the need to cut both property and income taxes. Iowa House Speaker Kraig Paulsen also claimed credit on behalf of Republicans for Iowa’s improving fiscal condition. House Majority Leader Linda Upmeyer spent a fair amount of time criticizing Congress before calling for state action to improve education and cut taxes. House Speaker Pro Tem Steve Olson repeated some themes of last year’s election campaign and quoted U.S. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida. Similarly, Senate Minority Leader Bill Dix concentrated on tax reforms.

Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal focused on education and workforce training programs to address “Iowa’s skill shortage.” Senate President Pam Jochum focused on health-related issues: improve mental health services, helping elderly people stay in their own homes, and expanding Medicaid, which she described as “the biggest opportunity for this session to make a positive difference for Iowans.” Iowa House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy emphasized the need for bipartisan work on a range of issues: education, mental health care delivery, the transition to a new maximum security prison, and protecting natural resources.

Follow me after the jump for excerpts from the opening-day speeches by legislative leaders (as prepared for delivery). I included the full text of Jochum’s remarks, because her personal journey says a lot about who she is. Jochum also paid a lovely tribute to former Republican State Senator Pat Ward, who died last year.  

President Barack Obama and Republicans in the U.S. House are still on a collision course over the debt ceiling, which needs to be raised sometime in the next month or two.

The Iowa legislature’s 2013 session opened today. After the jump I’ve posted details on the Iowa Senate majority and minority leadership teams, along with all chairs, vice chairs, and members of standing Senate committees. Where relevant, I’ve noted changes since last year. Click here for a similar post on the new Iowa House.

Democrats hold a 26 to 24 majority in the upper chamber. The huge experience gap between the Iowa Senate caucuses is striking. Only seven of the 24 Republicans have served as lawmakers in either the House or Senate for more than four years, whereas 19 of the 26 Democrats have more than four years of legislative service. Click here for details on the tenure of all 50 Iowa senators.

Multiple news sources are reporting today that as expected, Tom Vilsack will stay in President Barack Obama’s cabinet as U.S. Secretary of Agriculture.

The USDA has a budget of about $150 billion and is the third-biggest cabinet agency in spending after Defense and Health and Human Services. Food stamps for needy families account for about half of the department’s spending, with the remainder taken up by other nutrition programs and subsidies for farmers such as insurance for crops including corn, wheat and cotton.

Working on a new long-term farm bill will be a major task for Congress this year. The “fiscal cliff” deal extended some but not all important farm programs temporarily.

Vilsack may tangle with Representative Steve King, who just became chairman of the House Agriculture subcommittee on Department Operations, Oversight, and Nutrition.

Any relevant comments are welcome in this thread. In other Obama cabinet news, Janet Napolitano will keep her job as head of the Department of Homeland Security.

UPDATE: Interesting trivia courtesy of Alan Bjerga: “Should he serve until 2017, the former Iowa governor would be the first person to head the Department of Agriculture for two terms since Orville Freeman led the agency under presidents John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson in the 1960s.”

SECOND UPDATE: Added a statement from Vilsack after the jump.

Today’s Sunday Des Moines Register features a long story by Jennifer Jacobs about Representative Bruce Braley considering a run for governor in 2014.  

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

After the jump I’ve posted a bunch of links about finances and spending, large and small.

The Iowa Secretary of State’s Office posted the statewide statistical report on the 2012 general election this week (pdf). For those wondering what took so long: Iowa county auditors had 60 days after the general election to submit their final reports.  

A few things surprised me when I looked over the numbers for the first time and compared them to the 2008 statewide statistical report (pdf).

UPDATE: I asked the Secretary of State’s Office for a comment on the discrepancy between the certified election results, which showed that 1,589,899 Iowans cast ballots in the general election, and the statewide statistical report’s “total voted” number of 1,572,198. The explanation is at the end of this post.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency submitted lengthy comments this week on Iowa’s draft strategy for reducing nutrients in waterways. I’ve posted the full text of EPA Region 7 Administrator Karl Brooks’ letter after the jump. The EPA found more problems with the “nonpoint source” part of the strategy, which primarily addresses runoff from farms. The Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship drafted the nonpoint source part of the nutrient strategy, largely without input from Iowa Department of Natural Resources staff who are experts on agricultural runoff. Under “general comments,” the EPA confirmed that rejecting numeric criteria for nutrient pollution from farms “does not reflect the EPA’s current thinking.” The Iowa Farm Bureau Federation applauded that aspect of the nutrient strategy. We’ll see whose view holds sway in the final version.

The Iowa DNR was responsible for drafting the “point source” part of the nutrient strategy, which addresses municipal and industrial discharges (such as from wastewater treatment facilities) into rivers and streams. The EPA submitted only minor suggestions for improving the point source section.

Iowa citizens and advocacy groups have until January 18 to comment on the nutrient strategy.

President Barack Obama announced today that his Chief of Staff Jack Lew is his pick to replace Timothy Geithner as Treasury secretary. I have low expectations, since Lew has been a “central player in two failed attempts at a grand bargain on deficit reduction with House Republicans.” The “grand bargain” would have paired token tax hikes on the wealthy with significant benefit cuts for middle-class and low-income Americans. Republican Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama did not rule out filibustering Lew’s nomination.

I was surprised to hear that Hilda Solis is leaving as Labor secretary. She was one of Obama’s better cabinet picks, but White House officials have undermined her on several issues, notably efforts to regulate child labor at agricultural facilities. Brad Plumer posted a good summary of Solis’ record.

According to the White House, the following cabinet members will stay on for now: Attorney General Eric Holder, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, and Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki. I’m concerned that Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood was not on that list.

Any comments about Obama’s cabinet and/or the “embarrassing as hell” lack of diversity in the president’s “inner circle” are welcome in this thread.

UPDATE: I did not realize that the Commerce secretary position has been vacant for almost six months.

Barack Obama’s 2012 Iowa campaign manager Brad Anderson confirmed yesterday that he plans to run against Secretary of State Matt Schultz in 2014. I hope there will be a competitive Democratic primary, because from where I’m sitting, Anderson looks like the wrong candidate for this race.

UPDATE: Added details from Anderson’s formal announcement below, along with his campaign bio and a list of Democrats on his steering committee (including Senator Tom Harkin, former governors Tom Vilsack and Chet Culver, Representatives Bruce Braley and Dave Loebsack, and several former chairs of the Iowa Democratic Party). Looks like there will be no competitive primary.

As the next showdown over raising the debt ceiling approaches, a new scenario has emerged as a possible way to avoid both default and budget concessions to Congressional Republicans. Some analysts believe the government could mint one platinum coin, assigning a denomination of a trillion dollars, and deposit that coin in the treasury to “pay down” a trillion dollars of our national debt. Not everyone agrees that minting the coin is a realistic option, though. I’ve posted some links and analysis after the jump.

For the record, I don’t believe President Barack Obama would seriously consider minting a trillion-dollar coin. In fact, the only past presidents I could imagine pulling a stunt like that would be FDR, LBJ, and Richard Nixon. What do you think, Bleeding Heartland readers? Incidentally, today would have been Tricky Dick’s 100th birthday.

This is an open thread, so all topics are welcome.

Last week the Iowa Department of Natural Resources extended the public comment period on the state’s proposed strategy “to assess and reduce nutrients delivered to Iowa waterways and the Gulf of Mexico.” Nutrients have become “Iowa’s most widespread water pollution problem” and are the primary cause of the gulf’s “dead zone.” The Environmental Working Group’s recent report on “Murky Waters” explains the causes of Iowa’s chronically poor water quality.

Interest groups aligned with corporate agriculture had extensive input while the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship drafted its part of the nutrient reduction strategy, even shutting out the Iowa DNR’s experts on agricultural runoff. For more background on the proposed state policy, which relies on voluntary efforts to curb pollution from farms, click here or here.

Iowans have until January 18 to comment on the nutrient strategy. Many groups and individuals have already submitted their feedback. After the jump I’ve posted comments from the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation and the Sierra Club Iowa Chapter. The contrast is striking.  

The Iowa House will begin its 2013 session next Monday with 53 Republicans, 46 Democrats and one seat to be filled in a special election on January 22.

After the jump I’ve posted details on the Iowa House majority and minority leadership teams, along with all chairs, vice chairs, and members of standing House committees. Where relevant, I’ve noted changes since last year’s legislative session.

Some non-political Iowa House trivia: three state representatives have the surname Olson (not counting Democrat Jo Oldson). There are two Millers, two Taylors, and two Smiths, one from each party in every case. David is most common first name: the new cohort contains three Daves and two Davids. Four state representatives have the first name Mark, four are called Daniel (three go by Dan) and four were given the name Robert (two Robs, one Bob, and a Bobby). Four women are named Mary (one goes by Mary Ann), and two are named Linda. There are two men each named Greg, Chuck, John, Kevin, Pat, Bruce, Tom, and Chris, and there would have been two Brians if Brian Quirk had not resigned shortly after winning re-election. Oddly, no current Iowa House member is named Mike or Michael.

JANUARY 28 UPDATE: Democrat Todd Prichard won the special election in House district 52, bringing the number of Todds in the Iowa House to two. I’ve added his committee assignments below. Republicans maintain a 53-47 majority.