Here is the latest Iowa news from The Associated Press at 3:40 a.m. CST

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — After months of speculation and secrecy, the 2020 presidential primary season is about to explode into public view. With more than three Democrats already in the race, a half dozen more are making final travel, staffing and strategy preparations to launch White House bids in the coming weeks. The announcements are expected to come in waves, with the first featuring a group of ambitious, but lesser-known Senate Democrats and the second led by political heavyweights.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — The 2019 legislative session begins today (Monday), with Republicans who retain majorities in the House and Senate eager to continue achieving a variety of conservative goals. Topics include property tax reform, choosing judges and feeding the need for more workers. The session may be defined by how willing Republican leaders are to push policies strongly supported by their conservative base but less enthusiastically by a majority of Iowans. Gov. Kim Reynolds appears open to many of the ideas.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Errors in Iowa’s list of felons cost at least 20 people the right to vote in November’s midterm elections, and officials have known about problems in the list since 2012. The Des Moines Register reports the list of roughly 69,000 people who aren’t allowed to vote wrongly includes some people who were charged but not convicted of a felony and some who received a deferred judgment, which means their records were expunged after they completed probation.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The amount of water being released into the lower Missouri River will remain elevated at the start of the year, but should return to normal levels throughout 2019. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says the amount of water being released from Gavins Point Dam on the Nebraska-South Dakota border was recently increased to help clear out excess water collected last year.