(Radio Iowa) – The misdemeanor charge against a state senator from southeast Iowa legislator who was arrested during RAGBRAI has been dropped. Republican Senator Adrian Dickey of Packwood was arrested on July 24th north of Carroll. A Sac County deputy said Dickey was part of a large group blocking a rural road and Dickey argued with the officer, refusing to move. In a written statement, Dickey says it was a total misunderstanding because he wasn’t drinking and wasn’t part of the group blocking the road.

Dickey says in 50 years he’s never been arrested and he appreciates the Sac County Attorney’s decision to drop the charge and restore his reputation. The Sac County Attorney’s request to have the case dismissed said there was not enough evidence to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt. Dickey had asked for a jury trial.

A jury trial will be held in Washington County in the legal dispute over an insurance payment made to Dickey after his daughter’s vehicle was wrecked in an accident. Dickey says he bought the car for his daughter who was going to college in California and she knew the title was in his name so she wouldn’t sell it for quick cash or trade it in for a vehicle she could not afford.

Dickey’s biological daughter, her mother and stepfather say the car was given with no strings attached and they had no idea Dickey held the title and would get the insurance check after it was totaled. Dickey was elected to the Iowa Senate during a special election in 2021 and reelected to a full term in 2022.

(Radio Iowa) – Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis says the terror attacks in Israel deserve a swift and lethal response. “They have a responsibility to not just defend themselves, but to use overwhelming force to wipe Hamas off the face of the earth,” DeSantis says. “They’re terrorists. What they are doing it barbaric.” DeSantis, who visited Israel in April, campaigned in northwest Iowa yesterday (Monday).

DeSantis blasted President Biden for hosting a picnic for his staff at the White House this weekend and for a recent prisoner swap that freed five Americans but also gave Iran access to six billion dollars in frozen oil revenue. DeSantis says it means Iran’s leaders can send more money to terror groups like Hamas.

“This is just pathetic,” DeSantis says. “We don’t need a president ‘missing in action.’ We don’t need any more presidents that are past their prime. We need presidents that are actually going to lead and actually do the job, particularly in these crisis situations.” During a stop in Le Mars, DeSantis touted the debate he’s scheduled to have next month on Fox News with California Governor Gavin Newson.

“California’s probably four or five years ahead of where Biden is in terms of going in a leftist direction,” DeSantis says. “A second Biden term or Harris or Newsom or whoever they throw out would basically mimic what California has done and all that will do is facilitate an even quicker decline of our country.” DeSantis says his own record as Florida’s governor since 2019 represents a model for American revival and he says as president he’d bring discipline to federal government spending to get inflation under control.

“You’re paying more for everything because of what the people in Washington, D.C. have done over the last four or five years,” DeSantis says. DeSantis wrapped up a three-day bus tour through Iowa with a stop in Storm
Lake. Former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley campaigned in Boone yesterday (Monday). Haley, who served as United Nations Ambassador during the Trump Administration, says now is not the time for the U-S to be divided or distracted because Israel should get all it needs to defend itself and destroy the terrorists in its midst. She’s also calling for an end to taxpayer support of any country that sides with Hamas or fails to denounce anti-semetic activity.

(Radio Iowa) – There are at least two hundred pickleball courts in Iowa and many city councils, particularly in urban Iowa, are planning to build more. Officials who represent the 17-hundred residents of Lake City in western Iowa who’ve been discussing where and how to build a pickleball court in their community are planning a private fundraiser that will go beyond just collecting cash and checks. Jacob Mathews, the city administrator of Lake City, says they’ll accept electronic payments through the digital app called Venmo.

All the printed materials for the Lake City fundraiser will feature a Q-R code — one of those black and white squares with a barcode.

According to a software that tracks philanthropy in the United States, 63 percent of donors prefer to give online with a credit or debit card and another 17 percent want to use another electronic method like Venmo. Only four percent want to give cash. Mathews says a 50-thousand dollar donation — in any form — will secure naming rights to Lake City’s pickleball court.

(Radio Iowa) – Forty-three-year-old Kyle Ricke has entered a written plea of not guilty to first-degree murder in the shooting death of Algona Police Officer Kevin Cram last month.

Online court records show a pretrial conference has been scheduled for November 14th in Kossuth County District Court. If there are no delays in the case, a trial has been scheduled to begin on December 12th. Ricke is accused of shooting Cram, who was trying to serve an arrest warrant on the Algona man, and then fleeing the area around 8 p-m on September 13th. Ricke was apprehended near Sleepy Eye, Minnesota later that evening after an extensive search that involved law enforcement agencies from Iowa and Minnesota.