(Radio Iowa) – Another Democrat intends to seek their party’s U.S. Senate nomination and the chance to challenge Republican incumbent Chuck Grassley in 2022. Minden City Councilman Glenn Hurst is a physician who also chairs the party’s Rural Caucus. Hurst says Democrats can win over rural voters.

“They want to be able to buy groceries in their town. They want to be able to have good, stable jobs and live in safe communities and we have to give people the opportunity to do that,” Hurst says. “We have to tell them: we value a rural lifestyle and we’re willing to fight for it.” Hurst, who specializes in general and family medicine, works in Minden and two other clinics in western Iowa. He says health care access is a key issue.

Glenn Hurst

“I stand firmly on the believe that to save our rural communities we are going to have to invest in Medicare for All,” he says. “That is the solution for rural Iowa, that along with other components, such as supporting our labor movement.” Former Congresswoman Abby Finkenauer of Cedar Rapids and former Crawford County Supervisor Dave Muhlbauer are also planning to run in the Democratic Primary. Grassley has said he’ll announce this fall if he plans to run for an eighth term.

(Reporting by Iowa Public Radio’s Kate Payne)

(Radio Iowa) – Governor Kim Reynolds is among a dozen GOP governors who’re urging the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn previous rulings on abortion and give states the authority to regulate the procedure.

Reynolds signed onto a legal brief that argues the court’s 1973 Roe v Wade decision is an “unwarranted intrusion” on states’ rights. Reynolds also released a written statement, saying the ruling has “stymied” state efforts to enact abortion restrictions. An Iowa-based spokesperson for Planned Parenthood said it’s clear the governor’s goal is to ban abortions in Iowa.

Reynolds is among about 250 Republican office-holders from around the country who’ve expressed support for Mississippi’s law that bans most abortions after the 15th week of a pregnancy. The Supreme Court has scheduled legal arguments over Mississippi’s law during the court’s next term, which begins in October, with an opinion expected by next June.

(Radio Iowa) – Senator Joni Ernst says a bipartisan proposal to help Afghan civilians who worked with the U-S military is included in a security-related bill that easily cleared the House AND Senate yesterday (Thursday). There’s money for processing special immigrant visas as well as travel and housing assistance in the bill.

“This will help us move some of those Afghan interpreters, if they get cleared through the state department, then we can start moving them out of Afghanistan,” Ernst says. Congresswoman Mariannette Miller-Meeks of Ottumwa worked on the proposal in the House. Miller-Meeks says transferring authority to the Afghan government to protect Afghans who helped the U-S military over the past two decades would be a moral failure. The bill’s main purpose, however, is to ensure the budget for the Capitol Police doesn’t run out of money after the unexpected expenses of responding to the January 6th attack on the Capitol.

“With all of the additional overtime that they had, it puts them in a position the way they’re paid here, they would have to start furloughing workers,” Ernst says. Ernst says the 100 million dollars in the legislation prevents that and not only covers overtime, but mental health support for Capitol Police officers as well. Another 300 million in the bill is for new security measures in the Capitol complex.

“It’s additional repairs to the Capitol from January 6,” Ernst says. “It’s a different type of glass that they will be using in the glass at the Capitol building, things of that nature.” There’s also money in the bill to reimburse National Guard units, like Iowa’s, that were deployed to Washington to provide security.

(Radio Iowa) – A central Iowa man who’s been a member of the Iowa House since 2013 has died. Seventy-one-year-old John Landon of Ankeny was reelected to a fifth term in the Iowa House last November. A post on Landon’s Facebook page announced he was surrounded by his family as he passed away Thursday afternoon.

Landon, who grew up near State Center, enlisted in the Navy Seabees and served in Vietnam before a career in agribusiness. Landon had managed grain elevators before joining a farm management and ag real estate firm called the Peoples Company in 2002. Landon retired in 2012 when he first ran for the Iowa House.

John Landon (Photo from Iowa Legislature)

Landon, a Republican, won reelection in 2020 with 53 percent of the vote. House Speaker Pat Grassley issued a written statement calling Landon a humble public servant who was dedicated to his work in the Iowa House all the way until his final day. Governor Reynolds described Landon as a trusted, genuine and caring person.