Category: IA Gov

Perhaps Governor Kim Reynolds should just stay off planes. The AP’s Ryan Foley reported this afternoon that Reynolds had once again taken a questionable plane ride paid for by a donor that has business with the state of Iowa. Dave North, the CEO of Sedgwick, a company that is contracted by the state to handle workers compensation claims, reimbursed his company for the use of the corporate jet to fly Reynolds and her family to an ISU bowl game. It happened on December 30, 2017 for the Liberty Bowl. Reynolds drew scrutiny for another free trip in May of last […]

When Iowans enter the voting booth in November, which will weigh more heavily on their mind: Younkers or Medicaid? That seems to be what the race for governor is boiling down to at this point as Governor Kim Reynolds and Fred Hubbell are now months into their TV ad campaigns. Reynolds hopes to turn Hubbell’s business executive experience from the 1980s into a liability. Hubbell wants voters to focus on the broken privatized Medicaid system that many see Reynolds mismanaging. This week, Hubbell rolled out his hardest-hitting ad to date, one that features a quadriplegic man whose in-home care was cut […]

A man with a long history of bizarre, racist social media posts, including those which claimed Barack Obama was a secret Muslim, thanked Governor Kim Reynolds today for her team’s assistance in trying to get him on the ballot for Attorney General. [Update: Starting Line hears that while Republicans initially helped Anderson with signatures, around noon on Saturday the party and Reynolds pulled their support from his effort.] West Des Moines Republican and attorney Patrick Anderson waged a last-minute effort this week to collect enough signatures to oppose Attorney General Tom Miller on the November ballot. No Republican had yet […]

You may as well get used to the above image. You’ll be seeing it hundreds of thousands of times between now and November in countless Republican ads, both in Iowa and around the country. The disappearance of Mollie Tibbetts in Brooklyn, Iowa came to a sad and tragic end today when it was announced that investigators found a body they believed to be the young college student in a Poweshiek County corn field. This afternoon, the Iowa Department of Criminal Investigation released the name of the person they had taken into custody: Cristhian Bahena Rivera, originally of Mexico. The man apparently […]

Guest post from Mark Holub, who worked at Younkers 1986 to 1996. In 1986, I was hired as the Director of Visual Merchandising for Younkers and I worked with Fred Hubbell regularly. I remember a conversation I had with Fred early on in my tenure when we were touring one of the branch stores. His observation was simple: for thousands of Iowans, Younkers was often their “first job.” He said it was our obligation to keep the stores strong and growing to maintain that tradition of helping Iowans throughout the state start their professional lives. He took that as a very serious […]

Republican-turned-independent Senator David Johnson is endorsing Fred Hubbell for governor over Kim Reynolds today, the Hubbell campaign informed Starting Line this afternoon. Johnson left the Republican Party in June of 2016 over his disgust of Donald Trump’s nomination. His backing of Hubbell over Governor Reynolds adds a new talking point for Hubbell in his attempt to win over independents and former Republicans who are frustrated with the direction of that party under Trump. “Fred Hubbell and Senator Rita Hart are the leaders Iowans need to turn the page on the Reynolds Administration’s record of failure, and restore the services and […]

The Republican Party’s efforts to define Fred Hubbell early on have not had much success in the past month and a half. Now even Senator Chuck Grassley is critical of his party’s line of attack. “I always stick to policy when I’m campaigning, and I would advise other people to stick to policy,” Grassley told reporters yesterday when responding to questions about the “Sir Frederick” nickname that the Republican Party of Iowa has given Hubbell. It was the largest indication yet that Republicans are growing concerned about their own strategy to frame Hubbell as an out-of-touch rich guy. The goal […]