"What do you know about restoration of rights in Iowa?" Your letters, Sept. 8, 2026

Reader letters to Iowa Starting Line for Sept. 8, 2026:

Readers are invited to add to the conversation by emailing responses@iowastartingline.com. Please include your first name and last initial. You may also want to include your city, but that’s up to you. I may edit your content for conciseness or to correct typos.

When is it officially fall/Halloween decoration time?

“I confess, I haven’t changed my spring wreath to a summer one, mainly because it usually goes up for 4th of July but I didn’t want anyone to think I was dumb enough to celebrate FREEDOM 250 so I put all my decoration for celebrating America’s birthday in the back yard and on the patio.” — Barbara L.

“Anytime after Labor Day weekend coincides with not wearing white cutoff.” — Rob K.

Best fall hikes:

“Great info and pictures!” — Darryl G.

“Any thoughts on southeast Iowa? Just moved here to be w my 80 yr old parents after living in the Pacific Northwest for 60 yrs. I’d appreciate it, have a rockn day.” — Darrin W. [NOTE: Hell yeah I do!]

Cost of living includes insurance:

“Two big areas of the cost of living increase is property taxes and property insurance. Both of these hit the older people the hardest.

I have had to eliminate insuring all my outbuildings because I simply could not afford the premium for them. Only insure the house and garage. Lost two buildings and had damage to 2 others from the tornadoes last year. FEMA is a joke from the word go. The loss did not directly affect my livelihood, so no help. Clean it up yourself, thank you.

Insurance premiums go up every year and I have gone to $1500 deductible to afford the premium while the company builds a new office building, cancels out anyone with too many claims, etc. Did you ever see a insurance agent that lived moderately? My younger brother is a millionaire from basically nothing to owning a big company in Madison, Wis., so I know first hand how insurance works, and it darn sure is not for the insured. Something needs to be done to control the premiums as competition has not worked.” — Roger R.

Importing free beef:

“Supposedly China rejected a load of beef from Argentina after it tested for a banned chemical. Aware of this? (Could) Trump be buying similar tainted beef?” — Paul M.

UNI finally retiring Kurt Warner’s jersey 30+ years later:

“UNI only gives the award in person. Warner is no longer on a NFL broadcast team and can make the ceremony this year.” — Don H.

Election worries:

“I stumbled upon your newsletter and I like what you are doing! Keep up the good work! I do have a question for you to ask. What do you know about restoration of rights in Iowa? I went to prison for Marijuana in 1997. Am I eligible to have my rights restored? I would sure love to both vote and own a gun for the first time in my life.” — Justin C. [NOTE: I wrote about the voting part of this in 2024; hope it’s helpful!]

“It sounds like the Democrats will take back the House in November, but it is essential to also take back the Senate. We must end Trump’s lawless, corrupt, evil, dangerous reign of authoritarian power. …

We need to address the ‘politically biased’ US Supreme Court. There is absolutely no way our president should have complete immunity from prosecution. Supreme Court justices should be held accountable for their actions. There should be term limits for these justices and increasing the number of justices needs to be addressed. Nine justices may have been right in the beginning, but population has grown exponentially since then, with much more diversity. Supreme Court decisions must reflect past precedent and the views of the majority of Americans, not the lobbied opinions of six conservative justices.

And we need to strengthen the rule of law that no longer exists among Trump and his administration. We need to take a good, hard look at how Trump was able to violate the Constitution, to break norms and existing laws, to buy favor from the Supreme Court, to use the Department of Justice as his private law firm, to get the Republicans in Congress to give Trump unfettered loyalty and to allow Trump to file hundreds of frivolous lawsuits.

November will not go by without incident, I believe. Trump will interfere with the election somehow, guaranteed. He knows that if the Democrats take Congress, he’ll be impeached. So, he’ll do everything in his power to prevent that from happening. Armed ICE agents at the polls, invoking the Insurrection Act, seizing ballots, changing the laws regarding mail-in ballots, declaring martial law, or any number of other actions that might undermine the election. State and Federal laws have already been significantly rewritten to make it more difficult to vote, especially for Black voters.

We once thought that our democracy, Constitution and rule of law were unbreakable, but Trump has proven us wrong. We must take appropriate steps when Democrats retake the majority in Congress to ensure this Trumpian style subversion of our democracy never ever happens again.” — fmagnich

US Rep. Ashley Hinson’s husband lobbying:

“Who is this clown?” — racharsha

“Sounds crooked!” — John K.

“Thank you for that information on Ashley Hinson. I have felt extreme moral outrage.” — Thomas A.

“It is so unfortunate she is completely one sided. I somehow ended up on her newsletter. That is ok. I read for over a year, as it was good knowing what was happening in the legislature. Then I asked a question about why she made a decision regarding some action taken in the legislature I disagree with. It was just a question, not a complaint. Well I’ll be, I never received a response to my questions. I also never received another newsletter from her.” — Patti S.

US Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks debate?

“I was watching a Miller-Meeks interview with Ray Baccari and I noticed that she says that she will debate her opponents at 6:48. To my knowledge, Miller-Meeks still hasn’t accepted the Iowa Press debate invitation. I think only the independent guy Michael Bridgford has said anything about the debate publicly.

It’s very concerning to me that our sitting congresswoman seemingly doesn’t want to debate her opponents. I guess I am hoping some outside heat could force her hand to debate in October. Let me know what you think!” — Kasey L.

Feedback:

“We have a wonderful Democratic candidate in House District 23 in Karen Varley. She grew up on a farm in NE Iowa and with her husband Warren farmed in rural Adair and Guthrie County until their daughter Millie took over. Karen has a BS in plant science from Iowa State and an MS in plant genetics from Cornell University in Ithica, NY, making her, I think, a bona fide plant scientist. Both of those universities are rated in the top 10 in the United States in agriculture and plant science.

She has worked for ISU Extension, worked on economic development in Adair County, where she lives in Stuart, and worked at Pioneer where they sent her to law school to become a patent attorney. Then, as you know, Pioneer moved that division to Delaware. Now she is practicing law with her husband, Warren, in Stuart. She is a magnificent human being with the brains and skills to help move Iowa out of the morass that we are in.

She is up against Bubba Sorensen, the guy who paints rocks. He has been in office for eight years, four terms, and as far as I can see, has been a good reliable vote for the Republican party. Sent his kids to Saint Malachy in Creston and certainly voted for the voucher bill.

I’m just not sure how really skilled and amazing people beat an incumbent or even get the positive press they need to win. I’d love to see you do a series on rural candidates who are really skilled, yet are really challenged when it comes to going up against the good old boys club.

I would love to see a series of pieces about these highly skilled rural candidates who have the skills to problem solve and address the issues that are going on in our waterways and certainly other pressing issues. Making the case for collecting really skilled and smart people versus electing good old boys that everybody knows. Not bad humans, but It would appear not equipped to solve the problems they and their Republicans colleagues have created in the last 10 years.

Thanks so much for inviting feedback and reading this to the end.” — Susan O.

“Red Oak resident Joseph Christopher Norris, 36, was arrested on July 1, 2026, and charged with first-degree election misconduct, a class D felony. The charge stems from an incident on November 5, 2024, at the Montgomery County courthouse where he allegedly performed his duties as an election official in a manner that hindered the fair and orderly administration of the election.

Have tried to find out more about this charge. From what little bit I can gleam, which is not much, he has a spotless reputation in his community, and the powers that be, the Iowa Attorney General and the local Sheriff have done nothing to explain what hindered the fair and orderly administration of the election. He was a poll watcher? He raised a concern with an official? What concern? How did this hinder the fair and orderly administration?

If the Attorney General can make such a claim without any public reasoning almost 2 years later, is she trying to curry favor with national powers that be after sending our voting information to the federal administration? Would love to see this explored further.” — Gary M.

“I just received your newsletter and am trying to get this information out to anyone who would listen. The current State Auditor is running for governor and let something like this happen in a very small rural community. We need to have this investigated as well as every city in the state as I doubt this is an isolated incident.” — Judith H.

“I looked at a lot of the content and I cannot get behind this platform. I come from a union background. I have seen the reality of what collective bargaining is about. The union that I have experienced is oppressive and very much Big Brother-like. The business agents and health and welfare funds managers take control of members’ money, voices, and pension plans. Unfortunately, we the people cannot rely on organized unions to make the work space equitable.

They also attempt to cast the members vote towards only one party. The division of politics and party affiliation defined as R’s and D’s need to change. Gay/trans advocacy is not a good topic to argue on politically, and voting belongs to legal Americans who are contributing to the economy. America is great only if it remains about united in a participating workforce of the able.

I do see a need for a living wage to prevail. But I think this comes from forbidding the outsourcing of jobs to foreign countries and bringing manufacturing back to the USA. It takes a moral people to build the foundations of civil society. …

I would like to appreciate your passion but I believe the views of this movement are degrading our potential for growth. I agree about water quality, health care access. Data centers are not great unless they have to build their own power supply, even then maybe not. But let’s imagine stopping the growth of cloud based storage—can’t see that in our lifetime. Watch the movie ‘Animal Farm’ and think about the direction socialism will take the country. That’s all, thank you for considering my thoughts.” — Bev B.

“Stop sending money to isreal.” — Paul C.

“Three stories about Rob Sand and a story on Lahn’s Kansas school! You are so damned Democrat and biased! You are not a journalist nor fair in any manner! Disgusting. Fake.” — Sandra M.

“Keep up the good work.” — Ron P.

“My political opinion is none of your business.” — swfsmeng

“I did the survey about political choices. Should I be able to receive the offered gift card?” — Kathleen M. [NOTE: Lucas Survey is offering a gift card to those who choose to opt in to more surveys; all information will come from them.]

“Hello, this morning I put your information from your newsletter regarding the voting records of Nunn, Hinson, MMM on the NEXTDOOR newsletter and boy is it getting a lot of attention. I post regularly on this site. Might want to check out the many, many comments your article has generated. I referenced IowaStartingLine so people reading knew where to find your article. Thanks for all you do to get the truth out to your readers.” — Wanda M.