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Democrats comforting themselves with the thought that 2016 will be a cakewalk with Donald Trump or Ted Cruz as the most-likely Republican nominee may want to think again. Take a look at what's happening on the other side in Iowa and there's some disturbing trends at...
Union members have a lot at stake in the 2016 elections, public employee workers top among them. To fight back against Republicans' efforts to roll back workers' rights, many of the nation's largest unions have endorsed Hillary Clinton to lead the ticket this fall....
Bernie Sanders has talked to a whole lot of people in Iowa. On Sunday he passed the big milestone of combined Iowa turnouts of 50,000. It happened at a notably smaller and more subdued conference room at Upper Iowa University, filled with about 300 people. But, true...
About 100 Ironworkers from central Iowa gathered at the Local 67 headquarters on the northeast side of Des Moines a few cold weekends ago to hear from their international president on the importance of caucusing for Hillary Clinton. Their mission that day was to send...
Central Iowa got a lot of love from Bernie Sanders on his latest 4-day swing through the caucus state, with Polk County seeing the Vermont Senator at a number of venues around the metro area. Sanders held two large rallies, one in Ankeny and one on Des Moines' East...
While Iowa Governor Terry Branstad remains officially neutral in the Iowa Caucus, that doesn't mean he doesn't spend a lot of time with the candidates and their families. This past week Branstad invited Donald Trump's son along for his annual hunting fundraiser in...
Ever since Hillary Clinton's 11-hour performance in front of the House Benghazi Committee and her subsequent rebound in the polls, most national observers had written off the chance for a Bernie Sanders upset in Iowa. There has been good evidence to back up that idea....
Many Democrats were rather surprised to see Secretary of Agriculture and former Democratic Governor Tom Vilsack sitting next to Governor Terry Branstad on Tuesday morning. Vilsack was there to give support to Branstad's new proposal to divert funding from schools in...
Who will union members back in the Iowa Caucus? On paper it would seem like Hillary Clinton will enjoy the overwhelming percentage of labor support in her corner on caucus night. Clinton has racked up endorsements from 17 national labor unions, representing more than...
Now that we're under a month out from the Iowa Caucus, the Republican presidential field once again shows some real movement. The top two spots seem pretty secure at this point, but everything underneath looks increasingly up in the air. The battle to emerge from the...
It's the last day of 2015! Which means it finally gets less weird to talk about the 2016 election when the vast majority of important campaign developments and work came in 2015. Before the year is out, Starting Line is doing a year-end wrap-up of the best and worst...
3rd District Congressional candidate Desmund Adams gathered friends, family and local activists at a Des Moines hotel on the morning of Christmas Eve to announce a long list of new endorsements for his campaign. Former Lt. Governor Jo Ann Zimmerman came on board as...
The Democrats' race for the 3rd District nomination got a little more crowded today as West Des Moines businessman Mike Sherzan jumped into the race. Sherzan ran briefly for the seat back in 2013, and has been considering a new campaign for several months. We spoke...
Good morning readers! Sorry about that Iowa game, but at least we got a hilariously incorrect Joni Ernst tweet out of it. It was a busy week on the Iowa Caucus trail, so let's get right into it: Reporting On The Boring This weekend seven Republican candidates were in...
He may hail from a small northern Jackson County community named Leisure Lake, but Pete Hird's focus in his campaign for State House is all about work and the working people he hopes to represent. The 33-year-old electrical worker is an active volunteer in the small,...
Hillary Clinton scored a major victory this past week by gaining the endorsement of SEIU, the healthcare workers union that represents over 2 million workers. That bumped the total membership of unions backing her candidacy to nearly 11 million. With the endorsements...
It's the biggest day of the Iowa Caucus campaign for Iowa Democrats, with the state party's Jefferson Jackson Dinner set to be held in Vets Auditorium tonight. The speaking schedule has been trimmed considerably, as Jim Webb and Lincoln Chafee both dropped their bids...
A little under eight years ago, a crew of Western Iowa Hillary Clinton staff and their best volunteers gathered after finishing their final task in Iowa, corralling Iowans into the Clinton corner at precincts across the county. Crowding around the TVs in a German beer...
Guest post from Taylor Van De Krol He brings excitement. He brings energy. He understands the importance of retail politics in the first in the nation caucuses. His detail-oriented, goal-driven, and actions-over-words mentality gives me confidence that he is the right...
Longtime Democratic State Senator Dick Dearden will be retiring next year and not running for re-election in 2016. Democrats looking to succeed the Senator in Des Moines' East Side/Pleasant Hill district are quickly making their intentions known. Earlier this week,...
It's different this time. That must have been the thought going through Hillary Clinton's mind as her campaign van crossed the border into Iowa days after her official announcement in April. It was a fun, impromptu-like start to her second presidential run, the idea...
Former Iowa First Lady Christie Vilsack has thrown her support behind Monica Vernon for the 1st District Democratic primary today, as have two new labor unions in the last week. It's a few more additions to the long list of public endorsements Vernon has received, who...
Now that we're past the Labor Day holiday, often used as a marker for both voter interest and campaign phases, let's pull out our crystal ball and predict what key factors and storylines will affect caucus night for the Democrats: Is Sanders' Campaign The Howard Dean...
Bernie Sanders may not be appearing at any Labor Day events in Iowa today like Hillary Clinton and Martin O'Malley are, but his presence will certainly be felt after winning over many union members with a campaign stop three days ago. At an informational picketing...
The sun had begun to drop behind a picturesque Iowa cornfield as Bernie Sanders took to the stage at a rally in Burlington on Thursday. By the time he was finished, it was pitch black outside. His voice turned scratchy by the end of the day, and his Brooklyn accent...
Like a swarm of minimum wage-raising locusts, Democratic candidates will barnstorm Iowa cities over the next five days, hitting many Labor Day-related events. Bernie Sanders is first up with a two-day swing through mostly eastern and southeastern Iowa. Martin O'Malley...
If you didn't know any better, you might have thought Tom Harkin was Bernie Sanders' surrogate speaker at Progress Iowa's Corn Feed event on Sunday. Actually, scratch that - you might have concluded that Harkin was using his speech to push Sanders to the left. To a...
Endorsements are a complicated issue. For one thing, there is always an open question about if endorsements matter. (Is anyone really swayed by the fact that Lil B has endorsed Bernie Sanders?) Additionally, there is a concern about why someone would choose to...
Four of the five Democrats running for President spoke to an AFL-CIO convention at Prairie Meadows Casino in Altoona, giving Iowa labor leaders a policy-focused look at their potential candidates. Richard Trumka, the national president of the AFL-CIO sat on a panel of...
Governor Terry Branstad sure has gotten unpopular recently. Maybe it's time for a change. But who should replace him? Hmm, how about.... Iowa native Ashton Kutcher? Sure, why not? Here's a list of why we think Governor Kutcher would be much, much better than Governor...
