Governor's race, Senate poll, lawmakers defeated in primaries

June 8 edition of "KHOI's Capitol Week"

Rob Sand with running mate Dave Muhlbauer in photo released by Sand’s campaign

Good morning! A few notes on upcoming events: this evening, June 9, I will moderate a conversation in Iowa City about competitive state legislative races. Reach out ASAP if you’d like event details.

This Thursday, June 11, Kathie Obradovich and I will talk about the primary election results and take questions about the 2026 campaigns at the Democracy Iowa meeting in Des Moines. Here’s the link to RSVP.

I don’t charge a fee to speak to local groups or nonprofit organizations, for the same reason I don’t paywall any content on this newsletter or at Bleeding Heartland: I believe everyone should be able to keep up with Iowa politics, regardless of what's in their bank account.

But I do need to cover my operating expenses, including my salary, technical support, web hosting fees, and subscriptions. So supporters are holding several fundraisers for me this summer. These are informal gatherings. After some social time, I talk about my reporting journey, the legislature’s work, and the election landscape. We always leave plenty of time for Q&A.

Events are scheduled for Davenport (June 16), Newton (June 17), Des Moines (June 24), and Dubuque (June 27), with more in the works. Please reach out if you’d like to attend or help plan a house party in your area.

If you can’t come but want to chip in—and are not an Iowa elected official, candidate, or paid campaign staffer or consultant on an Iowa campaign—you can make a one-time gift using a credit card, PayPal, Venmo, or personal check (message me for the mailing address), or a recurring donation via credit card or Substack.

Back to our regularly scheduled programming: the audio from the June 8 edition of “KHOI’s Capitol Week” is at the top of this post. Here’s the written recap, for those who would rather read than listen. If your email provider truncates this message, you can read it without interruption here.

Rob Sand picks Dave Muhlbauer

We spent almost half of the program on developments in the governor’s race. On Monday morning, Democratic nominee Rob Sand announced that fifth-generation family farmer and Crawford County Supervisor Dave Muhlbauer is his running mate.

The pick was not a surprise—though I had wondered whether Sand might choose an independent. Like Bill Clinton choosing Al Gore for vice president in 1992, this was more of a “reinforce the narrative” choice than a balancing pick. Sand grew up in the small town of Decorah, while Muhlbauer is a family farmer who won a county supervisor election in red territory.

Like Sand’s 100 town hall tours, putting Muhlbauer on the ticket is a clear signal that Democrats will be competing in small towns and rural areas. It’s not necessarily about winning those counties but keeping down the GOP margins there.

As Douglas Burns pointed out, Muhlbauer does bring some geographic balance to the ticket, since he is from western Iowa.

Sand chooses western Iowa cattleman as lieutenant governor running mate

An all-male slate of Democratic statewide candidates

Since Iowa amended the state constitution and started nominating candidates for governor and lieutenant governor as a team in 1990, there has always been a woman on the Democratic ticket. So Sand broke from tradition. (He wasn’t looking to check a box; when reporters asked what qualities he was looking for in a running mate, Sand consistently said he wanted someone he could trust.)

It’s striking that not only Sand and Muhlbauer, but all of this year’s Democratic statewide candidates are white men: Nate Willems for attorney general, John Norwood for state treasurer, Taylor Wettach for state auditor, Chris Jones for secretary of agriculture, and Ryan Peterman for secretary of state. (None had any competition in the Democratic primary; the U.S. Senate candidates on the primary ballot were also both men.) You have to go back to 1978 to find an all-male Democratic slate of statewide candidates in Iowa.

I doubt Sand will lose any meaningful number of votes over this. The gender gap is so pronounced and persistent in U.S. politics—not to mention the fact that Sand’s GOP opponent, Zach Lahn, supports a total abortion ban. Plus, three of the four Democratic candidates for U.S. House are women: Christina Bohannan (IA-01), Lindsay James (IA-02), and Sarah Trone Garriott (IA-03).

Possible Zach Lahn running mates

Lahn hasn’t revealed his pick for lieutenant governor. That’s coming soon, though: GOP state convention delegates will need to approve that choice this Saturday, June 13. Depending on Lahn’s choice, there may be an effort to nominate a different candidate at the convention. The last time we saw a GOP convention fight over the lieutenant governor nominee was in 2010, when hundreds of social conservatives sought to put Bob Vander Plaats on the ticket with Terry Branstad.

Randy Feenstra was widely expected to pick State Senator Kara Warme if he had won the nomination. Lahn picked up a bunch of legislative endorsements late in the game, including at least a couple of women (State Representatives Heather Hora and Helena Hayes). Given the questions about Lahn’s residency, he may choose a lifelong Iowan rather than someone who moved to the state relatively recently.

Sand launches first negative ad about Lahn

On Friday Rob Sand’s campaign launched its fourth TV ad of this campaign. A narrator says, “Turning Iowa around will be a full-time job, but Zach Lahn isn’t even a full-time Iowan. Lahn lives, voted, and hit it rich in Kansas.”

It goes on to say that Lahn was a political insider working for billionaires and special interests. After quoting from a Des Moines Register article where Lahn said that if elected, he’d “be in Iowa as much as humanly possible,” the narrator says “you can’t be a full-time governor if you’re a part-time Iowan.”

Lahn often talks about his deep family roots in Iowa, going back to great-great-grandfathers who were here in the mid-1800s, one of whom fought for the Union in the Civil War. But the time he spends in Kansas will clearly be a major issue.

Again we see why it was such an advantage for Sand to have no competition in the Democratic primary. He rolled out three positive TV ads before June, speaking to the camera in each one: “Stealing is bad,” making light of how “being thrifty is a Sand family tradition,” and touting his work as state auditor to promote efficiency programs and uncover misspent money.

So Sand was able to put up a negative ad right when many Iowans were hearing Lahn’s name for the first time—without that being the first message they heard from the Democratic nominee this year.

Andy Beshear campaigns with Sand

Around 500 people attended Sand’s first general election rally on Sunday evening in Des Moines, featuring Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear. I was there to absorb the energy in the room. I posted all of the speeches on my YouTube channel, and separate videos for those who just want to watch Beshear’s remarks, or Sand’s.

Beshear spent part of his time explaining his success in a deep-red state. He called on Democrats to spend 80 percent of their time on issues that matter to 100 percent of people such as good-paying jobs, or affordable health care and housing.

He also said Democrats are good at talking about the “what,” explaining public policy in great detail. But they need to do better talking about the “why”—the values that inform those policy choices. Like Sand, Beshear often speaks about his Christian faith. He said voters gave him credit even if they didn’t always agree with his decisions, because they knew he was trying to do the right thing.

Beshear also said Democrats need to “talk like a normal human being.” He gave a couple of concrete examples: don’t say someone died from substance use disorder, say they died from addiction. Don’t say we need to repeal the “big ugly bill” to stop kids from being “food insecure”–say that bill is going to make kids and seniors go hungry.

Bringing in the two-term governor of Kentucky also provided a pep talk for Iowa Democrats. If Beshear could win in a state Trump carried by 30 points, the logic goes, a Democrat can win in this state, which Trump won by 13 points.

Potential 2028 candidates taking an interest in Iowa

The Iowa Democratic Party announced last week that former Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg will deliver the keynote at the party’s big fundraiser (the Liberty and Justice Celebration) on July 12. Beshear headlined that event two years ago. Both are seen as potential presidential candidates in 2028.

I’ve said for a long time that there’s a very slim chance the Democratic National Committee will sanction the Iowa caucuses as one of the early 2028 contests. But it’s notable that several possible contenders are taking the time to visit.

Beshear was also campaigning for Sand in his role as chair of the Democratic Governors Association. Iowa is one of their top pickup targets.

More broadly, Democrats nationally understand the importance of getting Iowa back in the swing state column. The same trends that turned Iowa red are why Trump won what used to be called the “Big Blue Wall” states (Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania), and why Ohio has moved toward Republicans. So getting the pendulum to swing back in Iowa could show a path for Democrats across the Midwest.

Sand quotes Lahn’s TV ad back to him

Near the end of his speech at that rally in Des Moines, Sand criticized Lahn for claiming to be an outsider after working for ten years as a Republican operative. And he again highlighted how much time Lahn has spent in Kansas, quoting from one of Lahn’s own TV ads: “Iowa jobs are for Iowans.”

It was a mic drop moment and was quoted in every news report about the event (sometimes as part of the headline).

Sand continued, “God bless Zach Lahn and his family with everything that they need down in Kansas. And God bless Iowa with a full-time Iowan as our next governor.”

For most of this year, Sand’s team was preparing to run against Randy Feenstra, but it didn’t take them long to retool their general election message.

Sand proposes four debates in October

On Thursday, Sand’s campaign announced that he will be available for four televised debates in October. He wants to do one debate in each of Iowa’s four major media markets: Des Moines, Sioux City, Cedar Rapids, and Davenport. He encouraged media outlets interested in hosting a debate to reach out to his campaign.

That’s not how it normally works. Usually the news organizations get together and invite the candidates. Dave Price and Kathie Obradovich provided their perspective about Sand’s debate plan on the latest “Iowa Down Ballot” podcast, starting around the 27:00 mark.

Iowa Down Ballot with Dave Price 6/6/26

I’m not sure the news organizations will agree to this schedule–typically Iowa has had three debates, the first one in late September.

Sand wants debates to start in October because he has planned evening town hall meetings in several large Iowa counties during the second half of September.

By the way, after the rally on Sunday, Sand and Beshear took some questions from reporters. Since Sand often talks about breaking the two-party monopoly, I asked if he would welcome the Libertarian candidate for governor on the debate stage with him and Lahn. He said “likely,” yes—the ballots aren’t set yet, but “I would think so.”

Revisiting how Lahn beat Feenstra

Lahn’s surprise win was the biggest news coming out of the Iowa primary elections. So even though we covered the big picture on last Wednesday’s show, we wanted to revisit how Lahn won, and how Feenstra lost. It was close: 1,642 votes (less than a 1 percent margin) separated the top two GOP contenders.

When a race is that close, any number of factors could have been decisive.

I dug into the spending on TV and digital advertising, looking at campaign finance disclosures, as well as some data provided by Green and Wood Media Services. Overall, Lahn and Feenstra spent a similar amount, in the range of $3.8 million. But Feenstra spent around $900,000 in March, when Lahn was buying little paid advertising. The two campaigns were fairly even in spending in April. But Lahn outspent Feenstra by nearly $1 million in May, when more voters were tuning in and making up their minds.

I mentioned on the previous show that Feenstra carried most of the counties outside the Des Moines, Cedar Rapids, and Sioux City media markets. I speculated that Lahn didn’t spend much on TV in the other markets.

I was half-right. I was able to confirm Lahn didn’t buy TV ads in the Omaha, Mason City/Rochester, or Ottumwa/Kirskville markets (though he had some digital and possibly some cable ads in those areas). Feenstra did win most of the counties in those markets; one of the two counties that went for Adam Steen was Van Buren, in the Ottumwa market.

However, Lahn did buy TV in the Quad Cities market. It appears he spent more there than Feenstra.

So why didn’t Lahn’s message land as much in southeast Iowa? One of my contacts speculated that the Steve King endorsement, which would have been helpful in northwest Iowa, was not a draw in the Mississippi River counties. I’m open to other theories.

Why Trump didn’t deliver for Feenstra

I’ve seen a lot of national commentary about why Donald Trump’s endorsement didn’t seal the deal for Feenstra. I don’t think this proves Iowa Republicans are moving away from Trump. Lots of diehard MAGA voters supported Lahn or one of the alternatives.

I think four days before the primary was simply too late to convince voters who had already decided they didn’t like Feenstra.

And while Feenstra surely picked up some late support, the Trump endorsement probably drove a lot of voters from Steen in particular to Lahn as the only way to block Feenstra.

For the past year, we’ve repeatedly noted that Feenstra was taking a risk by skipping all of the debates and forums where other candidates appeared. His reputation for not showing up surely contributed to Lahn carrying 21 of the 36 counties in Feenstra’s own district. In retrospect, Feenstra should have changed up his operation after the surprisingly narrow 60-40 win against Kevin Virgil in the 2024 primary. If he’d spent two years being accessible to people across his district, that could have saved him.

I mentioned this on Wednesday, but I want to repeat that Feenstra got less than 50 percent of the vote in Sioux County! Lahn got more than 2,000 votes (around 40 percent) there. If Feenstra had locked down his own district or even his home county, Lahn could not have overtaken him.

The Polk County numbers were stunning as well. A lot of old-fashioned establishment Republicans live in central Iowa. Yet Lahn came out of Polk with a 2,600 vote lead–more than his statewide margin. Feenstra should have done better.

Poll shows Turek and Hinson tied

On Monday, we saw the first poll of Iowa’s U.S. Senate race since last week’s primary. Public Policy Polling found Turek and Republican nominee Ashley Hinson tied with 46 percent support each, and 7 percent of voters undecided. Here’s the one-page polling memo. Caveats: the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee commissioned this survey, and I haven’t seen the full questionnaire or cross-tabs.

The poll found Turek’s net favorability was in positive territory (+4), while Hinson’s was negative (-5). Trump’s approval was upside down (-9). It also found Iowans oppose the war in Iran and blame Trump and Republicans for higher gas prices.

Last Wednesday, we reported that national election forecasters (the Cook Political Report and Sabato’s Crystal Ball) are now calling Iowa’s Senate race “lean Republican.” You may wonder, why isn’t it a toss-up, if a poll shows the race tied?

I would argue that Hinson has more room to grow, because this poll showed only 83 percent of Republicans said they would vote for Hinson, while 93 percent of Democrats said they supported Turek.

Hinson goes into the general election with a fundraising advantage. Most important, the overall partisan lean of the state works in her favor. With almost 200,000 more registered Republicans than Democrats, Hinson can win even if the turnout rate is lower than usual for the GOP.

That said, the messaging from Thomas Laehn (the Libertarian candidate for U.S. Senate) could pull votes from Hinson. Laehn is emphasizing eminent domain and private property rights, and criticizing the war in Iran. Turek probably needs a large number of Republicans to leave that ballot line blank or vote third party.

Hinson puts up first attack ad against Turek

Immediately after the primary, a Republican group called the Senate Leadership Fund began running a digital ad portraying Josh Turek as “too liberal.” And Hinson is clearly worried about this race, because her campaign is already running TV ad calling Turek “just as liberal as the rest of them. ” The ad accuses Turek of supporting sex changes for kids, “amnesty” for immigrants who are here illegally, and a 90 percent tax rate.

Politifact fact-checked the ad and labeled it “false.”

The script refers to “kids changing gender without parental consent,” but the visual shows physicians in an operating room, so the spot is obviously designed to imply Turek supports surgeries for kids without their parents’ approval. Turek doesn’t support that and was absent in 2023 when Republicans passed a bill to ban all forms of gender-affirming care for minors.

The bill in question was Senate File 496 from 2023, which requires school staff to notify parents if their children are seeking an accommodation (like using a different name or pronouns) at school.

One thing is for sure: anti-trans rhetoric will be a big part of this race and every other major Republican campaign this year

Turek has noted that in the 1950s and 1960s, the top tax bracket was about 90 percent, but I haven’t heard him advocate for raising taxes to that level.

Joe Mitchell’s campaign spends heavily at Mar-a-Lago

We had time for a couple of stories related to Iowa’s second Congressional district. Violet Jira of the Washington, DC based news outlet NOTUS reported last week that Joe Mitchell, the GOP nominee, has spent more than $77,000 this election cycle at Mar-a-Lago, President Trump’s club in Florida.

Mitchell’s campaign spending at Mar-a-Lago — $77, 390.18 — tops that of any other Republican running for Congress this cycle entering April, according to a NOTUS analysis of Federal Election Commission records. The only entity that has reported spending more money at Mar-a-Lago since January 2025 than Joe Mitchell for Congress is the Republican National Committee.

In addition to spending campaign cash at Trump’s club on events, catering and travel, Mitchell also appears to have spent significant time there.

Several of those events (including one organized by Turning Point USA) happened in 2025, before Mitchell landed Trump’s endorsement in late January. There was also a fundraiser for Mitchell there in March.

This reporting dovetails with some of the recent messaging from Lindsay James, the Democratic nominee in IA-02. She has called Mitchell “an ultra-wealthy insider” who “has never had to make an impossible economic choice in his life.”

I spoke to Mitchell by phone after we recorded the show, and he pointed out (accurately) that James has also held out-of-state fundraisers for her campaign.

Mitchell previews attacks on James’ voting record

Last week, Mitchell previewed his case against James, accusing her of making “petty and personal attacks.” He said he would focus on cutting taxes, protecting our borders, and keeping what he called “radical LGBTQ policies” away from kids.

James has served in the Iowa House for eight years, so there’s a long list of Republican bills she has voted against, including several targeting LGBTQ Iowans. Mitchell said in one social media post about James, “It’s not personal, she’s just wrong on every issue imaginable.”

General election ballot not finalized yet

None of Iowa’s Democratic or Republican primary races were recount-close. But the November ballot isn’t final yet. I reported last Wednesday that four Libertarians and two independent candidates submitted enough signatures last week to qualify for the November ballot:

• Thomas Laehn, Libertarian running for U.S. Senate

• Nicholas Gluba, Libertarian running for governor

• Rick Stewart, Libertarian running in Iowa’s second Congressional district

• Marco Battaglia, Libertarian running in Iowa’s third Congressional district

• Michael Bridgford, independent running running in Iowa’s first Congressional district

• Dave Bushaw, independent running in Iowa’s second Congressional district

All of those candidates told me they are confident they submitted more than enough signatures to qualify.

The deadline for filing an objection to anyone’s nominating papers or petitions is June 9 at 5:00 PM. The spokesperson for the Iowa Secretary of State’s office told me on Monday that no one had filed an objection yet. She reached out this morning to let me know that an objection was filed against Battaglia’s paperwork. I’ll be at the panel hearing to consider that challenge on June 15.

Three incumbents lose state legislative primaries

We spent a few minutes on notable results from state legislative primaries. Three members of the Iowa House (two Republicans and one Democrat) lost to primary challengers.

State Representative Brian Lohse has served in the House for eight years, representing parts of eastern Polk County. He has chaired the Justice Systems Appropriations Subcommittee for the past four years. He lost to Austin Stubbs in House district 45 by a three-to-one margin. Outside groups played a major role in this race; the Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity and the social conservative group The FAMiLY Leader combined to spend more than $50,000 either promoting Stubbs or attacking Lohse.

I was surprised Lohse didn’t have a primary challenger two years ago. He has voted against quite a few conservative priorities, including the school voucher bill and several anti-LGBTQ bills in 2023, the overhaul of Area Education Agencies in 2024, and the rollback of civil rights for transgender Iowans in 2025.

In a video posted to Facebook on election night, Lohse said he planned to leave the Republican Party, which he said had been “taken over by a faction that uses the same tactics as the woke left who they fight.” He said he’d been called “countless names” and had his faith questioned, and said Ronald Reagan wouldn’t recognize the Republican Party today.

In House district 60, Jane Bloomingdale lost to GOP challenger Dani Ollenburg by roughly 58 percent to 42 percent. I was surprised by the margin, since Bloomingdale held off a primary challenger in 2024. She served in local government before being elected to the legislature five times, chairing the State Government Committee for the past several years.

Ollenburg campaigned against Bloomingdale’s votes against the 2018 abortion ban (she skipped the 2023 special session), against school voucher bill in 2023, and for allowing local governments to use traffic cameras. As a “MAHA” candidate, Ollenburg also criticized Bloomingdale for missing a vote on a bill related to school vaccine exemptions bill. Although Bloomingdale voted to remove gender identity from the Iowa Civil Rights Act in 2025, Ollenburg criticized her for co-sponsoring a proposed amendment that would have weakened the bill. (The amendment was withdrawn, so never had a floor vote.)

Democratic State Representative Ken Croken, a former Scott County supervisor, lost to community organizer Adam Peters in House district 97, based in Davenport. This was a lopsided result, roughly 63 percent to 37 margin.

Peters didn’t criticize any specific legislative votes by Croken, but said it was time for fresh ideas and new representation. State Representatives J.D. Scholten and Adam Zabner had endorsed the challenger. Peters also got a late endorsement from Pete Buttigieg, for whom he worked as an organizer before the 2020 Iowa caucuses.

Incumbents who survived primary challengers

While no other sitting lawmaker lost to a challenger, several had tough races.

The closest call was GOP State Senator Dave Rowley, who defeated Stacy Besch in Senate district 5 by just a 5-point margin. His ability to campaign was limited as he’s been undergoing cancer treatment. There was some outside spending in this race, with mailers accusing Besch of being a conspiracy theorist. Among other things, she had shared social media posts accusing the military of spreading bioweapons, suggesting the moon landing was fake, and describing hantavirus as “propaganda.”

State Senator Lynn Evans (Senate district 3) got more than 70 percent of the vote against his primary challenger. He’s likely to remain chair of the Senate Education Committee.

State Senator Mike Bousselot chose not to run in his current Senate district 21. Instead, he decamped to Senate district 23, now held by former Senate Majority Leader Jack Whitver. Some expected a close race here, but Bousselot received around 65 percent of the vote against Wes Enos, a former staffer to U.S. Representative Zach Nunn.

I was surprised Senator Annette Sweeney won with about 68 percent of the vote in Senate district 27. Her primary challener Rocky Damiano campaigned hard against the CO2 pipeline and use of eminent domain. Sweeney is a decades-long friend of Bruce Rastetter, a leading figure in Summit Carbon Solutions.

I’m working on a post about what the competitive legislative primaries may mean for the Iowa House and Senate next year.

Governor’s final bill signings

June 2 was not only the primary election day, it was also the last day for Governor Kim Reynolds to sign bills passed near the end of the legislative session. She signed dozens of bills, but we only had time to flag a few. We hope to cover more new Iowa laws as they take effect on July 1.

House File 2694 will limit the next governor’s powers in an emergency. If there’s another pandemic or major disaster, Reynolds’ successor will have less leeway to close businesses and no power to regulate gatherings at religious institutions or conduct in private residences. There will also be no authority to require vaccinations.

Some other bills Reynolds previously signed will prevent the next governor from changing state policies on things like work requirements for Medicaid or limits on food people can buy with federal SNAP benefits.

The governor signed several crime-related bills, including House File 2542, the so-called “three strikes” sentencing bill championed by House Republicans. This was one of the last bills approved during that marathon final weekend of the legislative session. Marc A. Levin and Khalil Cumberbatch of the Council on Criminal Justice wrote a guest post for Bleeding Heartland outlining several problems with the bill:

Current Iowa law designates anyone with three felony convictions a “habitual offender,” subject to a three-year minimum sentence — one that judges can defer or suspend when the circumstances call for it. House File 2542 discards that flexibility entirely, mandating a seven-year minimum with zero deferral option. Judges would lose the authority to distinguish a genuine career criminal from someone whose third conviction — for theft, crop damage, or another nonviolent offense — does not pose the same threat to public safety.

The bill’s reach is broader than its proponents have suggested. It covers every felony without exception. House members considered an amendment requiring the final strike to be a forcible felony, but Republicans defeated that amendment when the bill was first debated in March.

Iowa’s habitual offender statute has never included a time limit on prior convictions, and this bill does nothing to change that. A 55-year-old Iowan with two low-level felonies from age 18 or 19 who commits a third nonviolent offense today faces mandatory incarceration until age 62, with no judge empowered to consider the decades of law-abiding life between then and now.

The House and Senate passed the bill without waiting for an updated fiscal analysis from the Legislative Services Agency. The fiscal note published on May 20 estimated that the law would massively increase Iowa’s incarcerated population, requiring nearly $2 billion in spending to build new prisons and an additional $115 million per year in operating costs to staff and run the system.

Several new laws negatively affect LGBTQ Iowans

Since it’s Pride Month, we took a moment to we want to circle back on the legislature’s work that will most affect LGBTQ Iowans.

The advocacy groups Iowa Safe Schools and One Iowa counted more than 30 anti-LGBTQ bills introduced this year. Two dozen of them didn’t make it to the governor’s desk. Those included extending the ban on teaching about gender identity and sexual orientation (now prohibited for grades K-6) to grades 7-12. Republicans voted that bill out of the House Education Committee but never brought it to the floor.

Earlier this year, Republicans enacted Senate File 579, which bans local government from adopting ordinances that protect transgender people from discrimination. As part of the “standings” appropriations bill (House File 2800), Republicans included language saying local governments can’t continue to enforce existing civil rights ordinances that protect transgender people from discrimination.

In April, Reynolds signed House File 2253, which changes various Iowa Code references from “pregnant person” to “pregnant female.” It’s another sign that Republicans don’t want to acknowledge transgender people exist.

Late bill signings included House File 571, which allows doctors and hospitals or health care clinics to refuse to provide care on matters of “conscience.” Many believe providers will use that law as an excuse to deny care to LGBTQ people.

Senate File 473 prohibits the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services from requiring that foster or adoptive parents be supportive of LGBTQ youth.

I didn’t have time to mention it on the show, but House File 2670 (a broader education bill) removes language requiring preschool education to be “multicultural” and “gender-fair.”

That’s all for now. Thanks for reading or listening!