Free Republic

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley's office said Wednesday he is reviewing the chamber's "blue slip" tradition, after Majority Leader Mitch McConnell pledged to eliminate the tool used to block judicial nominees. "The chairman of the Judiciary Committee will determine how to apply the blue slip courtesy for federal judicial nominees, as has always been the practice," said Taylor Foy, Grassley spokesman, in an email to the Washington Examiner. "Over the years, chairmen have applied the courtesy differently, but the spirit of consultation has always remained." Under the Senate's blue slip procedure, a state's senators are consulted by the White...

It is a privilege to live in a country where someone like myself, raised by parents with 10th grade educations, can live the American dream. I am a small businessman, a coach, a father, a husband -- not a career politician. I ran for office because I believe in the American dream -- the faith that education, initiative, and hard work can earn anyone a better life in this country -- is a dream worth defending. I was raised to believe that in America, the greatest country on Earth, each of us has a voice in our government. This is...

The IRS award of a $7.25 million no-bid contract to Equifax after a hack of the data services company that exposed personal information of as many as 145 million Americans “just doesn’t add up,” according to Sen. Chuck Grassley. “Given recent Equifax breach the IRS needs 2make clear &demonstrate that taxpayer information is safe if doing biz w Equifax,” the Iowa Republican said in a post on Twitter Wednesday morning. “Not only was I surprised, but I was sitting with a senator in Judiciary (Committee) today that was told that by another senator and he said, ‘You got to be...

The abortion chain Planned Parenthood lost a legal challenge to Iowa’s 72-hour waiting period law Monday when a judge upheld the law. The Des Moines Register reports Iowa Judge Jeffrey Farrell refused to block the law. He rejected the abortion business’s argument that the law places an “undue burden” on women’s access to abortion. “The Iowa Act is arguably the strictest mandatory waiting period law in the country, but the only question to the court is whether it complies with the constitutional standard,” Farrell wrote. “It does.” The Iowa law requires that a woman be offered the chance to see...

Iowa State University has added new language to its job applications that requires prospective employees to pledge they will “demonstrate their contribution to diversity and inclusion” once hired.

Boeing Co. and Airbus SE voiced concerns about a proposed tie-up of two leading suppliers Tuesday, potentially upsetting United Technologies Corp.’s $23 billion acquisition of Rockwell Collins Inc. The world’s largest planemakers added to the chorus of skeptics of a deal that would create an aerospace behemoth with a range of products to outfit jetliners and warplanes. Investors sent United Technologies shares plunging by the most in two years, while credit ratings companies said the manufacturer risks downgrades. Boeing, which has been squeezing suppliers for discounts, warned it would take action to protect itself if it saw the merger as...

A Senate Republican is standing up for a GOP colleague in his contentious reelection bid, despite opposition from President Trump. Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) will speak at a Phoenix fundraiser for Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) in support of the senator's reelection campaign against a pro-Trump challenger, according to azcentral.com. Ernst will appear at a Young Republicans meet-and-greet event on Sept. 7, followed by a "Women for Flake" fundraiser the next day, Flake's campaign told the paper.

An Iowa Democratic congressional candidate's foul mouth reportedly has gotten her barred from speaking at a local fundraiser next month. The Des Moines Register reports that a Polk County Democratic Party committee voted not to offer a speaking invitation to Heather Ryan for their upcoming steak fry, where several members of Congress and other candidates from across the state will speak. Committee co-chairs Kimberley Boggus and Lindsay Paulson reportedly wrote in a letter to party members that the event will include children and should be "family-friendly." ----------- "The party that tells women to sit down and shut up is not...

An assistant professor at the University of Iowa who pledged to expose her students to “their own white ignorance” in a “peer-reviewed academic journal” was stunned and appalled that she was, well, criticized for it. Jodi Linley, a white education instructor, wrote that her goal was to make her “mostly white” graduate students keenly aware of their “white privilege” and use her classroom to “deconstruct whiteness.” If she did otherwise, she explained, it would make her “complicit” in perpetrating white supremacy. “For white students,” she wrote, “talking about race with an all-white group of peers … [reveals] their own white...

Caked in mud and covered with bug bites, a shivering group of six friends from the Quad-Cities huddled together in the dark this past Sunday, stranded in the woods of northeast Iowa.

Apple Inc will build a $1.375 billion data center in Waukee, Iowa, Apple and state officials said on Thursday, with $207.8 million in incentives approved by the Iowa Economic Development Authority and Waukee city council. Apple will purchase 2,000 acres (8.09 square km) of land in Waukee, about 20 miles (32 km) west of Des Moines, to build two data centers. The company will receive a $19.65 million investment tax credit for creating 50 jobs. Apple said the project will generate more than 550 jobs in construction and operations, but did not specify how many of those jobs would be...

Former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa (D.) said California Sen. Kamala Harris (D.) will be "knocking on doors in Iowa," indicating Saturday he expects she will run for president. Villaraigosa, who is running for Governor of California in 2018, was asked by MSNBC host Hugh Hewitt about Harris, a newly elected senator considered a rising star in the Democratic Party. Hewitt predicted she would be the nominee for the Democrats in 2020. "Has she got a stake in this governor's race?" Hewitt asked. "Well, not yet," Villaraigosa said. "I hope she will support my candidacy, but as you say, she...

In one of the biggest 2018 premium hikes sought to date, Iowa’s only ObamaCare insurer is looking for a 57 percent rate increase – that’s 13 percent more than they asked for just two months earlier. It’s a troubling trend that’s been spreading across the country as jittery insurers stay stuck in a holding pattern waiting on Congress and the Trump administration to decide the fate of the Affordable Care Act. President Trump has at different times encouraged lawmakers to let ObamaCare implode, pushed his party to repeal and replace the bill, admonished his own party for failing to do...

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley is demanding plaintiffs of three separate lawsuits filed against President Trump, who claim the president violated an obscure Constitutional provision known as the Emoluments Clause, should also consider investigating violations allegedly committed by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, since the basis of their lawsuits also implicate the former presidential candidate. The clause prohibits any person holding office from receiving gifts or payments from foreign governments without the consent of Congress and the chairman says the overwhelming evidence against Clinton should be made part of the ongoing lawsuits, which he says are both "partisan...

There is a distinction between color blindness and absent mindedness. The former is a worthy goal consonant with Dr. King's desire that we judge each other "by the content of our character not the color of our skin." The latter is too frequently on display in academia. "As a white assistant professor of mostly white graduate students who will become higher education leaders, I work to dismantle whiteness in my curriculum, assignments and pedagogy," Jodi L. Linley writes. "I make meaning of my own white identity through my commitment to reflexivity as a constant activity." "Equally salient are my identities...

Edith Rivera loved her life in Hampton, Iowa, but for many undocumented immigrants like her, this summer has been a season of fear or flight. It was quitting time. Edith Rivera took one last lunch order, dropped off a basket of tortilla chips and set off from work, heading out to the farm roads where other immigrants feared to drive. Like them, Ms. Rivera, 33, had no legal status in the country where she had lived for 18 years. She had no driver’s license, apart from the long-expired North Carolina identification she held safe, like a talisman, in her wallet....

Iowa Democrats pulled off an impressive and important victory in a Southeast Iowa special election this evening, boosting the party’s hopes that 2018 could be a bounce-back year. Democratic veterinarian Phil Miller of Fairfield comfortably defeated Republican farmer Travis Harris of Davis County, 4,021 to 3,324 (about 55% to 45%), thanks largely to a massive victory in his hometown of Jefferson County. That means Democrats will hold on to a key rural swing district that Donald Trump won in November by 22 points.... Miller was about as ideal of a candidate as you could hope for in this race: a...

I missed this when it was announced roughly two weeks ago but it’s worth pointing out even now. Two activists confessed to multiple acts of sabotage against the Dakota Access Pipeline using cutting torches and other tools. The two women, who are part of an Iowa’s Catholic Worker social justice movement, made the announcement before a small group of journalists and then started prying letters off a sign for the Iowa Utilities Board, which got them arrested. From the Des Moines Register:

According to news reports, during the 2016 presidential election, “Ukrainian government officials tried to help Hillary Clinton and undermine Trump” and did so by “disseminating documents implicating a top Trump aide in corruption and suggested they were investigating the matter…” Ukrainian officials also reportedly “helped Clinton’s allies research damaging information on Trump and his advisers.” At the center of this plan was Alexandra Chalupa, described by reports as a Ukrainian-American operative “who was consulting for the Democratic National Committee” and reportedly met with Ukrainian officials during the presidential election for the express purpose of exposing alleged ties between then-candidate Donald...

Multiple Republican senators broke with President Trump on Wednesday after he announced on Twitter than transgender troops would be banned from serving in the military. In separate statements, GOP Sens. John McCain (Ariz.), Joni Ernst (Iowa), Richard Shelby (Ala.), and Orrin Hatch (Utah) all criticized Trump for his decision that Obama-era rules allowing transgender troops to serve would be reversed. McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, ripped the call and said that Trump shouldn't be making policy announcements via tweet. “The President’s tweet this morning regarding transgender Americans in the military is yet another example of why major...