Good morning from Iowa Capital Dispatch.
“We can’t have a partisan deal on the floor of the United States Senate, or we don’t get anything done for the family farmers.” — U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, on the farm bill, which failed in the U.S. Senate Agriculture Committee.
The Senate Agriculture Committee clashed over SNAP error rate policy, and failed to advance updated farm bill legislation. (Photo by Cami Koons/Iowa Capital Dispatch)
Farm bill progress stalled Thursday as the U.S. Senate Agriculture Committee failed to move forward its version of the omnibus legislation due to a conflict over when states will shoulder a share of federal nutrition assistance costs.
While the bill included bipartisan language from more than 100 bills, Democrats were unwilling to budge on their demand for a two-year extension to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act policy that requires states to pay for part of their Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program if they have SNAP payment error rates in excess of 6%.
The Newton Village Health Care Center in Newton, Iowa. (Photo via Google Earth)
Two Iowa nursing homes are facing sanctions for alleged quality-of-care violations tied to resident deaths.
The Newton Village Health Care Center has been fined $8,500 by the state, according to the Iowa Department of Inspections, Appeals and Licensing. The state agency has also proposed, but held in suspension, a $10,000 fine against Northbrook Healthcare and Rehabilitation Center in Cedar Rapids.
Water quality is shaping up to be a big issue in many of Iowa’s races for the Nov. 3 election but especially in Iowa’s race for secretary of agriculture, where Republican incumbent Mike Naig faces water quality advocate and Democratic candidate Chris Jones.
Iowa Democrats running in two of the country’s most competitive U.S. House districts have released their first television campaign ads of the 2026 general election cycle.
Several months after he was criminally charged with sexual abuse and assault, an Iowa massage therapist is now facing sanctions from a state licensing board.
President Donald Trump on Thursday signed two executive orders in his second attempt to deny citizenship to babies born to noncitizens, following the Supreme Court’s defeat this summer of an earlier order to redefine birthright citizenship.
Republicans on a U.S. Senate panel voted Thursday to hold Dr. Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress after he declined to answer any questions at a hearing last week about the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Two courts this week dealt blows to the Trump administration’s attempts to withdraw clean energy and climate grants, Stateline reports.
COMMENTARY
“Ultimately, the question of whether marijuana should be legal in Iowa is separate from the question of how state government should be financed,” guest columnists John Hendrickson and Meg Tuszynski write.
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