Good morning from Iowa Capital Dispatch.
“We’ve got a huge water quality issue in the state, and we’ve got a huge cancer issue. I want to make sure I’m understanding the science, and then we need to advocate to do something about it because I think there’s a lot of stuff out there that could be preventable, and we need to have the will to make the changes.” - Diana Wright, a Boone County resident, speaking at an Iowa Environmental Council event about the issues are driving Iowa’s high cancer rates.
This dog was photographed by USDA inspectors in January 2023 at a kennel operated by Wuanita Swedlund of Iowa. (Main photo: USDA image courtesy of Bailing Out Benji; text-message illustration sourced from federal court records)
The owner of a southern Iowa puppy mill where 32 dogs were found to have been neglected is currently facing no criminal charges in the case.
Newly released court records also show that in the months leading up to the recent seizure of the animals, federal officials repeatedly allowed the owner of the kennel to help schedule the government’s on-site inspections of the facility.
Iowa Environmental Council led a conversation in Boone about its report on environmental risk factors and cancer. (Photo by Cami Koons/Iowa Capital Dispatch)
In a conference room at the Ericson Public Library Tuesday, cancer survivors, farmers, elected officials and community activists from Boone County discussed the things they have done to reduce their exposure to carcinogens and the things they hope will change in Iowa to help lower the state’s high cancer rates.
The discussion in downtown Boone was part of a series of community conversations led by the Iowa Environmental Council about the information in the “Environmental Risk Factors and Iowa’s Cancer Crisis” report the council released in March.
Gubernatorial candidate Rob Sand said he would support increasing pediatric cancer research funding, raising taxes on tobacco and nicotine products and ensuring access to cancer-preventing vaccines — but warned advocates Tuesday these actions will require GOP support.
Federal asylum officers can deny interviews to asylum seekers and send them immediately to an immigration judge, speeding up deportation proceedings, under a rule U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services published Tuesday.
Members of Congress paid tribute to their longtime colleague, the late Republican Sen. Lindsey O. Graham, in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda Tuesday morning ahead of a funeral service at Washington National Cathedral.
From hijacked freight shipments to tampered gift cards hanging on store racks, states are responding to new forms of organized retail crime with a fresh round of legislation. Stateline reports.
A federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that the federal government can continue implementing President Donald Trump’s executive order limiting vote-by-mail, reaching the opposite conclusion that another appeals panel decided over the weekend.
Evidence that noncitizens were on voting rolls in New Jersey and potentially Alaska won’t make a difference to efforts to push through the SAVE America Act, lawmakers and others say.
Hundreds of thousands of Haitian immigrants could lose their legal status as early as Tuesday, subjecting them to deportation after the U.S. Supreme Court last month allowed the Trump administration to proceed with terminating their humanitarian protections.
A proposed federal commission on artificial intelligence ethics could help address moral questions associated with the rapidly developing technology, but there are still some areas in which they believe the proposal falls short, experts say.
Attorneys representing the former Olympic canoeist charged with damaging part of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool have asked the judge in the case to release more information from the grand jury.
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