Former Republican Governor Terry Branstad broke his silence Friday about his 2010 gubernatorial campaign.
After months of speculation, Branstad used a Friday press conference to announce his retirement from Des Moines University, where he served as president for six years.
During that press conference, Branstad also announced his intent to fully explore a run for governor next year. He said he was "very touched and humbled" by the thousands who have asked him to run.
Earlier in the week, the 16-year governor hired top GOP strategist Jeff Boeyink as his campaign manager. The week before that announcement, Branstad formed an exploratory committee for governor.
"We're going to move fast," Boeyink said in an interview. "My job is to build the infrastructure and campaign to make his decision easy. ... It will happen very quickly now that we've moved from a volunteer organization, to secure a professional staff. We will be ramping up our efforts."
Boeyink resigned Monday as executive director of the Republican Party of Iowa to lead Branstad's campaign.
"The opportunity to be involved in what potentially will be the most significant campaign in our state's history -- somebody in my profession, it's something you cannot say 'no' to," Boeyink said. "Governor Branstad ... is somebody that I truly believe in; he's the first person I ever voted for. This is kind of a dream come true, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. ... I'm a true believer, always have been."
Already the state Democratic Party has announced a new campaign in response to Branstad's decision.
The party says the campaign is aimed at highlighting criticism of Branstad's record. It includes T-shirts and signs featuring the Web site TerryLovesTaxes.com.
"I believe Iowans will remember and then reject his brand of tax-hiking, two-sets-of-books politics," said state Representative Tyler Olson (D-Cedar Rapids) in a prepared statement.
The six other Republican gubernatorial candidates -- Jerry Behn, Christian Fong, Paul McKinley, Chris Rants, Rod Roberts, and Bob Vander Plaats -- will have to decide for themselves whether to stay in the race or drop out. Boeyink predicted that some of them will be leaving.
"Within the Republican community, Terry Branstad has a tremendous amount of support," Boeyink said. "I'd be very surprised if the field is this full by the time we get to the filing deadline in March."
State Workers Warned of Layoffs as Agencies Begin to Implement Cuts
State troopers, court employees, human-services workers, university employees, and teacher support staff are among those bracing for possible layoffs as state departments decide how to implement a 10-percent budget cut ordered by Governor Chet Culver.
"The fact of the matter is we are going to have layoffs across the enterprise," Culver said Thursday, a week after he ordered the cuts. "I think everyone needs to get used to that fact. It's painful and it's hard, but a large part of the savings will come from layoffs."
Here's how the cuts are already affecting and could potentially affect various parts of state government:
· Public safety: Public Safety Commissioner Gene Meyer this week told employees that anywhere from 100 to 169 employees could be lost, including state troopers, as the department implements an $8.9-million budget cut.
"There is absolutely no way to meet the budget reduction required without a reduction in our workforce. That reduction could be as high as 15 percent of our staff," Meyer said. "Those are the facts. I so wish I knew someway to make them sound better. ... These are extremely difficult times."
· Human services: The Iowa Department of Human Services could see 150 to 400 layoffs to help slice $132 million from the department, Director Charlie Krogmeier told the Council on Human Services.
Other possibilities include closing some of the eight regional administrative offices, making more county offices part-time, and reducing reimbursement rates to providers under Medicaid.
· Schools: The drop in school aid from the state could mean a loss of support staff in some districts, depending on the district's level of cash reserves and its ability to raise money from local taxes.
"Eighty percent of most school budgets are made up of staff and personnel, and most of those teachers and administrators are under contract and can't be cut midyear," said Megan Forgrave of the Iowa Association of School Boards. "So that leaves support staff as the main place that budget cuts can take place."
Culver also suggested that budget cuts could spur more school consolidation and reorganization, although he emphasized that he believes in local control and it won't be a state mandate. "Suddenly, they're going to have a lot less money and they're going to have to find a way to keep the lights on and to keep those buses on the road," he said.
· Universities: Iowa Board of Regents President David Miles directed an immediate hiring freeze and asked the state's university presidents to consider options including a tuition surcharge, elimination of programs, and staff layoffs as they draft plans to cut $59.8 million from their collective budgets.
Also under consideration are temporary salary reductions, temporary layoffs, temporary reductions, postponing repairs, the selling of nonessential assets for one-time money and offering early-retirement packages to staff.
Miles warned that tuition increases alone wouldn't be enough to recover the nearly $60-million cut. He noted that an 8.4-percent tuition increase would be necessary for that.
· State audits: A cut of $90,547 to the state auditor's office could mean even more financial uncertainty down the line, State Auditor David Vaudt warned. He said the cuts equate to less auditing for agencies his office can't bill. That comes on top of assisting with the special investigation of the state's film tax-credit program.
"Our financial audit hours are going to be significantly reduced, which means we're not going to be able to carry out enough audit hours to give a clean opinion on the entire state's financial statements," Vaudt said.
Vaudt is also worried about other effects that furloughs and layoffs will have on state government. "With furloughs and layoffs comes a drop in internal controls. Checks and balances aren't going to be in place," he said. "So it puts financial resources at a greater risk."
Cuts to Include Governor's Pay, and Judicial and Legislative Branches
While the initial 10-percent across-the-board budget cut only affected state agencies in the executive branch, the legislative and judicial branch also prepared for steep budget cuts this week, and Culver volunteered to have the cut affect him and his department directors personally.
Here's a round-up of those cuts:
· Pay cuts: Culver this week announced he is taking a 10-percent reduction in his $130,000 salary and asked the same of his department directors, who make on average $150,000 a year. He said he hopes that will set an example and that rank-and-file state workers will also be willing to take furloughs or pay cuts.
"I believe this will have a domino effect," he said. "I think leadership starts at the top, and I do believe there will be a lot of state employees that are willing to take furloughs."
Culver even suggested a pay cut for all state workers. "We'll have further conversations with state employees and the unions about this topic," he said. "I think it makes a lot of sense. That might make the difference between someone keeping or losing their job."
· Courts: Iowa Chief Justice Marsha Ternus warned court workers that layoffs are ahead, given that the state's 10-percent across-the-board budget cut that would slice $16 million from the judicial branch's budget of $162 million if a similar reduction is applied to it.
The state has 1,600 judicial employees, in addition to 350 judges and magistrates, and the judicial budget is 95-percent personnel costs. "Regrettably, therefore, a reduction in our workforce is unavoidable," Ternus said. "None of our options for reducing expenses are good. The cuts are so deep that our organization may not look the same after the required reductions are implemented."
· Legislature: Iowa Democratic legislative leaders this week announced plans to immediately chop the legislature's budget 10 percent, which includes reducing the legislative session from 100 to 80 days, and furloughing all full-time legislative employees for six days.
Cuts will include eliminated staff positions, reduced hours for session-only staff, a continued pay freeze for all legislative employees, a hiring freeze for full-time permanent employees, a ban on all out-of-state travel, reduced constituency allowance for legislators, reduced in-state travel for legislators and staff, reduced printing, and no new equipment purchases.
Some Iowa Minorities Could Shift from Culver to GOP
Democrats shouldn't take for granted that minorities will automatically vote for them, the Reverend Keith Ratliff Sr., a registered Democrat who supported Culver in the last election, said this week as he endorsed Republican gubernatorial candidate Bob Vander Plaats.
"I have politically found that not all Democrats are our friends and not all Republicans are our enemies," said Ratliff, who's president of the Iowa/Nebraska NAACP Conference. "I personally feel that in general, some of our fellow Democrats take many African Americans and minorities for granted -- that we will automatically will vote one way."
Maria Rundquist of Sioux City, a longtime Hispanic activist, said she shares Ratliff's feeling of disillusionment.
"I feel how he feels," Rundquist said, describing how many candidates have come to her for help over the years, but how little has been done on key issues such as immigration despite campaign promises. "You hope they're going to do something for you. But when they get there, they forget. ...They come to you, they beg, they promise, they make you hopeful, and nothing happens."
Rundquist is the former president of Latinos Unidos, is part of the La Raza national Hispanic coalition, was chair of Iowa Latinos for Bush in the 2000 election, and was appointed by U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley as an adviser to the Senate Republican Hispanic Affairs Task Force in 2002. She backed Vander Plaats in his first run for governor but voted for Culver in 2006 and for Obama last year. But like Ratliff, she doesn't plan to vote for Culver again.
"You have a hope this young guy, he's going to do something, as a teacher he's going to do something for education, Hispanics, minorities," she said. "They haven't done it. He has inexperienced people working with him. He picked the worst people to work with him."
"Democrats don't take the votes of minorities for granted," said state Representative Wayne Ford (D-Des Moines), the longest-serving black state legislator in Iowa history. "Governor Culver has been supportive of the state's minorities. He has supported and signed minority impact statement legislation requiring an assessment of the effect of criminal legislation and state contracting on minorities, the first of its kind in the nation."
Ford said under Culver's leadership, the state's Targeted Small Business program has been revived, increasing minority business activity. And he said Culver supported and signed legislation enhancing the state's bouncer-training law that was enacted following the death of a young black man at a Des Moines nightclub.
"These are just the most visible examples of how Governor Culver has been sensitive to Iowa's minority population," Ford said. "I'm very much aware of the current allegations of discrimination in employment that black employees have against the state, but those allegations pertain to actions taken under a previous administration."
Grassley Votes Against Health-Care Bill as Dems Go Behind Closed Doors
The U.S. Senate Finance Committee this week voted 14-9 for the $829-billion health-care-reform bill, with Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) voting "no" as expected and Senator Olympia Snowe the only Republican voting "yes."
Grassley, the committee's ranking Republican and one of the "gang of six" who had worked toward a bipartisan compromise, called it a massive expansion of the federal government's role in health care and told the committee before the vote that "I wish I felt better about the substance of the bill."
"People's premiums are going to go up, and I think most people would expect, with health-care reform, that premiums would quit going up," Grassley told reporters. "There's new taxes and fees."
Grassley said that for the first time in the nation's history, it's going to require Americans to buy something even if they don't want to. That will force families to pay $1,500 and employers that don't have good enough health insurance for their employees to face a penalty.
He said people are going to have to spend at least 10 percent of their income on health care before they can deduct it from their income tax, compared to 7.5 percent now. And 25 million people are still going to be uninsured.
"So consequently, I don't think it does what it was portrayed to do over the long haul," Grassley said. "And there are some good aspects of it, yes, but I intend to vote against it. And I don't think it's going to improve the health care that farmers can buy at all. In fact, it's going to cause premiums to go up for them just like everybody else."
Senior White House officials and Senate Democratic leaders on Wednesday began the task of crafting the chamber's final health-care-reform bill that will be considered on the floor, beginning either in late October or early November.
Top Democrats involved in this effort, including U.S. Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), the chair of the Health, Education, Labor, & Pensions Committee, are vowing to give President Barack Obama a bill to sign no later than Christmas Day.
Senate Republican leaders are demanding that the final health-care-reform bill be given at least eight weeks of floor debate, a command that if honored would probably preclude the president from signing a bill this year. The Democrats are having none of it -- charging that the Republicans are simply stalling to block reform.
"Sometimes people fight just to fight you. The bill is another step towards achieving the goal of health-care reform. Let's get on with it," Harkin said Thursday in a conference call with Iowa reporters.
The work is being done behind closed doors in the Capitol office of U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada). There are no Republicans in on these talks, although some moderate GOP senators might be consulted during the process.
"Right now, everyone is focused with a laser beam on health-care reform," said U.S. Representative Bruce Braley (D-Waterloo), on Thursday during a conference call with Iowa reporters.
This weekly summary comes from IowaPolitics.com, an online government and politics news service. IowaPolitics.com staff contributed to this report.
