One of the most notorious faces — and T-shirts — photographed inside the U.S. Capitol Building on Jan. 6, 2021 belonged to an Iowan, Doug Jensen. On Friday morning, the 43-year-old former Des Moines construction worker was sentenced to five years in federal prison. This is just short of the 64 months’ imprisonment requested by […]
Donald Trump
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Prosecutors recommend more than five years in prison for Iowan who led mob on Jan. 6
Doug Jensen of Des Moines is facing more than six years in federal prison for his leading role in the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. In a sentencing memorandum filed in U.S. District Court in Washington D.C. on Wednesday, federal prosecutors recommended Jensen serve “64 months’ imprisonment, three years of supervised release, […]
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Iowa Republican leaders line up behind Trump after FBI raid: ‘We’ve got a right 2b skeptical’
Iowa’s leading Republicans once again followed Donald Trump’s lead and used social media on Tuesday to suggest corruption led to FBI agents executing a search warrant at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property on Monday. Not corruption on Trump’s part, of course. Iowa GOP leaders have consistently ignored or avoided acting on evidence of Trump’s corruption, whether personal, […]
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Trump testifies about why he told people at 2016 Cedar Rapids rally to ‘knock the crap out of’ anyone with a tomato
Everyone at then-candidate Donald Trump’s rally at the then-U.S. Cellular Center on Iowa Caucus day 2016 knew he was worried about tomatoes. He told them so. “So I get a little notice, in case you see the security guys,” Trump told the crowd gathered in Cedar Rapids. “We have wonderful security guys. They said, ‘Mr. […]
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As McConnell calls Jan. 6 ‘a violent insurrection,’ Grassley and Ernst avoid giving direct answers on the issue dividing Republicans
The Republican National Committee’s attempt to whitewash the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol as “legitimate political discourse” while condemning two Trump-critical party members has led to pushback from GOP senators, Politico reported on Tuesday. That pushback does not include Iowa’s two Republican senators, Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst. The RNC, the governing […]
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COVID-19: Reynolds talks about banning vaccine mandates and suing the Biden administration; IDPH reports 94 more deaths, 8,167 new cases
During a phone interview on a conservative talk radio show on Wednesday, Gov. Kim Reynolds said she’s “continuing to have good conversations with the legislature” about passing a bill banning any kind of COVID-19 vaccine mandate during its upcoming special session. That session, scheduled for Oct. 28, has been called to consider the second set […]
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Donald Trump lies, stokes xenophobia and endorses Chuck Grassley in speech at Iowa State Fairgrounds
When Donald Trump finally began speaking at the Iowa State Fairgrounds on Saturday night, it took him less than two minutes to get to his central message: “The election was rigged.” He was lying, but about an hour into his speech, the former president did say something true about the 2020 election. “I never conceded. […]
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How UI grad Liz Crokin became one of QAnon’s biggest influencers
Content warning: This article contains references to sexual assault, child abuse and racism. “QAnon Congresswoman” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene was red-pilled (that is, fell down the rabbit hole of far-right online conspiracy theories) back in 2017. “I first heard about [Q] from Liz Crokin,” Greene said in a Facebook Live video from November 2017. “She’s […]
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The fifth Iowan charged for the Capitol insurrection allegedly assaulted, threatened to shoot an officer
An Iowa man arrested by the FBI earlier this month for taking part in the U.S. Capitol insurrection was allegedly part of a mob that assaulted a police officer, shot him with a stun gun and stole his badge, radio and ammunition while attempting to grab the officer’s service weapon, among other acts of violence, […]
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Iowa Poll: 41 percent of Republicans say they won’t get vaccinated for COVID-19
In a new Iowa Poll published on Sunday, 41 percent of the respondents who identified themselves as Republicans said they have no intention of being vaccinated against COVID-19. Among those who said they voted for Donald Trump in November, the rate of vaccine rejection was even higher, with 45 percent saying they have no intention […]
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State Republicans pass bill to restrict early voting, voting by mail and voting on Election Day in Iowa
Just eight days after it was introduced in the Iowa Legislature, a bill that would make it harder to vote but easier to remove people from voting rolls, and creates new criminal liability for local election officials, received its final approval. On Wednesday night, the Republican-controlled Iowa House of Representatives sent the bill to Gov. […]
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‘It’s voter suppression’: Iowa Republicans target voting access, citing Trumpian election conspiracy theories
At least 33 state legislatures around the country, most of them controlled by Republicans, are working on bills that restrict voting. Iowa is one of them. “These bills are an unmistakable response to the unfounded and dangerous lies about fraud that followed the 2020 election,“ the Brennan Center for Justice said in a report on […]
