Rekha Basu: Kim Reynolds' default to secrecy gets judge's rebuke — and provokes more serious questions

Gov. Kim Reynolds recently met privately with dozens of people in the basement of an operations facility in a Marion park. The event wasn't listed on her official public schedule and members of the media who got wind of it and turned up were turned away. "Multiple elected officials were seen leaving the two-hour closed-door meeting," the Cedar Rapids Gazette reported. 

What would prompt Iowa's governor to go to a confab in a public works basement and not let the public know? Here's a guess: The meeting was intended to undermine a public school district — Linn-Mar — after its board voted to make accommodations for transgender students. A number of parents didn't like that students from seventh grade up would be referred to by their preferred gender pronouns and be able to use the bathrooms and locker rooms corresponding to their gender identities. Reynolds later told reporters that the parents "feel trapped," adding that, among other things, they feel "their values aren’t being represented at school." 

Instead of advising them that a public school system is intended to welcome and accommodate everyone regardless of race, religion, income, sexual orientation and more, Reynolds was there to reassure the parents they could opt out of public school with taxpayer dollars following them if her school plan passes. 

That effectively encourages families to also opt out of recognizing the civil rights of diverse groups in society. No wonder the governor tried to keep the meeting, and other things, under the radar. 

Also this month, a Polk County district judge ruled that a lawsuit against her for withholding public records can proceed. One of the plaintiffs, Laura Belin, wrote on her Bleeding Heartland website, “It was the third time in the past five months that a court denied the state’s motion to dismiss a suit claiming the Reynolds administration violated Iowa’s open records law." Five of Belin's public-records requests to Reynolds' office had not been answered, along with two submitted by Clark Kauffman from Iowa Capital Dispatch, and one from the Iowa Freedom Of Information Council's Randy Evans. The three were represented by the American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa, which alleges the governor’s office failed to respond in 45 cases (some repeat requests) over two years.

Kauffman was seeking documents relating to a fundraising dinner at the governor’s mansion for Des Moines Christian School, which purports to nurture “passionate apprentices of Christ." Iowa Capital Dispatch reported Reynolds had granted the school the right to auction off a dinner for eight at its fundraiser in April 2021, to dine with her and her husband at Terrace Hill.  

Why would the governor show such largesse to a private school over public schools in the state she leads? 

It gets worse. Separately, in February 2021, the Associated Press reported that Reynolds had auctioned off an afternoon in her company over lunch and a private Terrace Hill tour for a foundation owned by two of her biggest donors, Deb and Jeff Hansen. They own Iowa Select Farms, one of the nation’s largest pork producers. They also donated nearly $300,000 to Reynolds' campaign for governor.

"Reynolds not only attended their May 10, 2019, event but turned her state position into one of the night’s most lucrative auction items," wrote the AP's Ryan J. Foley. This is especially disturbing given how Reynolds subsequently refused to order pork plants closed to protect their largely Latino workers from COVID-19 exposure. In April 2020, Black Hawk County's board of health called a Tyson Foods Waterloo plant the biggest source of the county's COVID cases then, and asked that it be closed. But before it was, Tyson was blamed for 1,326 positive COVID-19 test results.

Reynolds had claimed the plants were "critical" infrastructure and their work was "essential." She even wrote to then Vice President Mike Pence, asking that the federal government "utilize every authority available to keep plants open." She was rewarded with an executive order from Donald Trump doing just that, even as a chapter president of LULAC, representing 2,800 mostly Latino plant workers, warned that "the blood of Latino workers will be all over that meat." 

The governor also asked for the federal government to indemnify pork producers for their euthanized hogs, pay the costs and provide them mental health assistance, among other things. Christensen Farms received $1.86 million through the Iowa Disposal Assistance Program for farmers who euthanized their hogs. Reynolds subsequently got a $25,000 campaign donation from board member Mary Ann Christensen. 

Meanwhile, we in the media couldn't even get data from the pork industry on the number of COVID infections at their processing facilities. Smithfield Foods said on its website it wasn't disclosing that information "out of respect for our employees' legal privacy."

And then there was Reynolds' use of federal COVID funds, uncovered by state Auditor Rob Sand while reviewing distributions under the federal CARES Act. Iowa's share of $1.25 billion came with the stipulation that the funds go for COVID-related expenses incurred in 2020 between March 1 and the end of December. But Reynolds opted to spend $21 million of those funds on a computer system with new accounting software, which lawmakers had declined to appropriate money for. The governor also allocated nearly half a million dollars from CARES to pay her personal staff's salaries and benefits for six weeks, though they were on the state payroll and the governor's office billed the Department of Revenue for reimbursement during those periods. Reynolds subsequently called on Congress to release more COVID funds, claiming the state lacked the means to adequately help residents. That was learned after a public-information request to the Iowa Department of Management by Belin.

It should come as no surprise, then, that Reynolds wants "my own (attorney general), please,” according to a video posted by WHO-HD reporter Taj Simmons at a weekend campaign event and reported by Iowa Capital Dispatch. “And I need a state auditor that’s not trying to sue me every time they turn around.” (Sand hasn’t sued her.)

It's not just media requests she resists. Clearly the governor doesn't want those in state government holding her accountable either. But Iowans can, and should, keep demanding answers on some disturbing patterns about what she keeps under the radar.