On pesticide-lawsuit immunity, Iowa senators must decide whom we serve | Letters
- On pesticide-lawsuit immunity, Iowa senators must decide whom we’re serving
- Senate needs to stand up for Iowans’ property rights
- At least Chuck Grassley is still showing up
- Chuck Grassley is too unreliable to serve
- People are dying because of USAID shutdown
On pesticide immunity, Iowa senators must decide whom we’re serving
Who were we elected to serve? That’s the question I keep asking as my Republican colleagues push legislation that puts corporate profits and Goliaths over Iowa families. It’s a backward way of legislating.
Take Senate File 394, the pesticide immunity bill being debated in the Iowa Senate. This bill strips Iowans of their right to hold chemical companies accountable while giving foreign corporations like ChemChina blanket immunity. It’s a betrayal of the farmers and families suffering from pesticide exposure, and it’s a dangerous precedent.
I was elected to ensure opportunity, freedom, and accountability for my constituents. I was elected to serve the Iowa families who are suffering through our state’s ongoing and escalating cancer crisis. I was elected to serve the farmers whose extended exposure to toxic chemicals has affected their long-term health and safety.
Farmers and rural communities are experiencing the long-term health consequences of toxic chemicals. Yet, instead of protecting them, this bill shields the corporations responsible. Lawsuits are the only way to hold corporations accountable when their actions hurt Iowans and make sure future products are safe. We need to stop letting corporations dodge accountability while everyday people pay the price.
Who should we side with? Massive, foreign chemical corporations or Iowans?
We’re here to serve Iowans’ interests. That’s our responsibility as legislators. Iowans are being taken advantage of by corporate interests, and it’s time to put an end to it.
I’ll be voting no.
State Sen. Matt Blake, Urbandale
Senate needs to stand up for Iowans’ property rights
I am 91 and a half years old, and I live on a farm that has been in my family for 128 years. In all that time, I have never been told that someone would come along and take a portion of my land, possibly jeopardizing my entire way of life, to build a dangerous pipeline that I have no say in stopping.
This pipeline isn’t for public use, but rather for Summit Carbon Solutions’ profit, at my expense. The Iowa House is trying to support us, but the Senate has for years refused to consider bills that would prevent pipeline companies from using eminent domain to seize our land.
If the Senate and the governor won’t step in, there are enough people standing in the way of this hazardous pipeline to force these companies to rethink their plans. This pipeline is only 1,000 feet from my home. What if it ruptures in the middle of the night? And it’s not just farmers like me who are at risk. This pipeline puts everyone along its path in danger.
Bill Fluhrer, Charles City
At least Grassley is still showing up
Thank you and kudos to Sen. Chuck Grassley for showing up in person at the Hampton town hall meeting and staying calm in the face of some serious disagreements in the room.
I, too, like one of the women who spoke, wish we could have the "old (meaning former) Senator Grassley" back, as she put it. I felt very disappointed at the GOP's instructions to its members of Congress to only hold town hall meetings online because they fear that footage of town hall meetings held in person will go viral and put the GOP in a bad light.
It can be hard to maintain calm and be polite when discussing opposing points of view; but I think Grassley and those who attended the meeting did the best they could in a tough circumstance. I'm glad not to see him hiding with other members of Congress behind closed doors and doing things in secret. I may not always agree with him, but transparency means a great deal to voters. He also doesn't make any excuses about not being able to travel due to his age; he shows up, in all 99 counties, every year. Now that takes guts, and I can respect that.
Lisa Boyes, Grinnell
Grassley is too unreliable to serve
Sen. Chuck Grassley, after watching you at the town hall meeting in Franklin County, I was reminded of an old car I use to have. It was a good old car for a lot of years but then it became too undependable to take me where I needed or wanted to go, so I sent it to the back 40 to rest in peace. You, sir, have become just like that old car, too undependable to do what Iowans want and need done in Washington. It is past time for you to resign or retire so that someone else can be our senator and do what needs to be done in Washington and that is stop Donald Trump and Elon Musk before they totally destroy our democracy and our country.
Duane Mortensen, Ankeny
People are dying because of USAID shutdown
Presidents Donald Trump and Elon Musk attempted to shut down the U.S. Agency for International Aid (USAID) which finances overseas foreign aid, disaster relief, and international development programs. A federal judge recently ruled their actions “likely violated the U.S. Constitution multiple ways.” Although Musk falsely claimed that “no one died as a result of a brief pause to do a sanity check on foreign aid funding,” people died.
One of the programs cut was PEPFAR, a program started by President George W. Bush, that saved 26 million lives from AIDS. As Nicholas Kristof, a journalist on the ground in South Sudan, reported, one of those who died was a 10-year-old who was infected with HIV from his mother during childbirth. He was unable to get his medicines due to the pause in funds. As a result, he died in late February. The health outreach worker who managed his care said, “If USAID would be here, he would not have died.”
In South Africa, where more than 7 million people are HIV positive, it has been estimated that ending PEPFAR would lead to more than 600,000 deaths over a decade in that country alone.
USAID is just one of the many programs and agencies that Trump and Musk are blindly and unconstitutionally trying to destroy. Make no mistake, the rule of law and our democratic freedoms are under attack.
Thomas Hill, Cedar Falls