Dear Friends,

LISTEN TO THIS WEEK’S PROGRAM, WITH CHARLES GOLDMAN AND ED FALLON:

(05:19) Trump and the fun factor.
(19:42) Are we headed toward autocracy?
(39:04) What’s next after the Iowa Supreme Court abortion ruling.
(54:31) Study on lab-grown meat contradicts claims of lower environmental impact, with Kathy Byrnes.

I welcome your feedback on any aspect of our June 19 program, but I want to focus here on last week’s abortion ruling. The Iowa Supreme Court’s split decision means that abortions in Iowa will remain legal up to twenty weeks. If the ruling had gone the other way, abortion would be illegal after six weeks — before many women even know they’re pregnant!

Undaunted, Governor Reynolds said after the ruling, “We are reviewing our options in preparation for continuing the fight.”

Charles and I discuss what those options might be:

1. VOTING OUT JUSTICES. Anti-choice radical (and Montgomery Burns lookalike) Bob Vander Plaats has threatened to oust the justices who voted to retain current law. He’s speaking from experience, because in 2010, three Iowa Supreme Court justices up for retention were booted after the Court’s unanimous ruling in support of marriage equality.

Sorry, Bob, it won’t happen this time. Only Justice David May is up for retention in 2024, and he voted for the six-week ban. The three justices Vander Plaats wants to oust — Waterman, Mansfield, and Christiansen — aren’t up for retention until 2028. Voters will have moved on by then.

2. IMPEACHMENT. Vander Plaats also called for Waterman, Mansfield, and Christiansen to be impeached. That’s more silly talk. After the marriage equality ruling, five Republican extremists in the Iowa House filed bills to impeach the four remaining Supreme Court justices. House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, also a Republican, quickly shot down that idea, because the Iowa Constitution allows for impeachment strictly in the case of “misdemeanor or malfeasance in office.” One’s displeasure over a Court decision hardly amounts to judicial malfeasance.

3. BALLOT MEASURE. In 2021, the Republican House and Senate passed HJR 5 to amend the constitution as follows: “To defend the dignity of all human life and protect unborn children from efforts to expand abortion even to the point of birth, we the people of the State of Iowa declare that this Constitution does not recognize, grant, or secure a right to abortion or require the public funding of abortion.”

For that proposed amendment to appear on the ballot in November, 2024, Republicans would have to pass the exact same language again next session. I’d be shocked if that happens. Governor Reynolds knows the public would vote it down. See the fate of anti-choice measures in South Dakota, Kansas, Kentucky, and Montana for details.

4. ABORTION LEGISLATION. Republicans could take another shot at a so-called “fetal heartbeat bill.” Maybe they’ll damn the torpedoes and take another shot at the six-week ban (which puts Governor Reynolds in a very uncomfortable position with regards to her ambitions for higher office). Maybe they’ll go back to a “life begins at conception” bill. They can’t do nothing — their base will revolt. Yet if they go too far, Democrats, most independents, and less-extreme Republicans will gain a key political advantage.

5. JUDICIAL “REFORM” LEGISLATION. In the closing hours of the 2019 session, Republicans passed a bill that gives Reynolds increased sway over how Supreme Court and appeals court judges are selected. I won’t dig into the weeds, but suffice it to say that Reynolds and her statehouse servants (i.e., the Republican leadership) regard that bill as unfinished business. Even though every member of the Iowa Supreme Court was appointed by a Republican governor, these justices aren’t falling in lockstep with the Reynolds agenda. Legislative changes that give Reynolds the rock-solid radical majority she craves could be accomplished without the kind of political fingerprints that could damage her DC aspirations.

I’ll leave you with an important caveat. The extent to which Republicans have gone to undermine the freedom of pregnant women has already landed the GOP a whole lot of political baggage. They’ll certainly keep pushing for even more draconian measures, in Iowa and across the country. Some of those measures may pass, and many people, especially mothers, will be hurt.

But the powerful can only go so far in negating personal freedom before the mass of people rise up and say, “Enough!” We’re already seeing that happen, and the groundswell for a restoration of sanity on abortion policy will only continue to build.

Thanks for reading, listening, and doing what you can to build a better work.

*******

In addition to our PODCAST, listen to the Fallon Forum on these affiliates:

– KHOI 89.1 FM (Ames, Iowa)
– KICI.LP 105.3 FM (Iowa City, Iowa)
– WHIV 102.3 FM (New Orleans, Louisiana)
– KPIP-LP, 94.7 FM (Fayette, Missouri)
– KCEI 90.1 FM (Taos, New Mexico)
– KRFP 90.3 FM (Moscow, Idaho)
– WGRN 94.1 FM (Columbus, Ohio)
– KKFI 90.1 FM (Kansas City, Missouri)

Please support the local businesses and non-profits who make this program possible. Click on their logos on the Fallon Forum website and in our weekly email, and visit Dr. Drake Family Psychiatry, Story County Veterinary Clinic, Bold Iowa, and Birds & Bees Urban Farm. Thanks to Des Moines Irish Session for providing our bumper music, and thank you for supporting the civil alternative to the shock jocks!

Ed Fallon