Iowa
Over 30K Iowa students OK’d for education savings accounts
DES MOINES — More than 30,000 Iowa students have been approved for a state program to use state dollars to pay private school tuition in the upcoming school year, Gov. Kim Reynolds said Friday.
The numbers indicate an increase of more than 11,000 students from the 2023-24 school year. It’s about 10,000 more than the nonpartisan legislative services agency estimated would participate when the law was passed in 2023.
The Republican governor made the announcement at the annual Family Leadership Summit hosted by the conservative evangelical organization The Family Leader during a conversation with Betsy DeVos, the former U.S. secretary of education under then-President Donald Trump.
The state received 35,417 applicants for the program before the June 30 deadline, Reynolds’ spokesperson Kollin Crompton said. Applications are still being reviewed, but more than 30,000 have been approved so far.
Approved students will be able to use their full per-pupil state funding to pay for tuition at an accredited private school. Not all of those students may end up attending a private school with the funds. If a student does not attend a private school, the account is closed and the money remains with the state.
During the conference, DeVos praised Reynolds’ push to pass the education savings account program. Reynolds endorsed primary challengers to Republicans who opposed a narrower version of the plan in 2022, many of which lost their primaries to candidates who supported the program.
“She really did set a new tone when taking on members of her party who refused to make that step to give families more power,” DeVos said. “And it was not without a lot of difficulty and a lot of political capital, shall we say. But clearly she knew where her constituents in Iowa were and are on that subject.”
Reynolds said the COVID-19 pandemic, when instruction was moved primarily online and parents had a closer view of educational instruction, solidified her support for private school choice initiatives.
She said the program will give families who otherwise could not afford private school the opportunity to send students to a school that best fits their needs. About 60 percent of the approved applicants last year already attended private school, while 40 percent were public school students.
“We had school choice prior to this … but it was only if you had the means to do that,” Reynolds said. “And that is just not right. It’s not fair. And so I forged on a mission to get things turned around.”
Reynolds said she believes her education policies will improve public schools as well as private schools. She pointed to open enrollment changes, a teacher salary increase and literacy standards passed in this year’s legislative session as examples of improvements to public schools under her administration.
The education savings account program was Reynolds’ top policy priority in 2023, and one of several education changes she has pursued in recent years as governor. The program cost the state about $128 million last budget year.
This year, Reynolds signed a bill into law that overhauls the state’s area education agencies, which provide special education support to Iowa school districts. The law also increased the minimum teacher salary to $50,000 by the 2025-26 school year.
Under the law, funding that now goes to the AEAs will eventually go directly to school districts, and they will need to contract with the AEAs to provide special education services. AEA funding for media and other education services will go directly to the school districts, which can spend it on any general fund purpose outside the AEAs.
Reynolds calls DeVos role model
DeVos served as the U.S. secretary of education under Trump from 2017 to 2021. She is a strong proponent of private school choice policies and has led several conservative education think tanks.
Reynolds said DeVos has been a role model for her and said she was inspired by DeVos’ work as secretary of education.
“You never backed away from your beliefs or what you went there to do and I thought if she can do this at the federal level, I could do this at the state level,” Reynolds said.
Reynolds in May denied suggestions, first reported in the Daily Caller, that she was interested in serving as secretary of education in a potential second Trump administration.
The conservative outlet attributed an unnamed spokesperson who said Reynolds may be interested in the position. But Reynolds said the report “mistook the way I talk about education” as being interested in the job.
“I am passionate about education. I’m proud of what we’re doing,” Reynolds said at the time. “I mean, it started with STEM, it started with registered apprenticeship programs, literacy, parental choice. So I’ve got a lot of work to do as governor.”
Democrats have opposed many of Reynolds’ education policies, saying they will weaken public schools and funnel taxpayer dollars to unaccountable private institutions. In a statement, Iowa House Minority Leader Jennifer Konfrst, D-Windsor Heights, said the Iowa GOP has gone too far in its education policies.
“Iowans are sick and tired of politics. Governor Reynolds celebrating her voucher bill with billionaire Betsy DeVos and the special interests today is a huge reason why,” Konfrst said in a statement. “Iowans overwhelmingly oppose vouchers because public money is for public education. They don’t want more public schools to close and they sure don’t want their kids to lose access to special education services.”
DES MOINES, Iowa (Gray Media Iowa State Capitol Bureau) — U.S. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson told Gray Media Iowa that he got briefed late Thursday afternoon, a few hours before President Donald Trump gave a prime-time speech to make his latest claims about election fraud.
“Yeah, I just got off of a telephone call literally in the motorcade as we were driving here,” Johnson said after arriving at a campaign appearance with U.S. Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R – 1st District, Ottumwa) at a Pella bakery.
Miller-Meeks is running for re-election in what is again considered a competitive race with Democrat Christina Bohannan, a University of Iowa law professor from Iowa City.
This is the third straight election that the two will meet in a general election.
Johnson said the “off the record” intelligence briefing to leaders in the U.S. House and Senate previewed Trump’s new election fraud claims. He called it “blockbuster information.”
“It’s the result of an investigation that’s been ongoing for some time now about fraud and irregularity in in federal elections, American elections around the country,” Johnson said.
Gray Media Iowa asked Johnson whether he believes congressional colleagues were elected because of fraud.
He did not directly answer that question.
“…everybody’s going to be able to evaluate all that information on their own, and it will lead to other investigations, I’m certain,” Johnson said of the briefing.
He added, “we’ll have to see where all this goes.”
For years, Trump has alleged widespread fraud that cost him the 2020 election. Trump has lost dozens of court cases on the matter.
On January 7, 2021, Congress certified his defeat to Democrat Joe Biden, a day after Trump supporters rushed the U.S. Capitol Building. Some attacked law enforcement officers and damaged the outside and inside of the building.
After returning to office in 2025, President Trump pardoned supporters for their crimes.
Copyright 2026 Gray Media Iowa State Capitol Bureau. All rights reserved.
With the college football season right around the corner, the Iowa State Cyclones will be hoping to have a strong campaign with a new regime coming in. However, a lot of their success might depend on one key player.
Following the departure of Matt Campbell to the Penn State Nittany Lions, the Cyclones saw their roster get completely gutted. Most of their players entered the transfer portal, leaving new head coach Jimmy Rogers with plenty of work to do.
Fortunately, Rogers and the coaching staff were able to get out there and bring in a lot of new players from all over the country. While Iowa State might be lacking star power and aren’t going to be as talented as they were last year, they do have a good amount of depth.
There should be quite a bit of competition for spots in camp, but there are some players who should clearly be starters that transferred in.
Pete Nakos of On3 recently predicted who would be the starting quarterback for every team in the Big 12. Unsurprisingly for the Cyclones, it was Jaylen Raynor who was the choice.
Raynor an Easy Pick
After bringing in the three-year starter from the Arkansas State Red Wolves, Raynor instantly became the favorite to be the starter for the Cyclones in Week 1. Him being predicted as that guy should come as no surprise, and his ability to play against elevated competition on a weekly basis will be key.
There is a lot to like about Raynor’s game, and he could certainly help Iowa State exceed expectations next year.
Last season with the Red Wolves, he totaled 3,361 passing yards, 19 passing touchdowns, and a 66.5 completion percentage. It was career-highs for him in all three of those categories, showing some nice improvement in his junior season.
As a dual-threat player, he also totaled a career-high in rushing yards and rushing touchdowns. The junior recorded 423 yards on the ground to go along with seven rushing scores.
Overall, the numbers for Raynor were really solid, and there is reason to believe he might be even better in his senior season. For the Cyclones, with all of the new players on the roster, there will undoubtedly be some competition for starting spots around the field. However, it should certainly be Raynor who is under center to start.
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CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (KCRG) – Syringes from injectable weight loss medications are turning up in drug drop-off boxes across eastern Iowa, creating a safety hazard for law enforcement officers who handle the containers.
Sgt. Erich Lear of the Linn County Sheriff’s Office said emptying the drug drop-off box is part of his daily routine — and the box fills fast.
“It’s probably a 30-gallon tote, and I’d say 3 out of the five days of the week it’s completely full,” Lear said.
Needles found mixed in with other medications
Lear said he has noticed over the past five years that people are placing medicine, nasal sprays and syringes in the bin. He said many of the syringes come from people discarding GLP-1 medications such as Ozempic and Wegovy.
“That tote that I pull out — there’s nothing that protects me from needles other than my observation and using gloves when I sort through things,” Lear said.
The Hiawatha Police Department said it is also seeing an increase in improperly discarded syringes.
Where syringes should go
The Cedar Rapids Linn County Solid Waste Agency is the proper disposal site for sharps. The agency said it has seen syringe intake increase by more than a ton in recent years.
“We’re talking about two thousand pounds of sharps and syringes coming in,” said Joe Horaney of the solid waste agency. “Before 2021 we were around 1.9, maybe 2 tons a year — now we are over 3 tons a year.”
Horaney said any Linn County resident can bring syringes to the facility, provided they are contained properly.
“We just ask that you have it in a heavy plastic container — so one of those medically certified red biohazard containers,” Horaney said. “If you don’t have that, it can be a heavy plastic container like an old laundry detergent [bottle].”
A third-party company picks up the sharps from the facility and incinerates them.
Some drop-off programs discontinued
Lear said another reason sharps are appearing at drop-off locations is that some agencies have ended their disposal programs. The Marion Police Department said it stopped offering the service after people continued to place broken glass, liquids and other garbage inside the box.
Copyright 2026 KCRG. All rights reserved.
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