November 17, 2022

2024 Presidential Race Reminds Us: States Matter

The midterm elections are over, so now the question is: Who will be the Democratic and Republican nominees for President in 2024? Americans will sort that out over the next 18 months. Assuming Joe Biden either declines to run again or is challenged in his own party, two sets of major-party candidates will work in the states to win their party’s nomination. The state-by-state nature of the contest is thanks to the Electoral College, even though the party nominating processes are different from the presidential election process.

Guest Columnist Owning Our Future
October 18, 2022

Protecting Our Right to Bear Arms

Support for a constitutional amendment protecting the right to bear arms has grown to 62.2 percent, with only 31.6 percent opposing. In February, ITR Foundation polled Iowans on whether they would support a constitutional amendment on the ballot in November to protect their right to bear arms. There was overwhelming support at that time, as 58.9 percent of those polled […]

ITR Foundation Owning Our Future
September 15, 2022

Senator Jack Whitver: Iowa’s Quiet Conservative

In recent years, Iowa has led the nation in conservative policy reforms. Governor Kim Reynolds rightly deserves a great deal of credit for her leadership in implementing pro-growth tax reforms, championing a student-first approach to education, fighting against the woke cultural Marxist agenda and leading Iowa responsibility through the pandemic. Nevertheless, Governor Reynolds has been able to achieve many of these great accomplishments because of a conservative legislature. Iowa Senate Majority Leader Jack Whitver is a “quiet conservative” who is not only an ally of the Governor but is a crucial leader who is advancing a conservative policy agenda.

John Hendrickson Owning Our Future
August 22, 2022

Lessons to Learn

This week on ITR Live, John and Chris cover a lot of ground from aquatic centers, the state fair, the latest CDC Covid-19 guidelines, and another history lesson. Many cities believe the magical solution to local economic development and to improve quality of life is to build aquatic centers and other recreational areas. However, many of these facilities are struggling […]

ITR Foundation Owning Our Future
August 16, 2022

It Was Right to Oppose NATO Expansion

By John Hendrickson In a vote of 95-1, the United States Senate approved the expansion of NATO (North American Treaty Organization) by allowing membership to two new nations Sweden and Finland. The only Senator to vote “no” was Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO). Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) voted “present.” In his floor speech before the vote Sen. Hawley made a powerful […]

John Hendrickson Owning Our Future
August 12, 2022

Trump Raid: Impartial Law or Political Manipulation?

In unprecedented fashion, the FBI raided former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, on behalf of the National Archives. Immediately, social media exploded with people taking a stand on both sides of the issue.  On this week’s ITR Live podcast, ITR President Chris Hagenow and ITR Foundation Policy Director John Hendrickson discuss why this is such a startling development. The law should be […]

ITR Foundation Owning Our Future
April 19, 2022

Foreign Acquisition of American Agriculture

The United States is growing more dependent on foreign nations for necessities, including potentially hostile nations such as China. As we examined last month, 2021 was the 10th straight year America’s trade deficit with the Chinese eclipsed $300 billion.  If that pattern is not alarming enough, though, there’s more worrisome activity being undertaken by China: the massive acquisition of American farmland.  By the United States Department of Agriculture’s own estimate, investments from China held $2 billion of American agricultural land at the beginning of 2020.

John Hendrickson Owning Our Future
March 25, 2022

Is the Media Skipping Facts and Promoting Agendas?

Somehow Hunter Biden has managed to make himself the common thread that ties together a war in Eastern Europe with everything people dislike about politics in America, while pointing to this country’s  collective and completely justified distrust of the media.   We are not suggesting that Hunter’s activities in Ukraine have anything to do with Russia’s invasion.  But if American citizens […]

ITR Foundation Owning Our Future
April 14, 2021

You Should Run for Local Office

By Alan Ostergren You should consider running for local office. No, really, you should. Later this year Iowans will elect representatives to school boards and city offices (county offices are elected in even-numbered years). These elections are nonpartisan and take little organizational effort to mount a campaign. Most of these elections are very low turnout, meaning that a person who […]

Alan Ostergren Contributing Scholars
March 22, 2021

A Republic, If You Can Keep It

The late intellectual historian Stephen J. Tonsor wrote that in America, “the Founding is determinative, and the Constitution stands at the very center of American political conservatism.” As Tonsor wrote: Central to conservative doctrine, and the translation of this doctrine into the politics of a particular time and place, is the fear of unchecked power and its centralization…It is for […]

ITR Foundation Editorial
June 3, 2020

Tough Budget Decisions Ahead

Iowa’s economy is reopening, but the economic impact of COVID-19 (coronavirus) is still uncertain. Iowa’s April unemployment rate was 10.2 percent because of business closures resulting from social distancing policies used to mitigate the virus. The economic impact of COVID-19 is still a fluid situation. One of the uncertainties is the impact of the virus on state and local revenues. […]

ITR Foundation Budget
May 12, 2020

Uncle Sam to the Rescue?

David Kennedy, prominent historian and Stanford University professor, in an interview with Governing discussed the COVID-19 (coronavirus) emergency in relation to the Great Depression. In that interview he stated, “[President] Calvin Coolidge said that if the federal government went out of business, the average person wouldn’t notice for six months, except for the post office. Now, the federal government is twice the size of the states all put together.”     […]

ITR Foundation Budget
April 9, 2020

Governor Reynolds: Protecting Iowans

The COVID-19 (coronavirus) national health emergency is requiring national sacrifice, the scale of which has not been seen in some time. Governors in each state are tasked with filling dual roles: providing up to date information to their citizens and coordinating resources and relief. Iowa’s Governor Kim Reynolds is demonstrating remarkable leadership in this crisis.   Even in times of […]

ITR Foundation Owning Our Future
April 3, 2020

Dependent on China

“Why can’t the greatest economy in the history of the world produce swabs, face masks and ventilators in adequate supply?” asked Larry Summers, who served as Secretary of Treasury under President Bill Clinton. If COVID-19 (coronavirus) is not scary enough, Americans are learning that, as a nation, we have become dependent on foreign countries for essential medicines and medical supplies. […]

ITR Foundation Owning Our Future
December 9, 2019

Iowa Needs a Medicaid Audit

Iowa needs to audit the Medicaid program to ensure that not only are the people who truly need the services are protected, but taxpayer dollars are not wasted.   Amity Shlaes, an economic historian and author of the just-released Great Society: A New History, argues correctly that the “lesson of the 1960s is that political compromises with progressives can be […]

ITR Foundation Federal
July 12, 2019

TEF Iowa Hosts Midwest Policy Summit

Five state policy organizations recently met to discuss principles that create opportunity and promote liberty.   TEF Iowa recently hosted and sponsored the second meeting of the Midwest Policy Summit. Policy organizations from Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, and Nebraska met to discuss public policy issues confronting the Midwest. Some of the policy topics at the Midwest Policy Summit included:   […]

ITR Foundation Owning Our Future
July 2, 2019

The Forgotten Word in Politics: Restraint

It has been almost 100 years since government has shown spending restraint. What can be done to slow down our $22,000,000,000,000 national debt?   The $22 trillion national debt symbolizes not only the broken budget process of today’s federal government, but decades of overspending by both Republicans and Democrats. MarketWatch recently reported how much the national debt has grown under […]

ITR Foundation Federal
July 2, 2019

We’re in the Money!

A pander bear should be the official mascot of the Democratic presidential debates. Never have so many candidates proposed so much spending. They are clearly trying to bribe voters to support the one who offers the most “free” stuff.   In 1935, Ohio’s Robert A. Taft described President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal as “one of those fabulous creatures of […]

ITR Foundation Federal