Help Tracy Freese for State Senate before the April 10 Special Election and Other News

Tracy Freese is our candidate to replace Bill Dix
in Iowa Senate District 25 – learn more, sign up to help,
and contribute at www.tracyfreese.com

Dear Friends:

Since my last campaign update, the Senate Republican Leader, Bill Dix, resigned, triggering a special election on Tuesday, April 10, in Iowa Senate District 25 (all of Hardin and Grundy Counties, and parts of Story and Butler Counties).

We have a great candidate who has been running to replace Bill Dix since last July. Her name is Tracy Freese. I first met Tracy last May at a Grundy County Democrats’ social event in Reinbeck. She and her husband, Ben, who is a Grundy County native, live in Grundy County with their three school-age children. Tracy is a small business owner.

Tracy promises to bring “young, progressive ideas” and “economic innovation” to rural Iowa to end the brain drain and “give young people a reason to stick around.” As Tracy says, “Our sons and daughters deserve economic opportunities and a better quality of life.”

Tracy is a real dynamo – a millennial dynamo – who can revitalize rural Iowa and get Iowa going forward in a progressive direction. She is exactly the person we need in the Iowa Senate after the resignation of Bill Dix.

You can like and follow her on Facebook to learn about volunteer opportunities:
https://www.facebook.com/tracyafreese/

You can learn more and contribute financially at her web site:
https://www.tracyfreese.com/

You can also send a check payable to “Tracy Freese for Senate” to:
Tracy Freese for Senate
P.O. Box 361
Stout, IA 50673

I have already contributed to Tracy’s campaign. Please join me in supporting Tracy Freese over the next 16 days, and please send me an email at senatorrobhogg@gmail.com to let me know if you can contribute financially or volunteer.

Advocacy Alert – Ten Action Items for This Week

Iowans have been speaking up to stop bad proposals this year, and so far we have stopped several bad ideas: (1) a bill to end IPERS as we know it (SF45), (2) a bill to wipe out Iowa’s permit system for guns (SF2016), (3) a bill to require a Supreme Court super-majority to invalidate a statute (SF2282), (4) a bill to allow religious exemptions to civil rights, criminal laws, and other statutes (SF2238), and (5) a worker’s compensation bill (SF2305) that would have created a million-dollar agency to prosecute unsupported claims as felony crimes.

Thanks to everyone who has been speaking up. Unfortunately, we have a lot more work to do to stop as many bad things as possible. Here are 10 action items for this week:

1. Contact Governor Reynolds’ office (515-281-5211) to urge her to item veto the mid-year budget cut bill to stop cuts to our universities ($10.9M), our community colleges ($500K), and corrections ($3.4M).

2. Contact Governor Reynolds’ office (515-281-5211) to ask her to oppose legislation to gut our energy efficiency programs and, if necessary, veto those proposals (SF2311 and SSB3078).

3. Contact State Representatives (515-281-3221) to oppose the bill to gut energy efficiency programs (SF2311) – this bill is now pending on the House floor.

4. Contact State Senators (515-281-3371) to oppose the other bill to gut energy efficiency programs (SSB3078) – this bill is now pending in Senate Ways and Means Committee.

5. Contact State Senators (515-281-3371) to oppose the bill (SSB3206) for so-called “education savings accounts” for private school students – this bill is now pending in Senate Appropriations Committee.

6. Contact State Representatives (515-281-3221) to oppose the Senate Republican Tax Scam bill (SF2383) that would cut taxes for the wealthiest Iowans and raise taxes on solar power and credit unions – this bill is now pending on the House floor.

7. Contact State Representatives (515-281-3221) to oppose the so-called critical infrastructure sabotage crime bill (SF2235) that would make certain peaceful protesters Class B felons – this bill is now pending on the House floor.

8. Contact State Senators (515-281-3371) to oppose the bill (SF2081) to shift the cost of the 2013 commercial property tax cuts to local governments and community colleges – this bill is now pending in Senate Appropriations Committee.

9. Contact State Representatives (515-281-3221) to oppose the bill (SF481) that would impose an unfunded mandate on local governments to enforce federal immigration laws, and jeopardize the ability of law enforcement to work with undocumented people – this bill is now pending on the House floor.

10. Contact State Representatives (515-281-3221) to oppose the bill (SF359) that is being amended to ban abortions after six weeks, without exceptions for rape, incest, fetal deformity, or the woman’s health – this bill is now pending on the House floor.

You can also email Representatives and Senators or call their personal phone numbers available at www.legis.iowa.gov.