Republicans in the Iowa Legislature continue to introduce bills that would change how the school days would play out in K-12 public schools. Now in the first month of the session, there are proposals requiring students to daily sing the National Anthem and to place chaplains in schools.
An Iowa House subcommittee has advanced the National Anthem proposal onto the House Education Committee. At least one verse of the anthem would have to be sung in each class every day, and all four verses on patriotic holidays.
Representative Henry Stone, a Republican from Forest City, said he supports students being well versed in the anthem’s history and meaning.
Representative Sue Cahill, a Democrat from Marshalltown, opposes the anthem bill, saying schools teach civics and history, but patriotism cannot be forced.
In the Iowa Senate, supporters of giving K-12 districts the option of adding chaplains assert it would provide schools with another option to help teachers and students who are overwhelmed by stress or anxiety. The chaplains could be paid or be volunteers.
Background checks of the people serving as chaplains would be required, but there are no specified credentials and no requirements to have an educator’s license or endorsement. The measure moved out of a subcommittee onto the Senate Education Committee.
In another issue, a legislature panel has unanimously advanced a bill that would allow the state to help Iowans with disabilities vote via the absentee method.
It would enable the secretary of state to try out assistive technology so voters with disabilities could privately mark their ballot without someone’s help.
Iowans who are blind have been asking the Iowa Secretary of State for years to make it possible for them to independently vote in their homes.
Carlyn Crowe with the Iowa Developmental Disabilities Council says the in the IOwa House to create a pilot program is a step in the right direction
Additionally, Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds on Thursday said she agrees with the Texas Governor who is spurning a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that measures to secure the southern border at Mexico should not include razor wire.
In a social media post, Reynolds wrote, “When the federal government fails, states step in. Iowa sent the Iowa National Guard and State Troopers down to the border last year to stop this invasion. Iowa stands with Texas.”
Texas Governor Greg Abbott has said the federal government has not enforced the border against migrants crossing into the U.S., so Texas officials placed razor wire on the banks of the Rio Grande River.
Some migrants have been injured by the sharp wire and the Justice Department has argued the barrier impedes the U.S. government’s ability to patrol the border, including coming to the aid of migrants in need of help.
A divided Supreme Court on Monday allowed Border Patrol agents to resume cutting for now razor wire that Texas installed . Abbott has since said Texas has a constitutional right to defend itself, and Reynolds now says she agrees with that.
