Bills boomeranged between the Iowa Senate and Iowa House throughout the final weeks of the 2026 session as legislators added tweaks, or sometimes full rewrites, to bills that had passed the opposite chamber. The amendments set up a flurry of procedural jargon in debate as senators and representatives “concurred,” “refused to concur,” “receded,” and “insisted,” occasionally tripping up the House speaker or Senate president on a given day.
The wordsmithing concluded when the session ended for good on May 3. Here is an evaluation of whether the fine-tuning got the Legislature to a better place on five bills that passed ― and one that didn’t ― in the final few days of debate.
Three-strikes law: An unnecessary bill was, at least, moderated
The first version of House File 2542 would have set an uncompromising standard for how repeat criminal offenders are sentenced. That could have ballooned prison populations for the sake of, at best, marginal benefits to public safety. A Senate revision decreased the penalties significantly, producing a still-misguided but less-damaging bill. “Not as bad” can be a victory when evaluating new laws.
Vape tax: We needed a higher cigarette tax, too
Money from a new tax on vapor and nicotine alternative products in Senate File 2480 will help fund pediatric cancer research, which is welcome, as is discouraging vaping and related products. But it’s galling that lawmakers couldn’t bring themselves to tax cigarettes in the same way, as earlier proposals this year would have done. A win for lobbyists, a loss for Iowans.
Restrictions on the governor’s powers: House squelches a bad idea for the state budget
House File 2694 says that even during an emergency the governor may not regulate a place of worship or require businesses to close. Gov. Kim Reynolds did both briefly in 2020 because of COVID-19. The Iowa House refused to accept the Senate’s proposal for allowing state government to keep running even if legislators don’t send the governor a new annual budget. That was prudent, as there should be an incentive for the legislative and executive branches to reach agreement. But the overall bill would have been better served by requiring that emergency orders be ratified more often by legislative leaders, instead of codifying a failure of imagination (the idea that no possible future emergency could ever justify shutdown orders).
Charter school bill: Republicans sneak in a terrible expansion of oversight-free homeschooling
House File 2754 is mostly composed of Reynolds’ priorities to direct more public funding to charter schools and make other regulatory changes. While the editorial board isn’t fully supportive, those moves are mostly tolerable. But the House made the bill far worse by taking Iowa’s least accountable form of education, independent private instruction, and removing almost all of the few guardrails that existed, including the limit that such unmonitored homeschooling involve no more than four unrelated children. These provisions had been in their own bill that did not advance earlier in the session. It borders on incomprehensible that Iowa continues to bless no-check-ins-ever homeschooling after the horrifying abuse deaths of Sabrina Ray and Natalie Finn. There is tension between protecting freedom for parents and recognizing that that freedom can be appealing to abusers. State law should not resolve that tension with a blasé shrug.
License plate readers: Lawmakers’ good work goes to waste, for now
Senate File 2284 could have been one of the session’s high points for collaboration and thoughtful deliberation, as senators and representatives worked over four months to balance the usefulness to law enforcement of automated cameras that read license plates and the obvious privacy concerns the readers pose. Instead, the bill fell by the wayside after the Senate added some mostly cosmetic changes on April 30 to the House version. The House never took the bill back up in the final three days of the debate. Now lawmakers will have to start over in 2027.
Lowering flags: A victory for pique
Although Senate File 2430’s text didn’t change from Reynolds’ proposal to final passage, it still rates as the Legislature’s biggest waste of time this year. The law will allow the attorney general to sue if a local government ignores the governor’s proclamation to lower U.S. and Iowa flags to half-staff. A Johnson County supervisor saying he didn’t want to lower the flag after the 2025 political assassination of Charlie Kirk prompted the move. The only thing worse than the supervisor’s indiscreet choice is this petty bill, which should be Exhibit A for people wanting to argue the Legislature should have devoted time to their pet issue this year.
Lucas Grundmeier, on behalf of the Register’s editorial board
This editorial is the opinion of the Des Moines Register’s editorial board: Rachel Stassen-Berger, executive editor; Lucas Grundmeier, opinion editor; and Richard Doak and Rox Laird, editorial board members.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Legislature end had progress, setbacks and a waste of time | Opinion
Reporting by The Register’s editorial, Des Moines Register / Des Moines Register
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