A racial equity group is urging the city of Burlington to sever ties with a bank because of an official’s Facebook post. The Black Leadership Council is outraged that Burlington is still doing business with Farmers & Merchants Bank & Trust after a vice president, Lisa Walsh, used a racist slur against Kamala Harris in a November Facebook post. The Walsh family owns 53% of the bank. Walsh has been placed on administrative leave. Burlington Mayor Jon Billups says he has been discussing the issue with F&M.
Another 71 people died in Iowa of the coronavirus and there were 1,425 new confirmed cases of the virus in the 24-hour period ending yesterday morning. The state Department of Public Health says the additional deaths raised the total number of virus-related deaths to 3,739. The number of confirmed cases now stands at 272,444. Data from Johns Hopkins University shows that in the past 14 days, Iowa has reported 691.7 new confirmed cases per 100,000 people. That ranks the state 40th nationally during that period.
An Iowa City woman is facing a felony charge accusing her of neglect that led to an elderly woman’s death. 54-year-old Tara Edwards was arrested Wednesday morning on one count of intentional dependent adult abuse causing serious injury. The Johnson County Sheriff’s Office says it began an investigation in February into the death of a 72-year-old woman who suffered from several conditions that prevented her from caring for herself. Authorities say Edwards was the woman’s primary caregiver and say Edwards failed to fill the woman’s prescriptions, failed to take her to medical appointments and failed to provide necessary nutritional supplements.
According to an Associated Press investigation, Iowa’s attorney general has not convicted a police officer for improperly using force since at least 2004, which was the earliest date for which records are available. Attorney General Tom Miller’s office only pursued charges against two officers out of 35 force cases it reviewed, and both of them were ultimately acquitted. Prosecutors who have a history of declining to charge police are now facing scrutiny of their records following a summer of mass protests calling for so-called accountability.
Iowa’s Second Congressional District is perhaps the closest election in the country this year…with Republican congresswoman-elect Mariannette Miller-Meeks defeating Democrat Rita Hart by six votes out of 394-thousand cast. But Hart is asking the Democrat-controlled U.S. House to overturn the election, saying 22 ballots were wrongly excluded. But on TV’s Fox and Friends program Wednesday, Miller-Meeks criticized the move. Miller-Meeks noted that the certification process in Iowa was already fair and decisive. This is the closest congressional race in the U.S. since 1984 when an Indiana Democrat won in that state’s 8th district by four votes. There are calls within the Democrat Party to remove Nancy Pelosi as Speaker in favor of a new leader. Miller-Meeks noted that can happen automatically if Republicans take the majority in the House in the 2022 elections. A Morning Consult-Politico poll found 56 percent of voters say it is time to replace Pelosi now.
