Gazette Daily News Briefing, August 31
This is Stephen Schmidt from the Gazette Digital News Desk, and I’m here with your update for August 31, 2023.
According to the National Weather Service it will be sunny with a high near 81 degrees on Thursday. On Thursday evening it should be clear, with a low near 52 degrees.
Iowa Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds said she will not reinstate COVID-19 restrictions as hospitalizations across the state increase and cases of a new coronavirus variant prompt masking requirements and other restrictions to reemerge at some colleges and businesses in other parts of the country.
In a statement issued by her office Wednesday, Reynolds said "concerned Iowans have been calling my office asking whether the same could happen here. My answer — not on my watch."
In recent weeks, COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations have been on the rise across the United States. This comes as the omicron variant EG. 5, recently designated as a “variant of interest” by the World Health Organization, became the newly dominant variant in the country.
The World Health Organization said it has not seen evidence of an increase in the severity of illness under omicron variant EG.5, but the appearance of a new "highly mutated" variant dubbed BA.2.86 — which the Washington Post reports threatens to be the most adept yet at evading the body's immune response — has raised questions among virologists and health officials about what the coming months could hold.
Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird has appealed a recent district court decision that would allow certain voting materials to be printed in languages other than English.
In a statement, Bird — a Republican — said the move is an effort to “protect election integrity and defend state law.”
The appeal follows a June court decision in which a district court judge ruled that county election officials could provide voters with non-English voter materials, like registration forms.
“The Iowa English Language Reaffirmation Act is clear; all official documents are to be written in English — including voter registration forms,” Bird said in a statement. “We look forward to arguing our case in court to uphold the Act and secure the integrity of our elections.”
The June decision overruled a long-standing interpretation of Iowa law that barred the state and counties from providing voter registration forms and other materials in languages other than English. The lawsuit was brought by the League of United Latin American Citizens of Iowa against Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate, the Iowa Voter Registration Commission and four county auditors.
The Supreme Court will either take up the appeal or send it to the state Court of Appeals to decide.
A Hiawatha man was sentenced to two and a half years in prison Monday on federal charges that he left threatening voicemail messages threatening to lynch an Arizona county election official and the Arizona Attorney General
Mark A. Rissi, 64, pleaded guilty in April to two counts of sending a threatening interstate communication.
Despite the Justice Department’s request for a 24-month sentence, U.S. District Judge Dominic Lanza, a Trump nominee, sentenced Rissi to 30 months in prison.
In court on Monday, Rissi’s attorney, Anthony James Knowles, told the judge that at the time of the calls, there was "a lot of misinformation being promulgated" by Rissi's family and the media leading them to believe Donald Trump had been cheated out of a 2020 election win.
At the sentencing hearing, Rissi stood when it was his turn to speak — and he expressed remorse, apologizing to the victims for the threats he had made.
