Stories

U.S. Rep. Steve King is hoping to derail health care reform legislation scheduled to be debated in the U.S. House by trying to harness the Tea Party protests that took place throughout the summer and once again bringing them to the nation’s capital on Saturday.
King announced Friday that “will join his Republican colleagues and Americans [...]

Republican Study Committee Chairman Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.) today introduced — along with 75 other Republicans — a resolution to officially commemorate the 9/12 taxpayer march on Washington. Other sponsors of H.R. 870 include Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.), Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa.), and Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.), the party’s whip.
The odds of passage–which would demand [...]

Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley has no aprehension going into a full day of town hall forums scheduled for Wednesday, despite reports of rowdy crowds at forums across the country.
Grassley will be in Winterset, Afton, Panora and Adel Wednesday to meet with his constituents. The August recess has been marked by protesters repeatedly disrupting town hall [...]

Crowd counting is more art than science, and media coverage of yesterday’s tea party protest in Des Moines bears that out.
The Des Moines Register reported yesterday that the crowd numbered about 1,000.  In the version of the story up today, that number has been increased to 3,000.  Radio Iowa reports the same number.
Neither story cites [...]

DES MOINES — Wednesday’s “tea party” protest at the state capitol did not actually involve much tea, but it gave a wide variety of conservative constituencies a soapbox to voice their concerns. The crowd, numbering around 700 people, brandished placards of all kinds, ranging in subjects from immigration to global warming to the Federal Reserve.

With legislators working to adjourn the 2009 session as quickly as possible, conservative groups with a long list of grievances will gather all week trying to make their voices heard.