Iowa Catholic Conference Newsletter, March 14, 2026

This week is the final “funnel” deadline. Legislation must have passed a chamber and then a committee in other chamber by Friday to stay alive for the session. Most committee work will come to an end except for Appropriations and Ways and Means. The deadline doesn’t apply to budget or tax bills. Although time is short, we’re making one last push in support of some legislation.

The Coalition of Pro-Life Leaders and the Iowa Catholic Conference (ICC) support HF 2563, which would prohibit “black market” abortion drugs being sent to Iowa without a doctor’s involvement. While we don’t support abortion, we do want to limit the harm of abortion as much as possible.

Please send a message to your legislator today asking this bill to move forward.

A legislator has filed an amendment to the bill that would allow for women who have an abortion to be prosecuted for first-degree murder. The Coalition of Pro-Life Leaders said in response, “this amendment will kill a pro-life bill that would protect women and save the lives of babies in the womb.” This is because for political reasons some Republican legislators don’t want to vote on the amendment.

The coalition and the ICC will continue to support measures that limit abortion as much as possible when a complete ban is not politically feasible.

Iowa Health and Human Services has released the most recent report on the Vital Statistics of Iowa. This data covers 2024 and shows that the number of abortions in Iowa dropped from 2,771 in 2023 to 1,792 in 2024, a 35% decline. This data includes chemical but not mail-order abortions. The ICC attributes this great news to the 2023 passage of the law which prohibits abortions after a heartbeat can be detected.

Another bill the ICC is still trying to get past the deadline is HF 2672, which would allow Iowans to subscribe to a shared, local solar project. This means congregations, families, and community members who cannot install solar on their own roofs could still benefit from locally generated clean energy and get a little off their electric bill. Click here for our action alert. 

We will most likely have some updated action alerts next week once we know what legislation has passed the deadline.

Last week at the Statehouse

Several bills passed a chamber with the support of the ICC:

• HF 571, the “Med Act,” which provides additional conscience protections for medical professionals, passed the Senate and was sent back to the House with an amendment.

• HF 2694 passed the House and was sent to the Senate. It would prohibit the government from closing churches during an emergency. An amendment to the bill would not allow the governor to change election dates or require people to receive a vaccination.

• HF 2696 would expunge (remove) some convictions of crimes committed by people who have been trafficked. The proposal recognizes that victims were subject to coercion and abuse when in captivity. Removing these records should make it easier for victims to get a job or housing. Iowa is one of three states that do not expunge some convictions. The bill passed the House.

Unfortunately, HF 2716 also passed the House. The bill includes a provision to exclude undocumented people and some others with work authorization from the WIC nutrition program. We are hopeful the bill will not advance out of a Senate committee this week.

Several subcommittee hearings were held last week on bills of interest. In the Senate:

• HF 2542 passed a Judiciary subcommittee. It would require certain habitual offenders to serve a minimum sentence of at least 20 years in prison. The ICC opposes the bill, understanding that while some people need to be locked up, requiring mandatory sentences will not allow judges to consider individual circumstances. The bill would certainly increase the Department of Corrections budget, perhaps without a long-term drop in crime.

• HF 2711, which repeals state affirmative action programs and anti-bias training requirements for law enforcement, passed a Judiciary subcommittee. The ICC opposes the bill.

• The ICC supports HF 2557, passed by a Judiciary subcommittee. It would protect a parent’s right to raise their child according to the child’s biological sex. In more than one state, a child has been removed from their parents’ home because the parent would not agree to “transition” the child.

• A Senate Local Government subcommittee passed HF 2296, which prohibits local communities from having an ID card of their own. The ICC opposes the bill, having seen no evidence that such IDs harm public safety.

In the House:

• A House Ways and Means subcommittee passed HF 2323, which provides tax credits for donations to maternity homes and for a “strong families” fatherhood support project.

• HF 2308, requiring state participation in the new federal “Education Freedom Tax Credit,” also was advanced by a House Ways and Means subcommittee. The federal law provides a tax credit of up to $1,700 per taxpayer for donations to K-12 scholarship funds for public or private school, or home school. Those funds can be made available by scholarship granting organizations to students from a household with an income not greater than 300% of the area’s median gross income.

The ICC is monitoring various property tax reform proposals, which generally put a 2% cap on revenue from property taxes for local government. SSB 3001 passed out of the Senate Ways and Means Committee last week.

Now that the Revenue Estimating Conference (REC) has released its March revenue estimate, legislators will begin work in earnest on the state budget. The REC said on Thursday that state revenues are expected to decrease by 9.3% from fiscal years 2025 to 2026. It looks like it’s in large part due to lower corporate tax rates that were passed by Congress last summer and reflected in Iowa’s tax code. It is expected that the legislature will take more than a billion dollars from the Taxpayer Relief Fund to balance the budget.

Please use our ICC Action Center to contact your legislator about any of the above bills.