Muzzling the auditor

The Iowa Legislature has passed, and Gov. Kim Reynolds is expected to sign, a bill that would effectively strip the state auditor of subpoena power when investigating government agencies, and would bar court review. It’s a terrible idea that goes against Iowa’s long history of honesty and accountability in government, and it will lead to waste of taxpayer money.

The Republicans in control are trying to bury State Auditor Rob Sand, the only Democrat to hold statewide office. They fail to appreciate that Sand will use the law to portray himself as a crusader against government waste when he runs for governor. He will be able to say that Gov. Kim Reynolds conspired to obliterate the auditor’s investigative authority to expose government waste and corruption. Sand can build an effective campaign around that. They are shooting themselves in the foot, which is why Reynolds should veto the bill. She probably won’t because she is so intoxicated by power, and it follows the Florida playbook of hiding information from the public.

Iowa is not Florida. We have had long-tenured, scrupulous auditors like Richard Johnson and David Vaudt who kept state government on the up-and-up. Sand follows in their footsteps. None of them abused their office. We think Sand could have flexed more of his authority — on Medicaid privatization, for example, and on helping figure out where Storm Lake’s tax increment financing went. Sand, an attorney, is a calculating politician who has posed no threat. But the GOP views him as one, so much that it obscures their vision.

If you want to keep an eye on the rats, you need a hawk. If you want to drain the swamp, you need a plumber who can look at the hidden pipes. Legislators are doing what they can to keep the public out of their business, and by attacking Sand even conservatives are getting queasy. Shane Vander Hart, editor of the conservative website the Iowa Torch, this week urged Reynolds to veto the bill. “If the State Auditor were a Republican and not a Democrat, this bill would not have seen the light of day. But Rob Sand is not a Republican, so the Republican legislature want to tie his hands,” he wrote.

They may tie his hands but the bill also will give him a voice leading toward 2026. Voters may get tired of arrogance and elitism, and they also might get a stomach full of crazy laws that take this state backwards decades. Republicans are giving Sand precisely the platform he wants, so he can be seen as a moderate who is interested in the facts. Martyrs have a way of capturing the imagination.