Governor Terry Branstad.
The Iowa Supreme Court gave both sides until noon Monday to file their briefs in the stay against the new abortion law that Governor Terry Branstad signed into law Friday.
Branstad won’t predict whether the court will continue the stay. He says he never tries to predict what the court will do and says they will go through the normal procedure. Branstad says no matter what happens, the majority of the law is not impacted.
“I would point out it is only a portion of the bill that is the subject of this request for an injunction. That is the waiting period,” Branstad says. “The 20 weeks is not subject to the lawsuit, so we are very hopeful that it will be approved.” Student government leaders and the presidents of the three state universities said Monday that the state has not done enough to support higher education as they discussed a proposed tuition increase. Branstad says he had proposed spending more on higher education
“If the revenue had help up, I am sure the legislature would have approved. But the March revenue estimate was reduced again, was reduced substantially, and by law the legislature can spend only 99 percent of that estimate,” Branstad explains. “So, the legislature did what it had to do, it was painful.” The governor points out the students saw not tuition increase when the revenue was available.
“We had two-and-a-half years when we had not tuition increases. And if you go back to the Vilsack administration, there were years where there were double-digit increases, as much as 17 and 18 percent a year,” Branstad says. He says he hasn’t given up on higher education.
Branstad says he is very cognizant of the cost of higher education as he didn’t get his last student loans paid off until the first time he became governor. He says even with the increase being discussed, it is still only five percent and not the double digit increases of the past. Branstad made his comments during his weekly meeting with reporters.