Clay Masters

Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden will have an advantage over the Senators running for his party’s nomination as President Trump’s impeachment trial begins Tuesday. The trial centers on the president pressuring Ukraine to investigate the Bidens. Iowa Public Radio’s Clay Masters sat down with the former vice president before a Saturday campaign event at Simpson College in Indianola.

Six Democratic presidential candidates faced off at a debate at Drake University in Des Moines Tuesday, less than three weeks ahead of the state’s first-in-the-nation caucuses. 

Six of the Democratic presidential hopefuls will debate in Des Moines Tuesday at Drake University. It is the first time there will be no candidates of color on the stage. The chairman of the Democratic National Committee is standing by the standards to make it on that debate stage.

Monday is the first day of the 2020 legislative session.  For the fourth session in a row, Republicans have control of the governor’s office, the House of Representatives and the Senate. Morning Edition host Clay Masters talks with IPR state government reporter Katarina Sostaric about what to expect this legislative session.

There are plenty of critics of the Iowa caucuses. This year, there's pressure from insiders and outsiders to change the process. On the seventeenth episode of Caucus Land, we'll talk about why some of those changes haven't happened with Lauren Chooljian, a host of the New Hampshire Public Radio podcast Stranglehold. Plus, conversations with two candidates: former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg and entrepreneur Andrew Yang.

Politicians around the country have been responding to President Donald Trump's order to kill Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani. This is also the case in Iowa, where the caucuses are now less than a month away.

Many of the Democrats were in the state this weekend, including two of the front runners: Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders.

In Waterloo, Former Vice President Joe Biden spent time calling possible supporters to see if he could count on their support on February 3.

He held a flip phone to his right ear. 

Entrepreneur and Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang is best known for his pitch for universal basic income, or the freedom dividend, where he’d give every American $1,000 a month. Yang talks about his signature policy and reacts to U.S. killing of Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani. 

South Bend, Ind. Mayor Pete Buttigieg finds himself polling in Iowa in the top tier among U.S. senators and a former vice president. The soon-to-be former mayor is a Rhodes Scholar and a military veteran, among other things. Buttigieg talks about foreign policy and healthcare with IPR Caucus Land co-hosts Clay Masters and Kate Payne in late December.

The Iowa Legislature is set to gavel in January 13, kicking off the third legislative session with Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds leading the state.

She wants to focus on policies that will help Iowans getting out of prison successfully re-enter the community. And a criminal justice reform committee appointed by Reynolds recently announced recommendations for that.

“We’re still working through that right now,” Reynolds said. “But I thought the list of recommendations that they proposed were a really good start.”

When Barack Obama ran for president in 2008, he defined marriage as “between a man and a woman." A decade later, that position would be almost unimaginable in this cycle’s Democratic presidential race. On the sixteenth episode of Caucus Land, we’ll talk about how the candidates are approaching LGBTQ policy. Plus, we’ll wade into the debate over whether Iowa is diverse enough to be first in the nation.

One of the surest ways to fire up Iowa Democrats at a campaign event? Bring up U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos. On the fifteenth episode of Caucus Land, we’ll hear how that outrage over K-12 policy is spilling over into presidential candidates’ plans. Plus, a conversation with Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren.

Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren has been doing relatively well in Iowa polls and has been talking about her Medicare for All proposal. She says she would phase it in during her first three years as president. Sen. Warren talks about insulating her healthcare plan from partisan whims of Congress, and the impeachment inquiry into President Trump, with IPR Caucus Land co-hosts Clay Masters and Kate Payne in early December.

President Trump built his 2016 campaign on stoking fears around immigration. Leading up to 2020, Democrats are running against his policies. On the fourteenth episode of Caucus Land, we’ll hear more about their immigration proposals. Plus, a look at a candidate who’s been campaigning in Iowa longer than anyone else this cycle.

The scientific community says the world must zero out greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. In response, Democratic presidential candidates are rolling out aggressive climate plans. On the thirteenth episode of Caucus Land, we'll talk about what it would take to meet those goals. And later, a conversation with Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders.

With less than three months until the Iowa caucuses, Democrats running for president are spending a lot more time campaigning in the state that leads the nominating process. That includes South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg who just finished an Iowa campaign tour on Monday. He drew sharp contrasts to Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren who has been rising in the state’s polls.

This weekend saw one of the largest events on the state’s political calendar: the Iowa Democratic Party’s Liberty and Justice Celebration. Thirteen presidential candidates took the stage in Des Moines Friday, but the campaigning didn’t end there: two dozen more events followed as candidates criss-crossed the state.

All the Democratic candidates have plans to tighten gun laws. Mass shootings have put the debate front and center. On the twelfth episode of Caucus Land, we’ll talk about the Democratic proposals with proponents, critics and experts. And later, a conversation with Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar.

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders nearly defeated Hillary Clinton in the 2016 Iowa caucuses. He’s running again in a much more crowded field in 2020. Sen. Sanders talks about his health, his Medicare For All healthcare plan and climate change with IPR Caucus Land co-hosts Clay Masters and Kate Payne before his first event back on the Iowa trail since his heart attack in early October.

Running a presidential campaign isn’t cheap and one of the first places candidates spend their money is Iowa. On the eleventh episode of Caucus Land, we’ll talk about recent fundraising numbers and what they tell us about the state of the race. Plus, a conversation with New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker.

Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar is running for the Democratic presidential nomination and regularly stresses the importance of working in a bipartisan fashion. Sen. Klobuchar talks about the importance of working across party lines and her background as a prosecutor with IPR Caucus Land co-hosts Clay Masters and Kate Payne on her campaign bus in Davenport.

Healthcare commonly polls as one of voters' top issues and political candidates have been running campaigns on it for years. This cycle, Democrats are having a very different conversation about how to fundamentally transform the way Americans get care. On the tenth episode of Caucus Land we talk about where candidates stand on healthcare and what their plans could mean for patients and providers.