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Gov. Kim Reynolds' 2018 Condition of the State Address

John Pemble
Governor Kim Reynolds speaks at the Iowa Capitol moments after becoming the state’s 43rd governor of the state. 5/24/2017";

Governor Kim Reynolds delivered her first Condition of the State address today. She succeeded Governor Terry Branstad and has not been elected to the office she holds, so this is an important moment for her.

“What a country and state we live in, where a small town girl from rural Iowa can become governor and have the opportunity to serve Iowans at the highest level," Reynolds says in her speech.

Reynolds calls for tax reform this coming legislative session, and she also addressed education funding, workforce development, mental health, Medicaid privatization, and rural broadband. Her full speech can be read here.

Following the speech, Charity Nebbe talks with Chris Larimer, associate professor of political science at the University of Northern Iowa. He says it sounds like a speech that reaches out to both sides, though it does begin by addressing conservative legislative wins on voter ID laws, and restricting abortion access and collective bargaining.

"It was not a hard-pitched conservative speech in the sense of really, putting it into the face of Democrats in terms of things that were done in 2017," he says. "Those issues were mentioned at the beginning of the speech, but then it was a little more bipartisan throughout the rest of the speech, and so I think that it could be an election year speech in that it’s not trying to push too hard one way or the other.”

The broadcast of the governor's address is made possible by Iowa Public Television.

Charity Nebbe is the host of IPR's Talk of Iowa