Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird

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[Henderson] From DEI to crime, the environment, social media and more. Iowa's Attorney General Brenna Bird on this edition of Iowa Press.

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[Announcer] For decades, Iowa Press has brought you political leaders and newsmakers from across Iowa and beyond. Celebrating more than 50 years on statewide Iowa PBS. This is the Friday, September 19th edition of Iowa Press. Here is Kay Henderson.

[Henderson] Our guest on this edition of Iowa Press has been on the program before. Just as a resume refresher, she has been a county attorney. She's been legal counsel for Iowa governors. She worked for Congressman Steve King. A long time ago. And she has been Iowa's Attorney General since January of 2023. Attorney General Brenna Bird, welcome back.

[Bird] Yeah, thanks for having me.

[Henderson] Also joining our conversation are Katarina Sostaric of Iowa Public Radio and Erin Murphy of the Gazette in Cedar Rapids.

[Murphy] So, AG Bird, a lot of issues that we want to get to involving your office. But before we dive into those, I want to spend just a quick little bit of time on talking some election and politics stuff. Since we saw you last. You decided against running for governor and going to run for reelection as attorney general, and said, could you just kind of summarize what went into making that decision ultimately?

[Bird] Yes. Well, I've decided to run for reelection as attorney general because there's still some work left to do. And being born and raised on a farm, I just can't leave a job half done. So we have our cold case unit up and going, but it's new and it's just getting started. We also have some important lawsuits that I'd like to see through. For example, our lawsuit against the Bitcoin ATMs that are being used as a getaway driver when Iowans are being conned out of money. We're the first state in the nation that has filed that lawsuit. We've got a lot of other things that I'm working on as well. I enjoy working with our law enforcement and our prosecutors, getting to uphold our laws and constitution. So I'm excited to get to be running for for reelection and looking forward to hopefully another term.

[Murphy] Yeah. I'm curious, on caucus night. Gosh, 2024. President Trump, during his victory, said he thought that Brenna Bird would make a good governor someday. And we all know at this point what President Trump's opinion means in a Republican primary. I guess from our side of the aisle, it was a little surprising. The decision you made, if for no other reason than that did you have President Trump's support if you had decided to run for governor?

[Bird] Well, I sure do appreciate President Trump's support. And and I appreciate the support of many Iowans from around Iowa. But I'm fully committed to running for reelection as attorney general. I enjoy the job. I love helping people. That's part of why I went to law school, and I still have some work left to do.

[Murphy] And speaking of and then and then we'll move on here. There is going to be a primary for that gubernatorial race. There's already boy, what are we up to? Four Republican candidates. I think, for governor. Do you plan to endorse in that, or are you going to sit back and let that play out?

[Bird] Well, I haven't made any decision like that. I may very well not endorse anyone at all. That primary is still quite a ways away. Next June. That's an eternity in politics. So I'm focused on the work that I'm doing as attorney general and doing a good job.

[Sostaric] Also related to elections, your office is involved in prosecuting some non-U.S. citizens accused of voting in Iowa's elections. From what we've heard, there's been one conviction and one acquittal so far. In those cases, there were a few dozen people accused of voting in the 2024 election who were non-citizens. I guess why does it seem like it's kind of taking a while for these cases to come through, when it seems like maybe the evidence would be somewhat easy to collect for those?

[Bird] Well, to be clear, it's illegal under Iowa law and federal law for someone who's not a citizen to vote in our elections. And that's been a longstanding law. The legislature gave my office the responsibility to prosecute those cases. And and we have done that. I believe we filed charges in six separate cases at this point. Two have gone to trial, four are still awaiting trial. And it's important that election integrity is upheld in Iowa. It's certainly something that's important to me because we want to know that when Election Day comes and the votes are counted, that no illegal votes are mixed in with legal votes. Canceling a vote out, even if it's just one. Elections come down to some pretty tight margins sometimes, and we want Iowans to have faith in the outcome of their election. As to the legal process, there is a full investigation that takes place before it comes to our office and then our prosecutors review it and determine whether charges are appropriate. So the legal process, of course, does take some time. But we try to make sure those cases get the priority that they deserve.

[Sostaric] And why do you think the one person was acquitted in one of those cases?

[Bird] Well, it's always hard to say. As a prosecutor, when a jury returned a verdict of not guilty. But I respect the decision of the jury. That is the way our legal process works. And I will say this. There are times there's an acquittal, and it can be hard to know why that occurred. But I respect the decision of the jury. Our office, though, would not have brought charges if we didn't think it was appropriate under the law. So we stand behind bringing the charges, but we also respect the jury's decision.

[Murphy] Is there an appeal planned in that one?

[Bird] Well, it doesn't work that way for prosecutors. No, no. Yes.

[Sostaric] You and Secretary Pate sued the Biden administration last year for some voter citizenship data for certain voters. Now, the Trump administration has allowed is allowing states to use the same system with Social Security numbers to look up voters citizenship status. Does that are you dropping that lawsuit against the federal government, or what's the status of that?

[Bird] We are still working through that because we want to make sure that the system we have in place makes it easy for that kind of verification to happen, so that we can make sure that if someone is a new U.S. citizen, that they fully can enjoy their right to vote, but also to be sure that there is no illegal voting. We'd like to prevent it from happening in the first place, to make sure that there are no illegal votes in Iowa, if that's possible. So we're working through that right now with the administration to try to get a system in place that will work.

[Sostaric] So is Iowa using the same system at this point?

[Bird] That'd be a question for the secretary of State's office. Yeah.

[Henderson] You this week have issued a statement about free speech on college campuses. Why?

[Bird] Yeah. Well, I think that it is important to remember the value of free speech, even at a tough time like this. After Charlie Kirk's assassination, as he was speaking on a college campus, exercising his right to free speech, and people were peacefully assembled and listening and debating that free exchange of ideas was happening on the campus in Utah when he was assassinated. And that was a sobering moment for all of us. That wasn't something we thought would happen on a college campus. I think it with number of young people that I've spoken with it, it really took them off guard. And I want to be sure that while we mourn his death and we also grieve the fact that it was very quickly on social media and a number of children and other people were exposed to brutal photos that I think people shouldn't see. I certainly didn't look at them and did everything I could to avoid them and to shelter my son from them at a time like this. It's also important that we remember the importance of the First Amendment and what that means on a college campus, and I want to be sure that colleges and universities aren't going to use security costs to exercise an assassin's veto over conservative free speech on campus, that any security fee or other type of facility fee like that would be without regard to the message of the speaker, whether it's a conservative or liberal, political or nonpolitical, that we could have that free speech on campus. And I did that so that students know their rights and so that schools also understand how important it is to observe the principles of constitutional free speech.

[Henderson] This past week, the Board of Regents ordered Iowa, Iowa State and Uni officials to review comments made by staffers in the in the wake of Charlie Kirk's assassination for potential dismissal from employment at a state institution. The Attorney General's office has a lawyer who goes to all of the Board of Regents meetings and sits there and offers legal advice, so where's the First Amendment line in these cases?

[Bird] Yeah, I think this is something we need to talk about publicly because there is some confusion. There. Certainly, the First Amendment is very important. It's not absolute. As we all know, there's no First Amendment right to make a criminal threat. Or as they say in law school, shout fire in a crowded theater. That's a common example. There's no right that someone has to do that. But when it comes to the situations that the Board of Regents is reviewing at, the universities are reviewing. While I won't comment on any particular case, I would say each one is individualized and has to do with the employment policies of the university and the types of rules they have for their employees that are paid for with taxpayer dollars. So it's very different. Someone's speech rights at an employer than someone's free speech rights in the public square. They're very different analyses.

[Murphy] Speaking of investigations on our campuses, you've your office has been looking into DUI policies and some staff at the Regents universities. In your office's view, trying to work around the new policies passed by the legislature, signed into law by the governor at your fundraiser recently, you talked about that investigation is still ongoing, so I won't ask you about that specifically because I know you can't comment on that, but you talked about wanting to get to the bottom of this, and you said it looked on the surface at least, like I said, like staff were adhering to the letter of the law, but trying to figure out a way around it. When you say, I want to get to the bottom side, shine some sunshine on this, what, what what is your hope? What what do you mean by that?

[Bird] Well, I think you're talking about the situation where the governor filed the complaint with our office. Under Iowa law and our office investigates that to see what is going on and whether Iowa law has been complied with, I want to assure people that have asked me about this and those that are following the situation, that we are going to look into it fully and fairly, fairly get to the bottom of see what is going on, and then issue a public report so people can see what is happening. So that's exactly what I mean. The educational system is supposed to be about education, not indoctrination. And they certainly have to follow the laws that the legislature has passed.

[Murphy] So a public report, ultimately, any action would be up to the regents or the universities. Is that what I understand?

[Bird] That would probably be what happens. But I'm not going to prejudge what the conclusions are until the report has been issued.

[Murphy] Do you plan to make any sort of policy recommendations to the legislature regarding this specifically?

[Bird] We'll see where the where the facts lead us in the situation, and then we'll go where the facts take us.

[Sostaric] Over the summer. Your office announced some fines related to water quality violations by two companies. There was a $50,000 fine for AG TriStar for violating its permit 60 times, and then a total of $100,000 fine for a fertilizer spill that killed fish. Over 50 miles of the Nishnabotna River. How do you respond to environmental advocates who say that these fines are not big enough to match the scale of the environmental damage that was done?

[Bird] Yeah, well, as part of my duty as attorney general, I file lawsuits to enforce our laws. And those were two environmental lawsuits that I filed with respect to the fertilizer spill down in southwest Iowa. The maximum fine was $5,000 a day for 20 days, and they agreed to pay a $50,000 fine, as well as do some habitat mitigation that would cost about $50,000. There's another portion of that lawsuit at the federal level. This was the state one that I did that the federal lawsuit will compensate for the loss of habitat and animals in that habitat. And that lawsuit is still ongoing. It's with the federal government. Iowa, I believe it's Nebraska and Missouri are all involved there because they're all impacted. And the point I'm trying to make here is that when something is happening and it's very serious, like the two cases that you brought up, that's exactly when I filed those lawsuits. Get to the bottom of it. And then when we have an agreement, that agreement is enforced on the parties so we can make sure that going forward, there's not going to be a problem. And with the new co-op skill, that spill, that was a one time accident with very serious consequences. And they certainly have taken good steps. Now with AG TriStar. It had been happening for a while and that's why we stepped in and had them pay that fine. And that means from now on we will be able to monitor them along with the court to make sure they're complying with Iowa law. And there aren't any more polluting or discharges.

[Sostaric] Do you think the state needs to make it possible to have higher fines in some of these cases, because is that amount enough to encourage businesses to make sure that they're not polluting?

[Bird] I think, you know, ultimately that's up to the legislature, but I think it's helpful here because when we have a final consent order where the parties have come together, we don't have to wait for a long legal process. Instead, we can continue to enforce the agreement between the state and the company. And if there are any problems going forward, we can more swiftly come in and stop them. If we've got a bad actor that is continuing to pollute or discharge. So they could look at the fines. I think here it's also helpful that we have the consent that we have between the parties, where it's enforceable by a court and where they've made certain agreements that will be enforced in a court of law, should they violate that agreement to stop polluting.

[Henderson] You have proposed and the legislature has advanced a proposed amendment to Iowa's constitution about children's testimony in court against an alleged abuser. Not to get too much into the details about the Iowa Supreme Court ruling that prompted this. I'm just wondering, because it takes so long to amend Iowa's constitution, and it'll be a while before even that amendment would be presented to voters. If you found some sort of alternative, or if your office and others are holding on to cases and hoping the statute of limitations doesn't run out.

[Bird] Well, a couple of things there that I want to talk about, each prosecution has to be an individualized determination. And one of the things that I weighed as a county attorney was the impact on the victim and the safety of the victim, especially child victims. So the problem with the Supreme Court decision is that without that constitutional amendment for the long term, kids don't have the legal protections that they need in court. Most of the time, the child witnesses can testify in court. And that's certainly been my experience as a prosecutor. But there are times that the type of abuse that they have been through is so violent and so scarring, they are not able to sit in a courtroom within arm's length of the person who may have abused them physically or sexually, or one of their siblings. And so it's really important to have the option for closed circuit testimony. We decided to pursue a constitutional amendment because I want to know that we are making a permanent fix. That is what is best for Iowa kids. It returns it to the way it used to be before the Supreme Court struck it down. It protects everyone's rights, including the defendant's rights, but it makes sure that kids, if they need to, don't have to testify in the presence of their abuser.

[Henderson] There were some members of the legislature who suggested this could be fixed by some sort of agreement, stopping short of changing the constitution. But you argue otherwise.

[Bird] I do, I certainly consider that. And we looked at every possible way that we could protect kids and came to the conclusion that, based on the language in the Supreme Court decision, it was troubling. And it was not clear that any Iowa Code language would satisfy some of the concerns that the court had raised. And for that reason, we wanted to put it in the Iowa Constitution so that kids are protected. And on the other side of things, the way cases work, if you can imagine having a statute and hoping that it works after a trial where a child has had to testify, going all the way through the appeals system, which can take years, and then finally finding out at the end that the Supreme Court had struck it down, and that that child did not get justice. That was not a path that we wanted to go down. We wanted to make sure that we have a good solution for kids and that we're protecting children.

[Henderson] What's an update on the case that was involved in that Supreme Court ruling?

[Bird] Yeah, well, in that particular case. You know, that that impacted the ability to retry the case. I think I'm just going to leave it at that because some things that considerations of victims, I want to keep those things private, but I will I want to make this point generally, which is many times cases of horrific abuse of children, where children are witnesses, they may have witnessed months of abuse that led to the death of a sibling or a half sibling. It's something that's unimaginable. We can't imagine that something like that would happen in Iowa, but sometimes it does. And when you have that level of horrific abuse and a child has to sit on the witness stand and testify, sometimes they can't do that. And there are times that you cannot prove a case fully without the child's testimony, because someone who would do that to a child, they would not act that way in front of an adult, or they may have another adult who is covering for them. So at the end of the day, that means that the child doesn't get justice. We're not sure that kids and siblings are being kept in a safe home, like a foster home. And it does mean that cases would have to be pled down. It's one of the most difficult decisions a prosecutor has to make, but you have to do what is best for your victim to when you're trying to seek justice for them. So that's why it's so important.

[Murphy] Well, and some related talking about protections for young people. And you touched on earlier some of the stuff that was on social media after the Charlie Kirk assassination. I know your office has been involved in trying to ensure safety for young people in the social media space. There's been some legislation with how much further would you like to to address that kind of general topic? And again, I think it also comes back to Kay's question earlier about, you know, where where is that line between wanting to have protections in place, but also honoring, you know, a business's free, free speech?

[Bird] Yeah. Well, as a, as a mom and a prosecutor, it's really important to me that we're protecting kids and giving parents the tools they need to protect their kids and to make decisions about what kinds of technology they want their child to have, what's age appropriate, who their friends are on social media or on different gaming apps. So those are important tools to give parents. And that's exactly why we've sued TikTok. They said that the TikTok app was safe for kids. They rated it 12 plus. And when we conducted an investigation, we found content that was served up that was sexual in nature would encourage suicide, binge drinking, drug use, some things that definitely are not appropriate for that age range. So we think those parental labels need to be accurate. I also think that it's really important that parents and everybody, whether it's an adult or a child, knows when there's a change to something. They use an app or a game that could affect them. For example, Instagram making location data available and people had to opt out of that when they did an update. That's that's a big problem. People need to have the tools so that they can make informed decisions if they're adults, and if it's for a child, we need to be able to protect children. There are some good things about social media and gaming. I mean, obviously parents, I'm certainly always worried about too much screen time and making sure that games are age appropriate and not too much time is spent on them. But parents have to have those tools, and they have to know what their kids might be exposed to. You know, one area we're looking at right now is Roblox. Roblox allows adults access to kids that are on the Roblox platform, and there are some pretty scary games on there, including one that would allow someone to reenact the Kirk assassination, for example. Things that are definitely not age appropriate.

[Henderson] And also there's a lawsuit involving that application platform that involves an Iowa case and a kidnaping.

[Bird] Yes, yes. And that's, you know, that's exactly what I'm talking about here. One advice I would give to parents is to know what your kids are doing online, but go further and research the different games. If you're allowing your child to play a game, make sure it's age appropriate. Of course not. Violent. Take a look at it and make sure, as a parent, I look for the ones that allow me to choose if they're going to play a game online with one of their friends. I get to Pre-approve who they're going to play with because I want to make sure they're not playing with an adult or an unknown person. I personally choose people who are known to me. Now. Some of these applications, you don't know who's on the other side, even if they say they're 14 years old, you don't know that. And that's exactly what happened in the Iowa case that you're referencing.

[Murphy] Yeah, I'm sorry, really quick, because we're down to our last couple of minutes. But I wanted to ask you, you mentioned TikTok. Congress passed a law, and the federal Justice Department has not been enforcing it regarding TikTok, are you disappointed in that?

[Bird] No. I think that is going down its course. What we're doing here is we're suing under Iowa's consumer protection law, saying that if you tell parents it's good for kids 12 and up, it needs to be good for kids 12 and up. And if it's not, they need to rate that. It's an adult app so that a parent, when they're deciding whether their 14 year old should have that on their phone, can have that information and can make a good decision.

[Sostaric] We're running short on time, but I wanted to ask about the audit you did of victim services and some changes that you made to victim service programs. What impact have you seen of that? Do you have any examples?

[Bird] Well, that has been one of the most rewarding things about getting to be attorney general. After serving as a county attorney, getting to go all around the state. We're doing that again this year, going and doing listening sessions where we find ways to improve victim services with victim advocates and law enforcement and prosecutors. So we've doubled the pay for sexual assault nurse examiners. Those are the nurses that meet a sexual assault victim at the hospital and help them through the process. We've also provided them mileage so that they can go where they're needed, even if it's a bit of a drive. We are implementing a training program to increase the number of nurses who are out there to help people. So there are a number of things that have happened. We fixed the victim notifications so they make sense and don't send a warning that an offender has been released from jail when they've simply been transferred custody from jail to prison. But we're not finished yet. We're still making some important improvements and one of the ways that I can serve as attorney general and use my experience that I have as a prosecutor, is to hear from all parts of the state, all of our counties, and make sure that every single county is getting served, that we're doing the best that we can, that no domestic abuse victim has to go back to their abuser because they're worried about a lack of support.

[Henderson] We have about half a minute left. What about funding? You were at the legislature saying, we have a problem. Do we still have a problem with victim services funding?

[Bird] Well, the governor provided us with about $5.5 million, which was a miracle. And it it solved the whole funding problem that we had with the big federal cut under the Biden administration. Going forward, we don't see those cuts on the horizon. So that is very positive. But please know I'm still asking for more money to help trafficking victims. It is very difficult for a survivor to leave the trafficking life, and they need more support and confidentiality than other types of victims. So I will be asking for $1 million to help us serve survivors of trafficking and help them.

[Henderson] Our time at the Iowa Press table has concluded for this time, please come back at another time.

[Bird] Absolutely. Thank you.

[Henderson] You may watch every episode of Iowa Press at iowapbs.org. For everyone here at Iowa PBS, thanks for watching today.

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Banking in Iowa goes beyond transactions. Banks work to help people and small businesses succeed, and Iowa banks are committed to building confident banking relationships. Iowa banks, your partner through it all.