Grassley in Mount Pleasant

Senator Chuck Grassley is back in Iowa during the Senate’s 4^th of July break.  He is taking the time to visit individual counties but is not holding his usual town halls.  He accepted an invitation from the Mount Pleasant Area Chamber Alliance to meet with representatives of the business community, school district and local government since the usual delegation from Southeast Iowa will not make the trek this year to Washington DC to visit him.  Questions and comments revolved around issues for Iowa small towns and rural areas. Grassley said he feels the challenges facing rural Iowa include a small workforce that’s not properly trained, drugs, an education system that is losing its’ position as a national leader and keeping the family farm. In fact he said the biggest battle is agriculture. Grassley said  “Only 2 percent of the people in this country produce the food for the other 98 percent. People in New York think food comes out of supermarkets and it’s a big responsibility to explain what’s going on.” Chamber exec Kristi Ray asked the Senator who to trust for information about the coronavirus. He honestly replied, “Listen to the scientists and public health people more than the politicians.” He did say he felt Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds handled the response to the pandemic “very well,” and Iowa has been “very fortunate.” GRASSLEY  Grassley acknowledged there was too much partisanship in Congress but not as much as Americans might think.  He observed that the country is more divided at the grass roots level right now. But said as long as the government process are in place we will get thru it, it’s just tougher right now.