Through Governor Reynolds Own Admission, She Failed to Notify Her Nominee to the 6th Judicial District Within the 30 Day Constitutional Limit and Documents Point Towards Potential “Backdating” of the Official Nomination

On Monday, Iowa Democratic Party Chair Troy Price and prominent Iowa attorneys and legal experts held a statewide press call discussing Governor Reynolds “constitution-violating” judicial appointment of Judge Jason Besler to the 6th Judicial District and the potential legal implications it presents. According to the Iowa constitution, the governor must make a judicial appointment by 30 days after names are submitted to her. If the deadline is not met, the constitution requires the Chief Justice to make the appointment instead. According to her own admission, and documents obtained by media, Governor Reynolds failed to do so.

Here’s a look at the timeline of events surrounding this constitutional scandal:

  • May 22, 2018: Records show the chair of the nominating commission for the 6th Judicial District submitted the names of nominees Jason Besler and Ellen Ramsey-Kacena – leaving Governor Reynolds until June 21st to make her selection.
  • June 21, 2018: Records show Reynolds announced her choice for another judgeship that day, but she did not announce Besler’s appointment. Governor Reynolds admitted last week to failing to notify Judge Besler on time stating: “I didn’t get the phone call made”because “We’re on the road. We’re busy.”
    • Governor Reynolds went on to say she realized on June 25th that Judge Besler had not been notified, and her office contacted the Chief Justice’s office to inform them of the appointment, and then Besler was notified.
  • June 25, 2018: Four days after the constitutional deadline, a new press release stated that the governor “appointed Jason Besler Thursday as district court judge in Judicial District 6.”
    • Since May 2017, Governor Reynolds has named more than a dozen judges and in almost every other case the press release went out on the day of the appointment.
    • o On the same day, Reynolds Chief of Staff, Ryan Koopmans, reached out to the legal counsel to Chief Justice Mark Cady to discuss the situation.
  • June 26, 2018: Judge Cady’s counsel, Molly Kottmeyer, emails back to Koopmans afterward to remind him that Iowa law says the governor’s appointments “shall be in writing” and must be filed with the secretary of state’s office.
  • July 2, 2018: Koopmans emailed Kottmeyer and said “the governor made the verbal appointment on the 21st while she was on the road and then signed the letter on Monday” when she was back in the office. However, this directly contradicts Governor Reynolds recent statements to media saying she failed to notify Judge Besler in time.

Since Governor Reynolds admitted to not notifying Judge Besler in time it raises questions on “backdated” documents. The letter that the Reynolds administration submitted, which unlike every other letter sent to a judge Governor Reynolds has picked from June 2017 through June 2018, omitted a time stamp, and backdated the appointment to June 21. In addition there’s the official appointment certificate. The official document was dated on June 21, despite the Governor’s office confirming she signed it “sometime after June 21.”

This has led legal experts and other prominent members of Iowa’s legal community to not only question the legality of the appointment, but raise concerns of the potential legal quagmires it could present.

“The deadlines required by the Iowa Constitution, the laws and rules of procedure in Iowa, are definite not discretionary or waivable; and the failure to comply with the Constitutional deadline calls into question Judge Besler’s judicial legitimacy,” said Iowa Attorney George Appleby.

“Outside of the gross negligence and overall mismanagement Governor Reynolds and her administration has shown throughout this entire ordeal, this is just the latest example of Governor Reynolds failing to admit a mistake or any wrongdoing when it is right in front of her,” said Iowa Democratic Party Chair Troy Price. “From continuing to double down and refusal to acknowledge the problems with her disastrous privatization of Medicaid, to attempting to cover up a rather simple judicial nomination, Governor Reynolds will go to great lengths to bend the truth rather than admit a mistake. That is not the sort of values or leadership Iowa deserves.”

Under state law, it is “felonious misconduct in office” when any public employee knowingly: “makes or gives any false entry, false return, false certificate, or false receipt, where such entries, returns, certificates, or receipts are authorized by law” ; “falsifies any public record” ; “falsifies a writing, or knowingly delivers a falsified writing, with the knowledge that the writing is falsified and that the writing will become a public record of a government body.”

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