The Iowa governor could not order closures of places of worship or mandate their locations or practices, even during emergencies or public health disasters, under a bill moved forward Thursday by an Iowa House subcommittee.
House File 2145 comes years after the COVID-19 pandemic. In March 2020, Gov. Kim Reynolds signed a State of Public Health Disaster Emergency executive order which included a prohibition on “social, community, spiritual, religious, recreational, leisure, and sporting gatherings and events of more than 10 people.” The restrictions on religious and spiritual gatherings were lifted in April of that year.
The proposed legislation would prevent future governors from being able to take similar actions in the case of public health crises or other disaster emergency situations.
Jeff Pitts with the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition said the organization supported the bill as churches or other places of worship should not be “strongarmed into closing, even temporarily” by the government for any reason.
“The church decides it should close, it will, voluntarily,” Pitts said. “If people desire to steer clear of said church, they will, of their own volition. The church is the body of Christ for believers, how that body is treated is no trivial matter.”
Rep. John Wills, R-Spirit Lake, said he agreed with Pitts’ characterization, saying churches and church attendees are able to independently gauge the safety of hosting religious gatherings.
“I think that’s exactly what we would like to see in the state of Iowa,” Wills said.
But Rep. Beth Wessel-Kroeschell, D-Ames, said she did not support the bill because it could restrict a governor’s ability to appropriately respond to situations similar to COVID-19 in the future.
“We don’t know what the next emergency is going to be,” Wessel-Kroeschell said. “We need to keep some flexibility to make sure that we can keep Iowans safe.”
The proposal comes during Reynolds’ last legislative session as governor. Both Wills and House Speaker Pat Grassley said the measure was not motivated by concerns that a Democrat may be elected governor in the 2026 election. However, Grassley did say lawmakers are considering that regardless of who wins the election, Iowa will elect a new administration in November.
“We’ve had it pretty consistent, from Gov. (Terry) Branstad through Gov. Reynolds, whether it was department heads and handling how they do state government,” Grassley said. “So anything we look at that boils down to, ‘what does it look like for the future of the governor’s race?’ I don’t want Iowans to read into any more than the fact that we will have a different governor, that does not kind of come from the standpoint of the Branstad-Reynolds legacy.”