In today’s post I am not trying to pick on the Daily Iowan in particular. They are an award winning college newspaper. They frequently do a good job, sometimes better than other publications. But an interview with Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks published on the DI website April 8 is a perfect example of what is wrong with the Iowa press.
I wrote this as a letter to the editor. I doubt they will publish it. But I wanted them to know that failing to ask follow up questions or getting clarification on vague, nonsensical statements does everyone a disservice especially when you are interviewing elected officials who frankly, lie a lot and are currently voting against democracy every chance they get. Declining to ask challenging questions of Republicans seems to be the standard journalistic practice among the Iowa press statewide. It is a huge problem because it serves to protect the Republican trifecta at the state level and our solid block of Republican representation in DC.
Here is a link to the DI Miller-Meeks interview if you would like to read it first. One of her answers was pure gaslighting. https://dailyiowan.com/2025/04/08/miller-meeks-responds-to-criticisms-of-a-lack-of-gop-town-halls/
Here’s my letter:
Dear Daily Iowan,
Regarding your recent interview with Mariannette Miller-Meeks I have three points I would like to make. https://dailyiowan.com/2025/04/08/miller-meeks-responds-to-criticisms-of-a-lack-of-gop-town-halls/
(1) When Rep. Miller-Meeks said, ““When we’ve heard people say that there are threats to our democracy, and you see people out being able to protest, being able to contest what they think that their government is doing, I think that shows you much more willingness than what I saw under the Biden administration,” did you ask her for a single example of what she was talking about? If you did, it was not in your article. Your lack of curiosity allowed her to use a standard Republican talking point, “Joe Biden” to successfully mislead and avoid accountability for her actions – in this case inaction.
(2) When she said she has a “full schedule” when she is back in the district did you ask her what is on her schedule that constituents could attend or even know about? Her staff consistently tells callers they do not know her schedule.
You allowed her to make statements that sound good but who knows if they are true because you provided nothing in the way of follow up questions to her assertions. Meanwhile, she voted to take away voting rights by passage of the SAVE act. She voted to give Trump even more power by voting for No Rogue Rulings Act (NORRA) an attack on the federal judiciary and on the checks and balances of our Constitution.
(3) Even though you included in your story that the National Republican Congressional Committee Chair Richard Hudson encouraged House Republicans to avoid in-person events you did not ask her about it. Was she following orders? Could she make a comment about her reaction to being told to avoid constituents? Did she think that was appropriate?
Iowa is ruled by Republicans. We have zero Democratic representation in congress or in the state legislature or the governor’s office. We need the press to ask follow up questions not just accept whatever Republicans say that sounds good and leaves them unaccountable for their actions.
Please give democracy a chance.
Blog For Iowa 
I agree with you 100%.
Are reporters too awed by the privilege of hearing a few word drip from a politician’s lips, or are they “afraid of losing access” or do they just not think quickly enough?
An easy and polite way to handle follow-up questions to to begin with “I don’t understand, could you please … ”
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Oh, how I feel your pain. I deeply hate the absence of follow up questions in Iowa political interviews. And to add insult to injury, that Miller-Meeks gaslighting was truly pathetic. I’ve seen better gaslighting from a four-year-old answering a question about who scribbled on the wall with a magic marker.
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Can we keep in mind these are college students and not seasoned reporters? I hope they have mentors to support this teachable moment
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Point taken. One would have thought if the Daily Iowan was going to send a reporter to DC for a face to face interview right before recess when Miller-Meeks was going to be in the district anyway, that a supervising editor would have helped the reporter with how to ask follow up questions and what those questions might be. Thank you for reading Blog for Iowa.
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Where and how did the reporter learn how to do interviews? One institution that is responsible: our journalism schools. The schools do not seem to have learned how to cover Trump, polarization, lies, accusation of fake news, etc. I ask alumni of J schools to push schools to change their pedagogy, if for nothing else, in face of social media. While I have seen criticism of the media over the past years, I have not seen any critique of the institutions that produce today’s professional media.
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Also a good point. I am not knowledgeable about what J schools are teaching now. But I do know from personal experience that Jeff Kaufmann pressures Iowa media outlets over stories he doesn’t like including letters to the editor. I have written many blog posts about how Iowa Press on IPTV simply does not ask follow up questions. Watch the statehouse pressers when Kid Grassley takes questions. No pushback at all. Stenographers. We’re lucky to get questions of clarification but that’s about it. The other thing of note is how many print interviews of our federal electeds have we seen from the Iowa media? Very few if any because they avoid them. Joni Ernst famously refused an interview with the DMRegister editorial board during her first campaign. You could be right but I suspect most of the problem is the Iowa press are intimidated. Can’t imagine they weren’t trained in school to ask follow up questions. I think Trump has just cemented the practice rather than caused them to change.
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thanks Trish. I agree with your comments about follow up questions. I don’t know about intimidation, because many of these same media interviews write fairly hard-hitting news stories and columns. Several years ago, I wrote about how Reynolds and Kaufman literally bullied journalists, in the style of Trump; at that time, I offered the suggestion that journalism schools should offer classes in how to deal with bullying politicos.
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Thanks for your comments Ralph. I would be interested in reading what you wrote about bullying journalists. I’ll shoot you an email.
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