DES MOINES, Iowa (Legal Newsline) - Attorney General Tom Miller has a reelection bid unlike any he’s had before, and he’s had plenty as the longest-serving state attorney general in U.S. history.
First elected in 1978 when the country was slogging through Jimmy Carter’s inflation and malaise, the 77-year-old Miller is again vying for another four-year term, this time in the throes of inflation and malaise under Joe Biden, whom Miller endorsed for president back in January 2020.
And he’s running in a state that his almost certain Republican opponent in November, the Guthrie County Attorney Brenna Bird, notes has morphed from Minnesota blue to Missouri red – a change reflected in a GOP governor, two Republican U.S. senators and Republican majorities in both houses of the General Assembly. It’s now a state, she says, that has no time for Biden, and is fed up with prosecutors who are soft on crime.
“With crime spiking in Iowa, the Republican message of being tough on criminals and pro-law enforcement is what appeals to Iowans now,” Bird, 45, told Legal Newsline.
Violent crime in Iowa shot up 14 percent in 2021, more than double the national average, FBI crime statistics show. Homicide is leading the way.
As a county prosecutor, Bird has witnessed the impact of the crime wave firsthand since first taking Miller on in 2010, and it’s heartrending, she says.
“Crime from the impact on the victim to attacks on law enforcement hits rural areas especially hard,” she said. “It impacts the entire community.”
She places a lot of the blame with rampant drug abuse, a weak probation system in desperate need of revision to require greater supervision, and a disengaged Attorney General.
“He’s sitting on the sidelines,” Bird said of Miller. “As Attorney General, I’ll do everything in my power to stop illegal drugs, and help those impacted by those drugs.”
Bird cites Miller’s underutilization of an Area Prosecutions Division in the AG’s office, an office that prosecutes major criminal cases referred to them by the county attorneys.
In addition, she points out that Miller is not involved in a campaign by 17 state Attorneys General urging the Biden administration to stop the influx of fentanyl across the U.S. southern border.
“Chinese chemical manufacturers are now sending the raw ingredients to make fentanyl to Mexican drug cartels, who are trafficking fentanyl into the United States at an alarming rate,” Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt and the other AGs said in a January letter to the administration. “Fentanyl is entering Missouri and destroying lives - over 800 Missourians died of opioid overdoses in the first half of 2021 alone. My Office has taken proactive steps to secure the border, it’s time the Biden Administration do the same. Their continued inaction could mean a matter of life or death for hundreds of Missourians.”
Bird also said that Miller is missing in the fight by the Attorneys General in 24 states, this one led by West Virginia AG Patrick Morrisey, to protect farmers and landowners from the Biden administration’s proposed revision of the definition of the Waters of the United States (WOTUS) rule. The proposed change would take the country back to an Obama-era rule that would subject nearly all the land in Iowa used for agriculture to crushing regulations by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
“This is a fight that Iowa should be taking the lead on,” Bird said. “Its a fight to show that we are upholding the Constitution, and one that would show that Washington D.C. needs to uphold the Constitution as well.”
Miller spokesman Lynn Hicks told Legal Newsline that Miller's office never saw the fentanyl and WOTUS letters, and was never asked to sign off on them. Miller did release a statement recently on the dangers of fentanyl, and Hicks said that Miller "has been involved with WOTUS for years," citing that he and former Gov. Terry Branstad, a Republican, sued the Obama administration over its WOTUS rules.
But Hicks had no response to a request for Miller's stance on the proposed Biden WOTUS rules or the letter from Schmitt and the other AGs urging the administration to stem the flow of fentanyl from Mexico across the southern border.
A review of Miller's 2019 expense records - pre-pandemic - shows he likes out of state travel, especially to Washington D.C. In October, he spoke at the Global Tobacco & Nicotine Forum in Washington D.C. There were three other Washington D.C. trips, that year, one that also took him to Boston as well.
He has now taken on additional duties that will almost certainly increase his out-of-state travel as the pandemic wanes; in December he was elected president of the National Association of Attorneys General (NAAG).
Hicks said Miller's new position will benefit "Iowans by using NAAG’s resources to educate consumers and address many tech and consumer protection issues affecting Iowans. Case in point: As I write this, he’s hosting a webinar on romance scams through NAAG."
For Bird, Washington D.C. under Biden is a battleground not a conference destination at the expense of taxpayers.
“On everything from EPA regulations that crush Iowa’s farmers, to authoritarian mandates, to advocating defunding the police, the Biden Democrats are wrong,” she said in a statement announcing her candidacy in January. “It is incredibly frustrating to watch Tom Miller sitting on the sidelines when we have so much at stake. In other states, attorneys general defend the people of their state.”
Bird has won the endorsements of Governor Kim Reynolds and Senator Joni Ernst.
She graduated from Drake University and received her law degree from the University of Chicago. She lives on the family farm in rural Dexter with her husband Bob, an Iraq war veteran, and their son.
The primary is June 7; the general election is Nov. 8.