The second legislative funnel deadline has come and gone in Iowa, and to many people’s surprise, a bill that did not make it through was the constitutional amendment to restore felon voting rights.

House Study Bill 68 was proposed as a priority of Governor Kim Reynolds, and it passed the House with near universal bipartisan support. However, when it reached the Senate Judiciary Committee, it stalled due to concerns regarding crimes that were considered too heinous to restore an individual’s voting rights. Representative Chris Hagenow, (R) District 19, says he understands where the Senate committee was coming from, but is frustrated that they didn’t bring the proposal through the funnel. “One of the concerns — and we actually mentioned this when we ran the bill in the House — is that we would want to take a look at some of the parameters for how that new constitutional amendment would work. But that would take place in a regular bill, we’d write the law around that. So they (the Senate) had additional concerns about what that policy might look like, is my understanding of why it didn’t move forward, but it is still disappointing.”

Hagenow adds, since a “general assembly” is defined as a two-year term, there’s a possibility the proposed amendment could still advance during next year’s session and be on its original timeline. In order for a constitutional amendment to be adopted, it must pass through two consecutive general assemblies and then be ratified by Iowa voters in a special election, requiring a simple majority. To learn more about this and other topics at the Iowa Legislature, listen to today’s Perry Fareway Let’s Talk Dallas County program on air and at RaccoonValleyRadio.com.