Photo: Gage Skidmore / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0
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Kim Reynolds announced in April 2025 that she would not run for a third full term as Iowa governor, ending a run that started when she took over from Terry Branstad in 2017.
Reynolds grew up in St. Charles and worked as Clarke County treasurer before serving in the Iowa Senate and as Branstad’s lieutenant governor. She is Iowa’s first woman governor.
Her years in office covered the pandemic, when she was one of the first governors to reopen businesses and schools, and a series of tax cuts that moved Iowa to a flat income tax. She also pushed through a school choice law giving families state money for private school tuition.
People around Wright County remember her calls during the pandemic most, and the press conferences that ran nearly every day in 2020.
Kim Sanders writes for Clarion News Online.