They doubled the credit and called it national security. I know the sentence. It is what you say when a memorandum of understanding is not enough and the statute still has the wrong percentage printed on it, so you call the legislature back on a Friday and rename the rewrite patriotism.<\/p>\n
On Friday, October 2, 2026, Iowa lawmakers returned to Des Moines for a special session \u2014 convened at 8:30 a.m. by Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds \u2014 with the sole purpose of amending the state\u2019s Major Economic Growth Attraction program so a proposed $15 billion integrated steel complex can clear the state\u2019s incentive ceiling. The Associated Press (Hannah Fingerhut), ABC News, The Washington Post, CBS2 Iowa, and Radio Iowa reported the same spine: Mesabi Metallics, a Minnesota company owned by India\u2019s Essar Group, is the proposed developer; Trump announced the plant Monday with Iowa officials as a major economic and national-security investment; Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said the \u201cdeal is done,\u201d while state action this week said otherwise. Reynolds asked lawmakers to raise MEGA tax credits on eligible projects from 5% to up to 10% of investment and stretch payouts from five years to ten. For a $15 billion project, that could mean up to $1.5 billion in tax credits over a decade once the plant is running and contingent on jobs. A Radio Iowa lawmaker estimate put the package near $1.4 billion \u2014 about fourteen times the more than $100 million Iowa once gave the Iowa Fertilizer Plant in the same Lee County corridor. The Export-Import Bank of the United States has announced it would extend $10 billion for the project. The company has not publicly committed to a final site; Lee County supervisors say the site is not locked; the memorandum of understanding between Iowa and Mesabi has not been released. Wisconsin\u2019s Foxconn saga \u2014 up to $3 billion promised, scope later collapsed toward about 2,600 jobs by 2029 \u2014 sits in the AP copy as the cautionary receipt next door. That is not nostalgia. That is the prior invoice.<\/p>\n
I am not recruiting a firm to save me from a bureau. The firm asked for the statute to be rewritten before it breaks ground. I am not recruiting a party to save me from the stamp. The stamp is the one calling the special session. Both parties are the help when one carries the national-security press conference and the other carries the term sheet for a conglomerate that was listing Paducah, Kentucky jobs as recently as July. Hating the assessor\u2019s envelope at home did not turn me into a market chaplain for a $1.5 billion kickback dressed as destiny \u2014 and hating the kickback does not acquit the crane that will still extract the yield when the jersey flips.<\/p>\n
Deb will say we are not doing \u201cspecial-session steel weather\u201d before the plate. Buck will text that national security is just a tax credit with better stationery and worse honesty. I love them. They are seasoning. The meal is a republic that rewrites the percentage on Friday morning because Monday\u2019s announcement needed a statute that did not exist yet. I am keeping the cardigan. I am not putting on the hat. Fill the notebook. Then ask who benefits when they call the doubled credit national security and the unreleased MOU a partnership.<\/p>\n
Sources:<\/strong> AP \/ Seattle Times (Hannah Fingerhut), Oct. 1\u20132, 2026<\/a>; ABC News (AP wire), Oct. 2, 2026<\/a>; The Washington Post (AP), Oct. 2, 2026<\/a>; CBS2 Iowa, Oct. 2026 window<\/a>; Radio Iowa (O. Kay Henderson), Oct. 2, 2026<\/a>; Iowa Gov. Reynolds proclamation, Sept. 29, 2026<\/a> ($15B Mesabi\/Essar plant; MEGA 5%\u219210% \/ 5\u219210 years; up to ~$1.5B credits; EXIM $10B; Lutnick \u201cdeal is done\u201d; Lee County \/ unreleased MOU; Foxconn Wisconsin caution). Fill the notebook. Then ask who benefits when the stamp rewrites the statute after the announcement.<\/p>\n \u2014 Theo Ashford-Lindstr\u00f6m<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Iowa special session to lift MEGA tax credits to 10% for a $15B Mesabi\/Essar steel plant \u2014 up to $1.5B. Lutnick said the deal is done. The stamp still had to rewrite the statute.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":292,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[5,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-293","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commentary","category-news"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/theo-iowa-steel-mega-1002.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=293"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/292"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=293"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=293"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetheolowgen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=293"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}