State Senator Claire Celsi, D-West Des Moines, is active on social media and was active on social media long before her election to the Iowa Senate.
Like President Donald Trump, she would be better served getting off Twitter where her official account reflects someone who is a partisan political activist, not someone whom we should take seriously as a legislator.
For instance, last week on Twitter, Celsi inferred that State Senator Jason Schultz, R-Schleswig, and Drew Klein, the Iowa director of Americans for Prosperity (AFP), are evil presumably because of their support for work requirements for Medicaid and SNAP.
She tweeted this meme asking, “What Would Dr. Evil Do?”
SSB 3135, a bill that Schultz sponsored, passed in subcommittee on Tuesday last week (the same day as the tweet above) and then passed out of the Iowa Senate Labor and Business Relations Committee last Thursday. Klein actively supported the bill in his lobbying role for AFP.
Celsi thinks it is evil for people to think that able-bodied Iowans should have to work, volunteer, or participate in a workfare program for twenty hours a week in order to receive the taxpayer-funded benefits. Lest you think legislators who voted for this are absolutely heartless, also consider it exempts the following recipients from this requirement:
- Those under 18-years-of-age
- Those over 64-years-of-age
- Recipients medically certified as physically or medically unfit for employment.
- Recipients who are pregnant
- A recipient who is a parent or caretaker responsible for the care of a dependent child under one year of age.
- A recipient who is parent or caretaker personally providing the care or a dependent child with a serious medical condition or with a disability, as determined by DHS
- Recipients receiving unemployment compensation and complying with work requirements that are part of the federal-state unemployment compensation system.
- A recipient who is in drug or alcohol addiction treatment and rehabilitation program.
The bill could be amended further to exempt a parent or caretaker who is responsible for the care of a dependent child under the age of 5 or 6, and if Celsi were a serious legislator instead of a partisan activist she would offer such an amendment.
But she’d rather call the other side evil and pander to her far-left base.
If this is what she is tweeting on her official, public Twitter account she created after blocking gobs of people from her personal Twitter account and then making it private, I have to wonder what she’s tweeting on her personal account. (She had previously called on a boycott of Hy-Vee.)
One can imagine it’s a dumpster fire, but one doesn’t really have to imagine because her official Twitter account is a dumpster fire.
The same day she targeted Schultz and Klein, she also targeted Maggie DeWitte, the executive director of Iowans for Life, on an ultrasound bill (that did not survive the funnel).
I was in that subcommittee, Celsi, however, was not. If DeWitte engaged in a side conversation it was very brief since she was not even three feet away from where I stood recording the subcommittee hearing. She certainly wasn’t talking throughout the meeting.
The following day, on Wednesday, she targets Hy-Vee.
She then makes a bad faith accusation of her Republican colleagues accusing them of voting down a bill because they are on the take from the manufactured housing lobby.
Despite the Tax Foundation placing Iowa in the bottom 10 states with the worst business tax climate, Celsi calls it a myth. Iowa was ranked 48th for corporate income tax and 42nd for individual income tax. Addressing states in the bottom ten, they wrote, “The states in the bottom 10 tend to have a number of afflictions in common: complex, nonneutral taxes with comparatively high rates.”
Yep, that describes Iowa. They did note that Iowa is taking steps to improve.
Next she accused the University of Iowa president and Board of Regents of ignoring her comments because they approved a deal she disagreed with. How dare they! Because, obviously, Celsi knows better.
Because money grows on trees…. she tweeted this:
She then blames independent private instruction for the death of Natalie Finn. It wasn’t included in the state ombudsman report because it didn’t contribute to her death. It’s utter nonsense to believe this when the facts plainly show that the Iowa Department of Human Services didn’t respond to numerous calls.
She then calls U.S. Senator Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, “Joni Baloney.” I’m sure she’s absolutely fine with nicknames that President Trump or Iowa GOP Chair Jeff Kaufmann create for Democrat politicians and candidates.
Then there’s another tweet thread targeting Hy-Vee.
Totally agree, with this. We’ve all seen Celsi’s Twitter account, and this is just going back to last week, so she has shown us that she is a partisan hack and we should believe her.
So what would Claire Celsi tweet? You would be wise to do the opposite.