Nikoel Hytrek is Iowa Starting Line’s longest-serving reporter. She covers LGBTQ issues, abortion rights and all topics of interest to Iowans. Her biggest goal is to help connect the dots between policy and people’s real lives. If you have story ideas or tips, send them over to nikoel@new.iowastartingline.com.
Nikoel Hytrek
Latest from Nikoel Hytrek
-
How To Still Get An Abortion If You Live In Iowa
Iowa has a new, strict, abortion law that prohibits abortion before most people know they’re pregnant. But there are still ways to obtain one or get help to do so. Here’s how.
-
Iowa GOP Passes New Abortion Ban During Special Session
In a one-day special session called just weeks after the Iowa Supreme Court ruled against their previous attempt to ban abortion, Republicans in the Iowa House and Senate rushed through yet another law to restrict reproductive freedoms. The newly-passed bill, expected to be quickly signed into law, will essentially ban abortion in Iowa at 6…
-
Hundreds Of Iowans Rally To Protest New Abortion Ban Bill
Hundreds packed the Iowa State Capitol Rotunda on Tuesday and made their voices heard to protest the abortion ban being considered by Republicans in the other room. The latest polling shows 61% of Iowans support abortion being legal in all or most cases. While members of the Iowa Senate held a public hearing nearby, demonstrators…
-
Iowa Doctors Warn Six-Week Abortion Ban Risks Lives
Abortion bans endanger people’s lives and fly in the face of medical science and training. That was the message delivered by Dr. Emily Boevers, an OB-GYN in Waverly; Dr. Francesca Turner, an OB-GYN in Des Moines; and Dr. Jill Meadows, the former medical director for Planned Parenthood of the Heartland during a Friday press conference.…
-
What’s In The Iowa GOP’s New Abortion Ban Bill?
Republicans in the Iowa Legislature have dropped their new six-week abortion ban, which will be heard during the special legislative session starting Tuesday, July 11. The law requires physicians test for “a detectable fetal heartbeat” with an abdominal ultrasound before they perform an abortion. The “fetal heartbeat” is described as “cardiac activity, the steady and…
-
Des Moines UPS Workers Prepare to Strike
UPS workers in Des Moines hosted a rally Friday morning to prepare and practice for the possibility of a strike later this summer.
-
Will Conservatives Try To Reshape The Iowa Supreme Court (Again)?
When the Iowa Supreme Court failed to reinstate a 2018 six-week abortion ban, the 3-3 split sparked reactions across the political spectrum. Democratic figures and reproductive rights organizations cheered the decision. Republicans and others who oppose the idea that pregnant people and their doctors should make decisions about what happens during pregnancy, did not. “To…
-
‘Attacks On Our Rights Are Coming:’ Iowa Democrats Preview Upcoming Fight On Abortion
Iowa Democrats aren’t sure how, but they do know Republicans won’t stop trying to take reproductive rights away.
-
Iowa’s 17 Award-Winning Historic Preservation Projects for 2023
Iowa is full of old buildings—some over a hundred years old, and some with significant impacts on the communities they’re in.
-
One Big Reason for Workforce Shortage in Iowa? Lack of Child Care Options
Iowa has a well-documented problem with child care, particularly the availability of care and the cost of it—leading to impacts on Iowa’s workforce.
