Dingus of the week: Joni Ernst
Welcome to Iowa. If the cancer doesn’t get you, Joni will.
Quick note before we dingus: I cannot write this newsletter without the support of paying subscribers. Especially since I live in Iowa and Joni Ernst is trying to kill me. Right now, nearly 70,000 people subscribe to this newsletter, and I am so grateful for that. But fewer than 10% have paid subscriptions. I know the economy sucks and a lot of people are scared or struggling or both. But if a paid subscription would be possible for you, please do consider it. Thank you.
As Jane Austen famously wrote, “It’s a truth universally acknowledged that all of you bitches are going to die.”
Last week, at a town hall in Parkersburg, Iowa, Sen. Joni Ernst was answering questions about the proposed Medicaid cuts in the “big beautiful bill,” when someone in the audience shouted, “People will die!”
Ernst, frustrated, responded, “We are all going to die!”
As part of the town hall, Ernst also repeated the lie that 1.4 million people on Medicaid are immigrants in America illegally, and that adding work requirements will help preserve the program for the people who are eligible. In reality, work requirements force eligible people off Medicaid and put their health and their lives at risk as a result. (Though it should go without saying that all human beings deserve health care. Full stop.)
In sum, Ernst continued to use a lot of words to repeat what she said the first time: We are going to die. You first.
Her comment was the front page of the Des Moines Register, and people immediately turned the comment into hats and t-shirts and photoshopped it onto the state welcome sign.
In response, Ernst posted an apology video, where she filmed herself walking in a graveyard, noting that we are indeed all going to perish: “So I apologize, and I’m really, really glad that I did not have to bring up the subject of the tooth fairy as well,” she continued. “But for those that would like to see eternal and everlasting life, I encourage you to embrace my lord and savior, Jesus Christ.”
And we are going to die. Even if you are a tech billionaire named Bryan Johnson and you are frantically lapping up the blood of your teenage son, you will meet your end. We are, all of us, simply dust in the wind. Our flesh is naught but dirt, simply waiting to return to its natural state. I suppose that everyone, except Bryan Johnson, understands this on a very basic level.
But, call me crazy, I think the goal is to not die of tuberculosis like some 19th-century poet because our government-funded insurance won’t cover the antibiotics.
Like I think when our founding fathers wrote “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” they meant the ability to actually stay alive and not have to watch your body slowly shut down because you can’t afford insulin.
To be fair, Ernst could be operating on a higher level than the rest of us. She could be a buddhist encouraging us to become one with our divine destiny.
“Medicaid expansion is clinging, and clinging is the enemy of inner peace. The truly enlightened refuse coverage, choosing to drift from urgent care to urgent care like cherry blossoms on the wind. Like their pulse, thoughts of single-payer systems soon fade.”
“Ask yourself: Who is this ‘you’ that wants chemotherapy so, so badly? There is no self. There is no plan. There are only prior authorizations.”
I watched both Ernst videos thinking that surely there was some context I was missing. Even though I love jokes here on this site, I do try to make sure I am not blowing anything out of proportion. More than once my editor has cut a joke or even a whole newsletter because it didn’t feel quite fair.
But there is no key context to miss here. Ernst said what she said. There are no mitigating factors. She isn’t apologetic. In fact, it’s pretty clear she thinks you should apologize for still breathing. Like, you absolute waste of CO2, at least trees put oxygen into the atmosphere. What do you even do except consume red dye no. 2, wear Birkenstocks, and post on BlueSky?
It’s pretty clear that Joni Ernst wants you to die. Mass shooting? Not being able to get chemo? Doesn’t matter, just get the job done. (The job is death.) And listen, since people in red counties have a higher death rate, she might just get that wish for her constituents.
Among many questions you might have (like “What?” and “What the hell?”) you might also be asking why, if Ernst is so pro-death, is she also anti-abortion? Well, that’s because abortion is actually health care. Abortion keeps actual human people alive. I think we can all admit that now. Now that’s been taken away from us and women are quietly dying from childbirth at higher rates in America than in any other country, and we all get to scratch our heads and say, “Huh I wonder why? What a deep, deep mystery to solve? Let’s hire 7-70 white guys with glasses to tell us why this isn’t really the fault of cuts to reproductive care. Maybe Joe Biden did this with his bare hands.”
Can’t make an America without killing off a few poor people, amirite? That’s what our founding fathers believed. And listen, it’s high time we got back to America’s real ethos: murder.
The nation that believed a little light genocide was our Manifest Destiny now believes it again, except this time it’s killing off a few old people so Elon Musk doesn’t have to pay taxes.
And now for some more slogans to put on the “Welcome to Iowa” sign.
Welcome to Iowa. If the cancer doesn’t get you, Joni will.
Welcome to Iowa! If you think our water is polluted, you should see the souls of our lawmakers.
Welcome to Iowa… sure, the homes are affordable, but there is no one around to hear you scream.
And now for something good
Ed. note: Lyz is off to run Relay Iowa and I, her humble editor, am at a loss as to how to update the Elon Musk link she had in here. Where to begin with the blowup literally everyone predicted from day dot? For now, let’s go with the Onion: Rift Widens Between Elon Musk, Anyone Who Ever Met Him. And please do share your favorite jokes and memes in the comments. We need this.
Pride marchers lit up the Jacksonville Bridge with rainbow colors.
Joni Ernst is up for reelection in 2026. I interviewed JD Scholten, one of the Iowa lawmakers hoping to run against her, for this newsletter in 2021 about rural politics and running against Steve King.
We might not have equal rights, but women can have a little sports as a treat.
Reddit is suing an AI company for using their data.
Also, it’s Pride Month!
Relay Iowa
This weekend, I am running Relay Iowa. Me and a team of my friends are running 339 miles across the state to raise money for Iowa Abortion Access Fund and Iowa Trans Mutual Aid.
Follow along via the tracking link: We are marker #7 on the map and we will start our run around 6 AM Central Time on Friday
And as always, donate to Iowa Abortion Access Fund
And the Trans Mutual Aid Fund
Red State Rager in Brooklyn
Right after Relay Iowa, me and my sore butt are getting on an airplane to go to NYC to raise some more money for the Iowa Abortion Access Fund.
And you can join me! Tickets are still available for the Red State Rager to support abortion access in Iowa! But they are going fast, so get yours today.
📅 When: Wednesday, June 11 · 7-9 pm EDT.
🍸 Where: 4 Berry Street, Brooklyn, NY 11211
🎟️ How do I buy tickets? Through this Eventbrite link!
Something I am enjoying
My kids are out of school for the summer, which means I must summertime parent, which means I have to do all the same work as before except now with an 11-year-old boy standing forlornly in the doorway of the office openly weeping for more screen time.
So, you want to know what I am enjoying this week? Weed gummies.
Have a great weekend. As you read this, know that I will be somewhere just off a rural Iowa road, peeing in a cornfield.
Joni Ernst reminded me of when Dan Patrick, then TX Lt-Gov, suggested that older people sacrifice themselves to Covid in order to keep the economy running.
It is the most fascist thing to literally call on fellow citizens to lay down their lives, not for the sake of others, but the sake of the state. And that seems to be the ideology.
Always so many gems, but if I could only choose one line to have on a T-shirt, it would be "Welcome to Iowa! If you think our water is polluted, you should see the souls of our lawmakers."