Great Plains (IA KS ND NE MO SD)

"Winter weather conditions and frigid temperatures may force some GOP presidential hopefuls to cancel campaign events in the final stretch leading up to the Iowa caucuses. Plus, a looming polar vortex could cause low voter turnout."

"Iowa Republicans scored a big win in their yearslong battle with animal rights group as a federal appeals court reversed prior decisions striking down two state laws aimed at activists who target livestock feedlots and other agribusinesses to expose alleged animal abuses."

"Chris Gloninger was excited to start his new job as chief meteorologist at KCCI, a TV station in Des Moines, when he moved to Iowa in 2021. He was coming from Boston to connect the dots between weather and climate change trends. Gloninger knew it might elicit some grumbling from Iowan viewers."

"In a country where the value of land often depends on access to water, powerful interests in agriculture, heavy industry and real estate draw vast amounts of water out of the ground. For generations, that water has been treated as an unlimited resource in much of the United States, freely available to anyone who owns a piece of land and can drill a well. Entire local economies have been built around the assumption that the water will never run out."