DES MOINES, Iowa – Iowa's Republican governor, Kim Reynolds, will never forget the summer night 20 years ago when a state trooper stopped her minivan on Interstate 35 and found a nearly empty bottle of Black Velvet whisky on the seat behind her.
What followed was a sometimes humiliating series of hearings and counseling sessions as Reynolds pleaded guilty to her second drunken driving offense in less than a year and committed herself to treatment.
It was a personal turning point for her, and now, so long afterward, it has also become the motivation for a stubborn campaign that has divided her from many in her own party.