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Attendees line up before the start of the Iowa Ag Summit... 
Bruce Rastetter.
Gov. Terry Branstad stated, emphatically, "First, don't mess with the RFS."  He said the RFS "provides fair access to the marketplace which big oil wants to prevent."  Branstad said that, "President Obama has not spoken the word ethanol since August 2011."
Rastetter is President of the Board of Regents of the State of Iowa, appointed by Gov. Branstad to a term running from 2011 to 2017.  He is a major Republican donor.  Here is his biography reprinted from the Board of Regents website:

Bruce Rastetter is an Iowa entrepreneur raised on a farm outside of Iowa Falls, Iowa. After graduating from the University of Iowa, Mr. Rastetter returned home to his family farm and founded feed management, construction, and swine production businesses.

In 1994, he merged these businesses into one company called Heartland Pork Enterprises.  Mr. Rastetter served as Heartland’s CEO until 2004, growing the company to the 13th largest pork producer in the United States, before successfully guiding the company through an acquisition by Christensen Farms.

In 2003, Mr. Rastetter co-founded Hawkeye Energy Holdings which grew to become a producer of over 450 million gallons of ethanol per year becoming, at the time, the third-largest pure play ethanol producer in the United States. He served as CEO of Hawkeye Energy until 2011.

Mr. Rastetter currently serves as CEO of Summit Group.  Growing out of the family farm of his youth, Summit Group is an umbrella organization encompassing diverse interests in agriculture including grain and meat production, value-added processing, renewable energy, and international development.

He is also an active philanthropist giving to all three Regent universities.  Mr. Rastetter has endowed a chair in Agricultural Entrepreneurship at Iowa State University, contributed to the University of Iowa athletics department and scholarship fund, and has donated to the University of Northern Iowa’s general scholarship fund.  Mr. Rastetter has also contributed to a variety of efforts that encourage thoughtful public policy.

In 2011, Governor Branstad appointed Mr. Rastetter to the Board of Regents, State of Iowa. He also serves on the board of directors for Hawkeye Energy Holdings, Advanced Bioenergy, and Growth Energy.

Mr. Rastetter was elected the 18th President of the Board of Regents, State of Iowa, on June 5, 2013, and unanimously re-elected on April 24, 2014; he became Interim President on May 1, 2013 and served as President Pro Tem from July 11, 2011 until June 5, 2013.

Regent Rastetter's term on the Board expires April 30, 2017.

Summit Group  |  The Rastetter Foundation

See also:
Adam Wollner.  "When This Man Calls, Republicans Come Running."  National Journal, Feb. 12, 2015.

Mike Kilen.  "Bruce Rastetter: The quiet, fierce man behind ag summit," Des Moines Register, March 2, 2015.
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