North Dakota State Investment Board, Bismarck, posted a net return of 17.1% for its $5.7 billion pension trust for the year ended Dec. 31. The return exceeded its performance benchmark by more than 1 percentage point, said David Hunter, executive director and chief investment officer of the North Dakota Retirement and Investment Office, in an Read More…
We’ve noted on several occasions how favorable the 2018 Senate map is for Republicans, even if the national electoral environment ends up with a deep blue tint (the GOP’s fortunes have ticked up, thanks to tax reform and good economic news, which the president’s foolish trade war gambit threatens). Losing Alabama was an entirely avoidable Read More…
The 2018 Budget Session of the Wyoming Legislature officially passed the midway point on Wednesday. In reality, lawmakers may be more than halfway finished, since it isn’t known yet whether the legislature will use the full 20 days allotted for the 2018 session. Wednesday was also the crossover period for the session, meaning that any Read More…
A Casper-based energy company has no more hurdles to clear before exploring 8 square miles of the Wyoming Range’s Cottonwood Creek area for deposits of oil and gas. The project, known as the “Lander Peak proposal,” has cleared the Bridger-Teton National Forest’s approval process, which means pipeline and road construction and drilling could begin as Read More…
A national analysis says the cost to provide workers’ compensation coverage in Montana is going down, which could mean businesses around the state will have to pay less in insurance premiums. “We fully anticipate that there will be across-the-board reductions in the premiums charged to our businesses, which obviously is always a really good thing,” Read More…
Montana’s high-tech businesses want to demonstrate that they can play a meaningful role in growing the state’s economy by offering higher wages than other businesses in the state, adding more jobs, and generating quick revenue growth. That’s according to a report out today from the Montana High Tech Business Alliance. The organization, with assistance from Read More…
CHEYENNE – Gov. Matt Mead on Thursday selected a former Wyoming secretary of state candidate and Laramie County prosecutor as the next secretary of state. Ed Buchanan will serve the remainder of Ed Murray’s term as the state’s election and business registration authority after Murray stepped down in early February following sexual misconduct allegations. READ Read More…
BNSF Railway, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Montana Department of Environmental Quality are looking to stabilize a short section of the north shore of Flathead Lake to ensure contaminants from the Somers Tie Plant Superfund site do not contaminate the largest natural freshwater lake in the West. On Feb. 27, officials with BNSF, Read More…
HELENA – U.S. Rep. Greg Gianforte, R-Mont., paid his candidate filing fee Thursday to run for re-election, likely completing the filed of competitors for Montana’s only congressional seat. Gianforte won the seat last May 25, in a special election to succeed Ryan Zinke, who resigned after becoming U.S. Interior secretary. In a statement Thursday, Gianforte Read More…
ATLANTA — Georgia lawmakers approved a bill on Thursday that stripped out a tax break proposal highly coveted by Delta Air Lines — the most stinging punishment that America’s pro-gun forces have leveled so far on one of the many corporations recalibrating their positions on firearms after the Florida high school massacre. The $50 million Read More…
A local environmental nonprofit organization has filed an appeal with the state Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, seeking a reversal of the agency’s decision to grant a permit to a water-bottling plant in Creston. The Flathead Lakers announced the group would appeal the DNRC’s January decision to issue a water permit to the Montana Read More…
POPLAR — A Fort Peck Tribal officer has indicated he will plead guilty next week to burglarizing the Fort Peck Tribal Law and Justice Building. Mikkel Shields, 33, is charged in U.S. District Court in Great Falls with four counts of burglary. As part of a plea agreement, Shields will only plead guilty to a Read More…
On Monday, Montana Governor Steve Bullock and other governors from around the country met with President Donald Trump to discuss the issue of guns and school safety. During his brief time at the microphone, Bullock asked the president to work on adding new elements to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System or NICS. “We Read More…
BILLINGS – As students and School District 2 are in talks about how best to handle a planned walk-out later this month, some students are opposed to it. The walkout is part of a larger movement across the country, set for the one-month anniversary of the shooting at a Florida school that left 17 dead. Read More…
HELENA – A Libertarian candidate is jumping into the race for Montana’s lone U.S. House seat, becoming the first third-party candidate to file for a statewide office this year. Elinor Swanson filed with the Montana Secretary of State’s office and the Federal Election Commission on Monday. She joins five Democratic candidates in the race against Read More…
HELENA – Bishop George Leo Thomas of Helena has been named the new bishop of Las Vegas by Pope Francis. Bishop Thomas will be installed as Bishop of Las Vegas on May 15, 2018 after serving as bishop of Helena for nearly 14 years. George Leo Thomas was born in Anaconda and raised in nearby Read More…
Montana Gov. Steve Bullock will visit Iowa for events with Polk County Democrats and Attorney General Tom Miller in April. Bullock, a two-term Democrat and former attorney general from Republican-leaning Montana, has been mentioned as a possible presidential candidate in 2020. The trip will be his first to Iowa as governor. In a statement, Bullock Read More…
There’s currently around $200 billion of bitcoin floating around in people’s digital wallets. For many of their owners, those bitcoins have proved to be a valuable asset. They’re happy to leave them to rise in value and build up their wealth. For others though, those giant piles of coins are exactly what they’re supposed to Read More…
When a group that says it provides financial assistance “relating to the jihad” sought to improve conditions for fighters in a squalid, sandbag-fortified trench in Syria late last year, it turned to a new funding conduit: bitcoin. “There is currently no shelter to protect the food and ammunition from the rain,” the group, called al Read More…
A South Korean official who guided Seoul’s regulatory clampdown on cryptocurrencies was found dead on Sunday, according to a government spokesman. Jung Ki-joon, 52, was head of economic policy at the Office for Government Policy Coordination. He helped coordinate efforts to create new legislation aimed at suppressing cryptocurrency speculation and illicit activity, the spokesman said. Read More…
MONTGOMERY COUNTY, Md. (WJLA) – Multiple firearms, including a shotgun and two rifles, ammunition, replica grenades, a ballistic vest, and a journal were located at the home of student accused of bringing a loaded handgun and knife to Clarksburg High School last week. The alarming revelation was made during a bond review for Alwin Chen, Read More…
COLUMBUS, Ohio – A pro-Second Amendment section of John Kasich’s website was removed Sunday, after the Republican governor appeared on CNN and said reasonable gun control measures should be enacted following last week’s deadly Florida school shooting. JohnKasich.com, his political website that is separate from his governor’s site, had previously contained text and photos illustrating Read More…
Sen. Patrick J. Toomey (R-Pa.), who once spearheaded an unsuccessful bipartisan agreement to strengthen gun laws, said Tuesday that he plans to introduce legislation in the coming weeks that would expand background checks on firearm purchases, giving a jolt to gun-control efforts in the wake of last week’s mass shooting in Florida that left 17 Read More…
As Democrats make raising the minimum wage a centerpiece of their 2018 campaigns, and Republicans call for states to handle the issue, both are missing an important problem: Wage laws are poorly enforced, with workers often unable to recover back pay even after the government rules in their favor. That’s the conclusion of a nine-month Read More…
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Tuesday that President Donald Trump was not attacking the FBI when he wrote on Twitter last weekend that the bureau spent “too much time trying to prove Russian collusion” and that it “missed all of the many signals” from the man police say killed 17 people at Read More…
Scrolling through the Instagram account managed by U.S. Sen. Steve Daines, a conservative Republican from Bozeman, it’s clear he’s hewed a well-established groove in the firmament of Western outdoors pursuits. Populating the first-term senator’s social media feed are pictures of him on backpacking trips deep in the Beartooth Mountains; him bagging ungulates on sunbaked foothills Read More…
18 year-old MacLean Kaiser is being held in the Ravalli County Jail without bond for allegedly posting an online threat to the Darby High School using Snapchat. Sheriff Steve Holton said the incident was first investigated by the Darby Marshal’s office. “Yesterday the school district got some information regarding a Snapchat post referencing the recent Read More…
You could feel the excitement. You could feel the cheering. As Mike Dennison detailed the millionaire after millionaire running for office this Fall, you could just imagine how excited the success-bashing Leftists were, sitting in their living rooms as they watched his report on the Montana Television Network. And then, you can imagine how the Read More…
The nation’s first manufacturer of cross-laminated timber plans to set up shop in Maine, with a goal of creating 100 jobs at a $22 million mill, officials said Friday. SmartLam, LLC of Montana still seeks a mill site, but has committed to building a factory in Maine within 18 months. Founded in 2012, the company Read More…
The Montana and Idaho Community Development Corporation recently received $65 million in New Market Tax Credits from part of the annual allotment distributed by the U.S. Treasury. The nonprofit organization with hubs in Missoula, Bozeman and Boise will sell the tax credits to investors, and use the cash they get in exchange to offer subsidies Read More…
The Front Brewing Company, a Great Falls brewery open since 2012, is in the process of being sold and changed. Jeremiah Johnson, the purchaser of The Front Brewing Company, said he and his wife are extremely fortunate. “I’m in the process of purchasing the Front Brewing Company from Linda Caricaburu and Brad Talcott here in Read More…
BUTTE, Mont. — It’s official. Meth is back in Montana and it’s more dangerous than ever. Opioid abuse has gotten a lot of the headlines in recent years but in Montana, methamphetamine has slowly become the drug that law enforcement officials deal with frequently. What used to be made in Montana labs in the eighties Read More…
Montana Attorney General Tim Fox (above) joined Tom Egelhoff on Open for Business to discuss the recent court decision concerning robocalls to Montana citizens. (Interview link at the bottom of the page) Montana US District Judge Charles Lovell, 88, a Reagan appointee, did not buy the argument of Dave Deshaw, of Victory Processing LLC, of Read More…
A mapping startup based in Missoula, Mont., which allows users to download sophisticated offline topographic maps outlining public and private lands and a number of other features geared towards hunting, fishing and camping, has pulled in its first major outside funding. onXmaps has closed a $20.3 million Series A round led by Summit Partners. Bessemer Read More…
Were it not for the stock market crash of the early 1970’s, James Stack might still be a mechanical engineer in Colorado. Stack graduated at the top of his engineering class at Montana State University in 1974 and went on to work as a project manager at IBM. Taking the advice of economists and Wall Read More…
Democratic Senator Jon Tester (D-MT) voted in support of sanctuary cities Thursday. The vote prompting one of his potential Republican challengers to tie Tester once again to the vote to shutdown the government over illegal immigrants. As The Hill reports, several other more moderate Senate Democrats voted to crackdown on sanctuary cities, while Tester voted Read More…
A documentary that emerges as a political whodunit with Montana in the spotlight is among the films featured in this year’s 15th annual Big Sky Documentary Film Festival, which runs Feb. 16-25 in Missoula. A free showing of director Kimberly Reed’s “Dark Money” will be 7 p.m. Friday at The Wilma theater. Gov. Steve Bullock, Read More…
BOZEMAN -Republican U.S. Senate candidate Troy Downing, charged multiple times for allegedly buying Montana resident hunting-and-fishing licenses when he was a non-resident, is going to trial – two weeks before his contested primary election. At a hearing Wednesday in Bozeman, Justice of the Peace Bryan Adams scheduled Downing’s trial for three days, from May 23-25. Read More…
HELENA – Montana may have the wealthiest member in all of Congress – Republican U.S. Rep. Greg Gianforte – but he’s far from being the only multimillionaire running for federal office this year in Montana. Three of the four Republicans running in the U.S. Senate race and one of the five Democrats vying to take Read More…
CHEYENNE — By the end of the first day of the 2018 legislative session, state lawmakers had proposed three different constitutional amendments to tackle the deficits facing school funding. The proposals — two from the Senate and one from the House — come as the full Legislature begins to grapple with a two-pronged education funding Read More…