South Dakota Gov. Larry Rhoden has signed five bills into law aimed at supporting agriculture and rural communities, including a measure to expand broadband infrastructure in underserved areas. Among the bills signed was House Bill 1048, which provides an appropriation for the expansion of broadband access, a priority Rhoden said is critical to strengthening opportunities Read More…
Attorney General Austin Knudsen praised the Helena City Commission after it voted Thursday night to rescind its immigration resolution, calling the move the right step to keep the community safe. “The commissioners made the right decision voting to keep the Helena community safe,” Knudsen said in a statement. “This resolution should never have been passed Read More…
The president on Thursday signed into law three measures authorizing the awarding of the Medal of Honor to U.S. service members for acts of valor in combat. Among the bills signed was H.R. 3377, which authorizes the president to award the Medal of Honor to James Capers Jr. for his actions while serving in the Read More…
U.S. Sen. Steve Daines is urging swift confirmation of Katie Lane to the U.S. District Court for the District of Montana, calling her a principled, Montana-rooted attorney who would bring integrity and constitutional focus to the federal bench. Lane, a Bozeman native and nominee of Donald Trump, appeared this week before the Senate Judiciary Committee Read More…
Conservative author and filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza came to Bigfork Saturday night. His talk, organized by the Last Chance Patriots and the Flathead County Republican Central Committee, nearly filled the 435-seat Bigfork Center for the Performing Arts. Audience members paid $100 per ticket to hear D’Souza’s take on politics, a topic he’s explored in 17 books Read More…
David A. Clarke Jr., the former Sheriff of Milwaukee County, spoke at the Yellowstone Valley Republicans Lincoln Reagan Day Dinner in Billings on Friday night. Clarke met supporters and signed book “Cop Under Fire” before the dinner. During his speech, he praised those running for public office, who spoke at the dinner. “Good luck to Read More…
HELENA – Former Vice President Joe Biden urged Democrats in Helena and across the state Saturday night to fight for the middle class, which he said made America the power and beacon of the modern world. “But for an aspirational middle class that is constantly rising, we would not have had the social and political Read More…
Jay Nelson announced Thursday that he will run for Lewis & Clark County Sheriff-Coroner, saying he wants to bring leadership and transparency to the office. A group of about two dozen supporters joined Nelson as he launched his campaign in front of the Lewis & Clark County Courthouse. In a brief statement for the press, Read More…
Montana Attorney General Tim Fox is urging congressional leaders to pass legislation supporting victims of child pornography. He is encouraging the House of Representatives to support and vote for the Amy, Vicky, and Andy Child Pornography Victim Assistance Act. “This is a very important piece of legislation,” said Fox. “As you know, child pornography is Read More…
Five Senate Democrats would lose to Republican candidates if the elections were held today and three have approval ratings under 50%, according to new Axios/SurveyMonkey polls. Why it matters: Democrats are defending 10 Senate seats in states that President Trump won in 2016. In six of those states, Trump’s approval is higher than 50% (compared to Read More…
Get ready for a title fight. Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D., and Rep. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D., look highly likely to be their parties’ nominees for a Senate seat. Both are big names in North Dakota politics, and with control of the U.S. Senate on the line this November, observers say it makes for an equally big 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…
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…
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…
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…
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…
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…
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…
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…
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…
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…
BISMARCK—North Dakota was given a grade of “C,” in a report released Monday by the Center for American Progress that provides an overview of election security and preparedness in each state. The report has garnered the attention of politicians in the state, including U.S. Sen. Heidi Heitkamp…. READ THE FULL STORY.
Washington (CNN)North Dakota’s Rep. Kevin Cramer said Tuesday he hasn’t made up his mind about whether he’ll challenge Democratic Sen. Heidi Heitkamp in this year’s midterm elections — but will decide by “the end of the weekend.” “There’s certainly a growing snowball of encouragement coming out of the state,” Cramer told reporters on Tuesday evening Read More…
It’s hard to get treatment when you’re 65 or older and rely on a program that pays health providers less than the price of care. And surprising medical bills is a whole other issue. That’s what a small group of locals told Montana’s U.S. Rep. Greg Gianforte at the Bozeman Senior Center on Monday during Read More…
Democrats are looking to embrace the #MeToo moment and rally women to push back on President Donald Trump in the midterms—and they don’t want Bill Clinton anywhere near it. In a year when the party is deploying all their other big guns and trying to appeal to precisely the kind of voters Clinton has consistently Read More…
Mitt Romney will launch his Utah Senate campaign Thursday morning with a low key announcement on social media, and will make his first public appearance a day later near Salt Lake City with a keynote address to a gathering of grassroots Republicans. Romney teased his run for Senate in a Feb. 1 tweet, saying that Read More…
Can a juror, faced with clear evidence that a defendant is guilty, still vote to acquit if he or she feels the law is unjust? Yes, say backers of “jury nullification.” This courtroom tactic was the focus of a Kalispell event organized by the Flathead County Libertarian Party. Presentations on nullification by Kirsten Tynan and Read More…
BILLINGS – Montana Secretary of State Corey Stapleton stopped by Billings West High School Thursday, to talk to students about the importance of getting involved. Stapleton spent over an hour with senior students at the high school answering questions. From social media to Indian Reservations and health care, Stapleton’s message to students was the importance Read More…
U.S. Representative Greg Gianforte visited a job training facility in Helena on Friday to talk about workforce development and tax reform. Gianforte toured the Montana Electrical Joint Apprenticeship and Training Center supported by local chapters of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers and the National Electrical Contractors Association. The center offers an apprenticeship program that Read More…
BILLINGS – Montana Secretary of State Corey Stapleton stopped by Billings West High School Thursday, to talk to students about the importance of getting involved. Stapleton spent over an hour with senior students at the high school answering questions. From social media to Indian Reservations and health care, Stapleton’s message to students was the importance Read More…
HELENA – Gov. Steve Bullock says he won’t rush into a new contract with the operator of the private prison in Shelby – even though it could yield the state as much as $30 million to offset planned budget cuts of “essential services” for the poor and disabled. In an interview this week, Bullock told Read More…
President Donald Trump’s approval rating is now higher than former President Barack Obama’s on the same date of his first term, Rasmussen Reports daily tracking data shows. In its presidential daily tracking poll released Thursday, the Rasmussen Reports showed Trump’s approval at 48 percent, statistically tied with his disapproval rating of 50 percent. READ THE Read More…
Montana Wilderness advocates are launching a campaign in opposition to a bill introduced by the state’s Republican Senator Steve Daines. If passed, that bill would eliminate protections for some federal lands in Montana. A new coalition called “Our Land, Our Legacy” says it plans to fight against Daines’ bill with social media messages and an Read More…
Bucking a recent trend of failed measures to shift Wyoming from its reliance on fossil fuels, one lawmaker is proposing a bill that looks to generate money from a traditional source of revenue — coal. House Bill 80 hinges on a potential reduction in federal fees on Wyoming coal, the sunset of the Abandoned Mine Read More…
WASHINGTON — Republican megadonor Foster Friess said Tuesday that he’s still weighing a primary challenge in this year’s Wyoming Senate race, but he doesn’t sound much like a politician gearing up to take on a sitting senator. For starters, Friess has nothing but praise for his would-be rival, Republican Sen. John Barrasso. “I love the Read More…