Two years ago, Wyoming became the first state to give its Freedom Caucus control of the statehouse. Earlier this year, the state became one of the first to reject that further right leadership.
In the wake of that decision, the Republican Party may return to the center and provide an early example of what other red states could see next, interviews with current and former GOP leaders show.
Former state lawmaker Marti Halverson, a Lincoln County Republican, moved to Wyoming decades ago because taxes in Pennsylvania were too high.
“The fact that most of our neighbors are good, solid conservative Republicans just made it all the better,” the director of Wyoming Right to Life said. Halverson supports a 50% property tax cut ballot initiative that voters will decide next week. And she thinks that in the August primary, Republicans rejected the Freedom Caucus too quickly.
Speaker of the House Chip Neiman worked through “every single Senate bill that came over to him,” Halverson said. “The same cannot be said of the Senate.”
But new polling from the University of Wyoming, however, shows most Republicans prefer more center-right policies and politicians. Neiman lost his Senate bid in August to Republican incumbent Ogden Driskill, who said he hopes the legislature will return to what he described as civility.
“We’re entering a new era here,” he said. “I think you’re going to see a lot more efforts of electeds to work together.”
In that way, Wyoming could be a leader for other red states. Neighboring Idaho has become a similar GOP battleground. There, the Idaho Freedom Foundation think tank has led campaigns against moderate Republicans.
Before it lost power, Wyoming’s Freedom Caucus sought to shrink government by slashing budgets and challenging government programs. It opposes DEI and has spearheaded abortion bans. Driskill says it will take a decade to undo some governance changes the Freedom Caucus made. And he warns that Wyoming will face a fiscal cliff if the Proposition 1 tax cut passes.
“It’s as big a hit as I’ve ever seen on a one-time shot to the budget,” Driskill said.
The Caucus defeat wasn’t the only shift in the GOP this cycle. The state party made endorsements for the first time in a primary. Most of those candidates lost. Party Chairman Byran Miller said that’s not proof the party is out of touch with the electorate. Instead, he blames a lack of publicity.
“We couldn’t spend a dime to put it out there,” Miller said.
The group is suing the state for the chance to put money behind its candidates next cycle. Miller and Driskill said there is still a threat from activist candidates like Rebecca Bextel, who claim GOP candidates are not conservative enough.
“I don’t doubt that she’s a solidly conservative,” Miller said of Bextel, a Jackson activist running for governor under the Constitution Party ticket. “But she has no idea how the system works. She has no idea how the party works. She has no idea how to actually affect change.”
Bextel declined an interview request from KHOL. On “The Tucker Carlson Show,” Bextel described her Republican opponent Eric Barlow as a Democrat.
“He’s funded by the Democrats, the dark, George Soros-funded money,” Bextel said.
Campaign finance records show most of Barlow’s fundraising came from around the state. On social issues such as abortion, Halverson, the former lawmaker, said Wyoming is solidly middle of the pack among conservative states.
Idahoans will vote next week on a ballot measure that could lead to a repeal of the state’s abortion ban. Halverson doesn’t want to put the issue to voters here.
“Given the experience in other states, we are reluctant to get behind that at this point,” she said, pointing to Ohio’s vote three years ago that made abortion access part of the state constitution.
Barlow, the GOP frontrunner for governor, supported a near-total abortion ban and a medication abortion ban. But Halverson says she’ll be watching closely to see who he picks as Attorney General to defend those bans in court.
