WEEK 7

Monday February 13 (Week 7)

Another story to start off week 7. You quickly learn that to be successful in any business, you build relationships with people. It was certainly true in my business career, but I think it is even more important as a legislator. The other day, Speaker Matt Regier singled me out, when a group of us were walking to a meeting a short distance from the Capitol. It’s hard to put into words, but you just know Mr. Speaker has your back. He goes out of his way to form personal relationships with virtually all 68 of us. While walking, we talked about this and that, and then he asked how I had adjusted to Helena. I told him a short, positive story. I relayed to him that Alice had told me that this Helena experience reminded her so much of our life when we were in college. Right now, we live in a basement apartment and on weekends, we do things together like we used to, back in our “younger” days. We go on drives, ask others to meet us for different activities and have spent more actual time together than we have done in years. In marriages, as time goes on, a couple can easily evolve into two people, each chasing their own careers, hobbies and a multitude of other things, and you just become roommates. As far as a relationship goes, what you once had becomes very different, and sometimes disappears all together. I’m not saying this happened to Alice and me, but I am saying that Helena has been a good thing for the both of us. So, I told Mr. Speaker that he possibly (??) saved our marriage … LOL!!! He said he doubted if that was the case, but he did say he would take credit for it!! Hard to get one over on him.

8 am … Madam Chair gavels us into committee, and we hear four bills this morning.

Two bills have to do with these large real-estate firms from out of state that buy trailer courts and immediately raise rates on the renters. This bill would give the trailer court patrons 60 days to come together and make an offer on the court. Right now, I’m thinking that maybe this isn’t something the government should get involved in. The patrons have the opportunity to ban together and make an offer anytime, even without the trailer court being on the market. Free market solutions are always better.

Bill #3 is introduced by Representative Terry Falk from Kalispell. We sit on each side of Representative Schillinger on the House Floor, so we have a lot of fun talking and teasing each other. (The other day, when we heard Bob Phalen’s obscenity bill, there were books placed on all 100 desks on the House Floor. These vividly outlined the life of trans people, with graphic, color pictures. Terry saw me holding mine and asked for it. We both ended up throwing ours in the trash …. (exactly where it belonged). Representative Falk’s bill would greatly increase penalties for first time DUI offenders … 5 days jail. I’m not sure where I land on this because most jails in cities are full, beyond capacity. At present time, 70% of first-time offenders don’t re-offend. It might be best to just leave things alone, but the throwback from Terry for voting “no” on his bill might be brutal. We don’t win every time, Representative Falk.

The fourth bill is presented by Representative Bill Mercer, who is a Federal Prosecutor out of Billings. It’s interesting, but when I came for training in December, I cut class and went down the hall and watched all the State Department heads give their Annual Reports. One of them was by the Director of Prisons and Bill Mercer was the person in charge of the committee that heard the report. I can tell you, from watching this in person, that Bill is very thorough and can really drill down. Representative Mercer asked the Director why the definition of “recidivism” was changed? Recidivism has to do with inmates re-offending and how often it happens. I almost felt sorry for the Director, because he will never forget that day. I say all that because today, Representative Mercer introduced a simple bill that defines “recidivism” to felony offenders. They will be tracked for 5 years. If they re-offend, it is immediately tracked, and the rate of re-offending will be easily documented. Next time, the Director will have a simple answer to a simple question.

We did take executive action On Representative Jane Gillette’s Patients’ Bill of Rights, and I almost messed up. I was a solid “yes” on Jane’s bill, but it’s always an oral roll call vote and I follow Zooey Zephyr on this oral vote. I always vote opposite of Zooey and he/she voted “yes”, so I almost voted “no” but did catch myself and corrected my vote. Zooey was the only one from the minority party to vote “yes”. I caught him/her in the lobby and shared that I almost messed up. Zooey smiled and said “… it could happen again …”.

Tuesday February 14 (week 7)

7:15 am … Whip meeting with leader Terry Moore. Always enjoy these meetings. He makes sure we all have input, and he shares the direction leadership would like the caucus to move this coming week. The discussion this morning was the issue of Constitutional Amendments, so Terry wanted us to choose I or 2 amendment proposals that we would like, so I chose 2 that had to do with our Supreme Court. One would allow the Governor to choose the Justices and then be confirmed by the Senate, not elected by popular vote. I like this but the danger is if the minority party ever re-gains power. They have become so extreme on virtually every issue that they no longer represent most Montana residents. Amendment #2 would limit their term to 16 years … I say make it retroactive immediately.

8 am … Our Chair lowers her gavel, and the Judiciary Committee comes to life. We hear five bills, and I will discuss two of them.

Representative Bill Mercer brought a bill that addressed County Attorney’s reporting child sexual abuse cases. He wants to create a report chain from counties right to the DOJ, and he mentioned Custer County. I think most everyone from Custer County would know exactly which case Representative Mercer was referring to. I asked to question the sponsor. It’s only in this setting that a welder could ever question a federal prosecutor. I simply asked if this bill puts another set of eyes on County Attorneys and his answer was “Yes, it does …”. I could talk for quite a while about what this really says about our County Attorney, right here in Custer County. It is not a good reflection if legislation must be created because of how one tragic case was handled … I will vote “yes” on this one.

Representative Laurie Bishop, a hardline liberal member of the minority party, presented her very controversial bill that would drastically change abortion law in Montana. We listened to 17 proponents … (those choosing to back this bill.) Chairwoman Regier limits testimony to two minutes each, and we heard virtually every argument as to why it is ok to sacrifice the life of the unborn. Opponents then testified and Representative Sue Vinton (our Majority Leader) was first. She leaves no doubt on her pro-life position. The second opponent witness is Jeff Laszloffy, of the Montana Family Foundation. He said this bill is the most radical anti-abortion legislation EVER introduced into Montana Legislation. Sixteen more opponents (against this radical bill) testify, and after a few questions from our Chair, the action on the bill was closed. I think this will be an absolute party line vote, 13-6, and the bill will be voted down in committee. Hopefully, it will never see the light of day. Why do they do this? Again, it’s called “optics”, and it becomes an absolute, strong statement on the minority party’s position on life. They are proud of their life position, and this will make the papers. Perhaps this is what they call a “show” bill.

Alice and I had an enjoyable evening meal with some great friends from Miles City. Loren and Mary Hinebauch and their daughter, Kristy (Kristy was my campaign manager, and keeps my Facebook page looking good). Their granddaughter, Kali Lindvold, a sophomore @ CCDHS, was serving this week as a Senate Page, sponsored by Senator Steve (and Beth) Hinebauch. He is serving his last term as a State Senator, so it was another very full day.

Wednesday February 15 (week 7)

Some habits are hard to break. On most days, my pickup is the first in the assigned parking lot just west of the Capitol. It looks like there are about four of us with this habit. Terry Moore and I trade as to who is the first to pull in.

8 am … Madam Chair gavels the Judiciary Committee to life. We also have a secretary and a research analyst assigned to us, along with an online secretary that handles all the remote testimony that is beamed into our hearings. The three state employees that assist our committee are professional beyond words, so with everyone in play, we begin a busy morning and hear five bills. We never know, some presentations last less than 10 minutes and some go for hours, like Representative Braxton Mitchell’s Drag Queen Bill, nothing terribly controversial today so the bill hearings went pretty fast.

1 pm … We have a short prayer and pledge of allegiance, and the floor session begins. We did something very different today when we adjourned to caucus. That’s when all 68 of us (Republicans) meet, without the minority party, to plan the next hour out. Today on the floor, we will vote on Representative Ler’s pronoun bill and his second amendment bill, and the minority party will be all over it, so we had some instruction from Mr. Speaker and the Majority Leader Sue Vinton. Basically, we are told there will be a lot of dialogs from the minority party and our instructions were to let our leadership do the talking and just vote right. It almost worked, but some Republican Legislators did speak out. But it was nothing compared to the minority party. They feel very strongly that in a school situation, when Johnny becomes Jane, the pronouns should also change. Representative’s Ler’s Bill said that it is proper and OK to address individuals by their birth pronoun, and we should not have to call Jane “she” if she is actually a “he”. The minority party goes crazy over this. They want us to affirm this lifestyle in every way and if we don’t, it’s called bullying and can lead to severe mental problems. Not only is this a problem, but we are told that 40% have or will try, to attempt suicide, and a lot of other mental problems are caused by us, because we will not be moved on the use of proper pronouns. You know, life can really get complicated way fast when folks choose to go down this road. We voted 66 yes and 34 no, which means 2 Republicans joined the minority party.

Next, we voted on the second amendment bill which says if you do business with the state of Montana, you must affirm you don’t prejudice against the second amendment. The same deal happened, with much talking by the minority party, but to no avail. 67 = yes and 33 = no. Only one Republican defected this time. There is much more I could write but I am going to call it a night.

Thursday February 16 (week 7)

Report for Bible Study at 6:30. Pastor Johnson does a great job considering both parties are represented. In my opinion, so much of the Republican Party Platform is affirmed in the Bible. All issues that pertain to life and gender are addressed and are just black and white while many other issues are touched on and delt with in the pages of the Bible.

Something did happen that everyone BUT me will find funny … I personally find no humor in this at all. Quite a few people have told me that Representative Ed Stafman, (who is a Jewish Rabbi and a member of the minority party), and I look alike… bald with a graying beard, glasses, and so forth. No offence to Representative Stafman but you could call me just about anything in the book EXCEPT Ed Stafman. So, on the way home tonight, I went by Albertsons, bought a new razor and shaved my beard off. I just wish I could transfer that hair to my bald head, but it doesn’t work that way. Tomorrow we will see if anyone will even notice, but we will see. I just feel better about it all.

Judiciary Committee came to life at 8 am sharp. The place is full of outfitters, so there must be something important going on. Montana set a legal hunting and trapping season for wolves, so many outfitters had hunts booked and paid for. I’ll be darn, but an environmental group filed for a restraining order on November 1, 2022, and virtually stopped the hunting season. By the time the restraining order was lifted, the season was just about over. The proposed bill we heard about would require any group filing for a temporary injunction to post a bond to pay for damages that might occur. I will support this bill.

1 pm House Floor. We will vote on bills that survived the committee hearings today. An interesting bill was presented by our Majority Leader, Sue Vinton. It would allow Montana taxpayers to continue to donate to schools and deduct it from their income taxes, (I’m oversimplifying but this is the idea). Tax credits can be donated to public schools or private schools. It sounded ok to me, but the minority party had a lot of push back on this. After listening to the argument for about 30 seconds, I figured out that the word “private” is an absolute, huge deal to the minority party. If they removed the word “private” the vote would have been 100 – yes, 0 – no, but it was a party line vote. 69 – yes and 31- no, which means one member of the minority party crossed over. (I’m thinking they pushed the green button by mistake because they seldom stray.)

3 pm … We begin to hear several bills. One catches my interest. Back in the day, we built several portable grain cleaners, and that was no small task. They basically take grain, (mainly wheat in our country), size it and remove all debris. It is totally clean and ready to be used for seed. Farmers virtually never take seed to be cleaned, because someone with a portable seed cleaner comes to them … innovation at its finest. This bill would put restrictions on the portable seed cleaners and make them keep records and samples from each customer. The idea is to not allow some modified varieties to be used as seed, as the genetics in some seeds are proprietary. My initial take would be to not make the operators of portable cleaners be the policeman. I’m thinking I will be a “no” on this one.

Friday February 17 (Week 7)

7:15 am … Majority Leader Vinton has our weekly meeting with Freshman legislators. A big day here because Representative Bergstrom, a freshman, and a teacher, is carrying the always contentious Right to Work Bill. All the unions are against this, and they are here in force. Security is much more visible today. In Montana most teachers, and virtually all public employees, are usually strong supporters of their union and rightfully so. They have a great benefit package that is worth fighting for. I asked Majority Leader Vinton the party position on Right to Work. She knew someone would ask and her prompt answer was that the Governor doesn’t really want to see a Right to Work bill on his desk. (This is code language that says vote “no”) I am not going to die on this hill, so if it gets out of committee, I will probably hold the party line and vote no. Let me know what you think.

8 am … Madam Chair gavels the Judiciary Committee to life. I have to be honest; I love being on this committee. Right now, there is a huge battle for our culture, and it is in the Montana Judiciary Committee where these ideas face off daily. My vote can have a huge effect on our everyday life. My thoughts … in Colorado and California, and probably more states, a mother can choose whether her 9-month-old healthy baby lives or dies. Right now, in Maryland, they are considering making gun sales illegal unless the firearm has an electronic tracker built into the firearm … WOW!!! In Washington, you can’t drive down their highways in 2030 unless your car has an electric motor in it. Many laws of this type will become a reality if the minority party ever re-gains control. Every day I smile because of the position the current Republican party is taking in Montana. When it comes to votes, I will be rock solid on family values, election integrity, energy independence and always a “yes” vote on laws that give freedom to the people.

Representative Paul Fielder started the day off by introducing his bill that would allow Judicial candidates (Supreme Court candidates) to simply volunteer to declare their party affiliation … entirely optional. The push back on this was shocking. The lobbyist for the Judges argued for a strong “no” vote and the trial lawyers said, “no way”. There were many opponents. I counted 12 in total. On the Proponents side was Jeff Lazloffy with the Family Foundation, Henry Kriegel with Americans for Prosperity and others for a total of 6. I am such a strong “yes” on this bill. If Jim Brown could have been able to put an R by his name, I believe that he would be on the state supreme court right now. This will pass out of committee 13-6 and will pass the House and Senate on partisan lines and will arrive on the Governor’s desk. It will be signed, only to be declared unconstitutional by our Montana Supreme Court. This is the culture war in action. Please think about joining the battle … get informed, learn the issues, get off the fence and make a difference. Montana needs you!!

Next bill presentation was by Representative Alice Buckley, a member of the minority party. An absolutely great job by Alice, as her bill re-defines assault when it pertains to date rape drugs. Some “hard to listen to” testimony by victims but a hard “yes” by me on this one.

Next Bill by Representative Ed Stafman of the minority party. The essence of this bill is as follows: If passed, a woman will be allowed to have an abortion, at any time, on religious grounds. I have said this before and will say it again, Stafman is so smart, and so well spoken. I heard he has a law degree and I bet his IQ must be right up there, but I’m telling you, this is so wrong. I will always defend the life of the unborn, at any point, and this is a hill I will gladly die on. I could talk a long time on this one but will just hit a couple points. I listened to the proponents and was amazed at the amount of clergy that testified as proponents, (ok to kill the unborn). I was shocked at this! Another thing happened during this bill hearing that was just classic. Minority Leader Kim Abbott has started sitting in on every Judiciary hearing. I thought this was strange, so I quietly asked Representative Casey Knudsen about this. He said it is allowable for party leadership to monitor hearings. They can speak but can’t vote. We came to opponents’ testimonies and many of them called abortion murder or other terms that meant the same. Minority Leader Abbott raised her hand and made a request that the bill opponents quit using terms that equated abortion to murder or anything close to that. So, here we sit, in a moment that I will never forget. The Minority Leader’s eyes are locked onto the eyes of our Chair, and she needs to respond within seconds. Tension immediately filled the air because the Committee Meeting was totally on hold until this complaint was dealt with. Madam Chair, very calmly looking at Minority Abbott, simply says, “noted”, and the hearing continued. An absolute, classic takedown that I will never forget!! Chairwoman Regier is my hero for making this unmovable stand! I will just say this will be a “Hell No” vote for me. The committee vote will be a 13 no – 6 yes vote and will then be DOA, but more will come. They just never stop.

Lunch in the Rotunda, and I was sitting next to Representative Greg Oblander, a chiropractor out of Billings. We enjoy our visits. This atmosphere here in the Capitol reminds me a little of when I was 18 and attending the University of Wyoming on a wrestling scholarship. You’re immediately thrown into a room with a bunch of strangers, but the environment is intense, so you make fast bonds with people that sometimes last a lifetime. After 4 years of participating in this grueling sport, many lifelong friendships were formed, and this Helena experience feels just like that. In this environment, you make close friends, fast, and Oblander is one of those. We were having a quick lunch and Madam Chair, Amy Regier, took a seat beside me. Lots of places to sit, but she sits beside me. I have to admit that I fell a bit honored she would do this. We had the best visit about all the goings on in the Judiciary Committee and we agree that this is where the culture war is fought. (Note: I’m thinking my missing beard and the story behind it had something to do with our visit, just saying … LOL!!!)

Floor Session at 1 … You will keep hearing my story about everyone around here (before January 2, 2023 … start of session). I had no idea who they were and vice versa, and now, in week 7, many have become trusted friends. Representative Neil Duram, from Eureka, is one of these. He is a recently retired Montana Highway Patrol. We serve on the Judiciary Committee together and Neil’s contribution to this committee is amazing. He does his homework and thinks of questions that shed tremendous light on the variety of subjects that we see every day. If a bill has a penalty, it ends up in Judiciary, so we see many DOJ (Department of Justice) and most law enforcement bills. Neil’s background is vital in helping most of us understand the bill. Something happened on the floor today I want to share. Representative Duram’s phone rang. A very close friend of Neil’s, who is a current Highway Patrolman, had made a traffic stop. The details are fuzzy, but this is what was pieced together. The pickup eluded the officer and became stuck, so Officer Lewis Johnson approached on foot. The pickup became unstuck. Officer Johnson ended up on the hood and the driver stopped suddenly so Officer Johnson fell in front of the pickup and then the driver ran over Officer Johnson and fled. Officer Johnson is in the hospital, and you can imagine his condition. The phone call was Representative Duram’s wife saying, “Lewis Johnson’s toes moved”. Representative Duram pushed his speak button on the Floor and asked the Speaker if he could be off the record and out of the journal, for the purpose of an announcement. He went on to share some of this story on the House Floor. Neil is just a few seats behind me, so I was watching, and I’ll tell you, it’s never easy watching somebody get news like this. We have all had these phone calls, but this really got to me. Representative Neil is super tough and an absolute man’s man, and my heart absolutely broke. He requested prayers be made for Officer Lewis Johnson. Our Speaker of the House immediately stopped the session and we prayed, as one group. That is how I would like to conclude this week 7 report … Please pray for Officer Lewis Johnson.