State Rep. Landon Brown, R-Cheyenne, said he was shown a statistic when he first entered politics that shows every time a negative ad is aimed at you, to effectively counteract it you need to create seven times as much positive messaging of your own.
“The proof is in the pudding with negative campaigning,” Brown said.
Former Wyoming GOP Chair Matt Micheli said it’s a sad reality that negative campaigning works.
“I think we’ve seen over the last several election cycles, every election becomes more and more about emotion and less and less about policy,” Micheli said. “Negative campaigning plays into the emotional side of the electorate.”
Mudslinging wasn’t just a tactic throughout the 2024 primary campaign, it became a political issue.
One of the most prominent slingers was the dark money-funded, Virginia-based Make Liberty Win, which was active in 40 races around the state. Most of its $371,260 in campaign efforts consisted of negative attacks made against candidates the group didn’t like.
Of the 40 candidates MLW supported, 22 won.
Although it had a lower proportion of negative ads, Americans For Prosperity also engaged in some negative advertising as part of the $343,697 it spent. Twelve of the 17 candidates it endorsed won.
“We’re thrilled to see these outstanding candidates clinch victory in their primary season, the likes of which Wyoming has never seen before,” AFP Wyoming State Director Tyler Lindholm said in a Wednesday press release. “From expanding education freedom to cutting regulatory red tape, our champions will get straight to work on the issues that matter most to hardworking families after they win again in November.”
By The Numbers
The WY Freedom political action committee, the campaign arm of the farther right Wyoming Freedom Caucus, also caught attention for some of its negative campaign efforts as part of the $179,875 it spent. Of the 46 Legislature candidates the Freedom Caucus endorsed, 32 won their races, an almost 70% success rate.
The Wyoming Caucus, which spent $199,646, centered most of its efforts around supporting its own candidates, but not without some criticism of the Freedom Caucus. Of the 21 candidates it gave money to, nine won their primary races, or about 43%.
Gov. Mark Gordon’s Prosperity and Commerce PAC was very busy during the election season, spending $212,574. The governor gave $150,000 of his own money to this group and also $15,896 directly to individual candidates around the state.
Although the governor has supported candidates in past elections, his PAC’s efforts this year caught much more attention for the creation of a website and wide-ranging text message campaigns.
Of the 49 candidates Gordon endorsed on the PAC’s website, 19 won their primaries, or about 39%.
Rep. Bill Allemand, R-Midwest, whose opponent Gordon supported, said the governor’s political maneuvering “backfired.”
“The people are tired of what’s being pushed on them and they’re waking up,” Allemand said.
The Wyoming Realtors PAC, which has traditionally been one of the largest players in Wyoming elections, gave $147,750 to legislative and county commission candidates this year. Of the 49 legislature candidates it donated to, 21 won their primary elections.
The American Federation for Children, which is linked to evangelist Corey DeAngelis and was founded by former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, whose family owns a large ranch in Wapiti, spent $81,854 on Wyoming races. DeAngelis said on X (formerly Twitter) on Wednesday that his group targeted Republican Reps. Dan and Dave Zwonitzer of Cheyenne and Rep. Ember Oakley, R-Riverton.
Hustle, Not Mudslinging, Pays Off
But conservative attorney Cassie Craven said during Cowboy State Daily’s live election coverage on Tuesday night that what can’t be understated in an election is the sheer determination and grit a candidate puts into a campaign.
Blaming every upset or loss in the primary election on “nasty mailers is just a disservice,” she said.
Craven mentioned how Cheyenne resident Gary Brown, who upset Rep. Bill Henderson, R-Cheyenne, knocked twice on every door in his district.
Although Dan Zwonitzer complained about negative attacks, he was sidelined by a broken leg that prevented him from doing doorknocking during the heart of the campaign.
Casper resident Julie Jarvis, who was also able to successfully dodge mud in her surprise primary win over Rep. Jeanette Ward, R-Casper, said one of the biggest factors in her primary win was the time and effort her volunteer team put in.
Above The Mud
On Monday night, Brown posted a heartfelt video to his Facebook where he talked about the criticisms he’s received for testifying on behalf of a former Wyoming Highway Patrol trooper who was convicted of first-degree sexual assault.
Brown apologized for doing so shortly after, but that hasn’t stopped people from continuing to condemn him on social media for the move, an onslaught which he said in the video nearly drove him to the point of considering taking his own life.
Craven said it’s perfectly reasonable that Brown would see some fallout for these actions.
“He’s dealing with accountability in a big way in a voting year,” she said.
Brown’s opponent Exie Brown didn’t dive into that much, but did issue a number of negative attacks against Landon Brown, while the legislator refused to act in kind, at least directly.
But Landon Brown wasn’t always even keeled to those who criticized him on social media, snapping at Cheyenne resident Sheree Nall on Facebook earlier this month and pointing out that she and her husband both work jobs for the federal government.
“If you’re so hell bent of ‘flushing’ me — maybe the new Rep. who hates government will expel your positions and you guys can love him for the loss of two very high paying jobs,” Landon Brown wrote to Nall.
Jarvis took the approach of responding to attacks with information and facts, also conducting a survey of residents in her district. She said the narrative that anyone who’s running against Ward in the primary must be a moderate Republican is simply untrue.
“It was more just working to set the story straight on falsehoods that were purely not true,” Jarvis said. “It was my goal to give back to local people by using facts and information.”
Rep. Bob Nicholas, R-Cheyenne, also directly pushed back on the negative messaging he was receiving with his own.
“The most powerful emotion is anger and fear,” Micheli said, “And negative campaigning plays into that emotion.”
When Sen. Jim Anderson, R-Casper, won his primary election on Tuesday, he expressed optimism that his win proves there isn’t an avenue for negative campaigning in Wyoming.
“I hope it proves that negative campaigning does not work in this state,” Anderson said. He characterized his opponent’s campaign as “nasty” and one that use out-of-state PAC money to try and defeat him.
Leo Wolfson can be reached at leo@cowboystatedaily.com.
