Tuesday’s primaries brought results that raised eyebrows across the state. While not exactly a clean sweep, Freedom Caucus candidates prevailed in enough races that the Wyoming Caucus is poised to lose its majority—and possibly control of the gavel—in both chambers.
While many heralded the Freedom Caucus domination as a welcome change, others consider it a frightening prospect. These alternate assessments of delight or dread are a little too dramatic for my tastes. A more sober assessment should step back from the breathless exaggerations of campaign season.
First, we should welcome the clarity. Recent primary elections have seen such lopsided ratios of Republican participation—94 percent in 2022, and 89 percent last Tuesday — that many Republicans wonder why we have primaries at all. But during this election cycle, a clearer picture of the battlefield emerged.
No longer were Freedom Caucus candidates portrayed as isolated extremists and fringe Republicans. Instead, they were treated as one slate of candidates opposed by an alternate slate. Governor Gordon’s list, and his targeted donations, could not have made it plainer.
This is a good thing. The increasingly lopsided ratio of Democrats to Republicans has effectively turned Wyoming into an unhealthy one-party state. The emergence of two clear caucuses within the dominant party helps the voter make an informed choice.
One result of this emerging reality is the new terminology that it requires. After decades of bashing conservatives as “far-right extremists,” what vocabulary remains to favor one sort of conservative before another?
Enter the “farther right Wyoming Freedom Caucus.” It’s a worthy try. But “farther right” just doesn’t seem ominous enough to have the intended effect.
Punditry’s struggle to find suitable terminology for Wyoming’s emerging political parties exposes a deeper problem. How are these parties defined?
On election night there was much talk about the old bipartisanship versus a new shrillness. Others cast it as traditional local concerns (education, roads, attracting new businesses) versus a new focus on abstract nationalistic social concerns. But these summary judgments are inadequate.
As an alternative analysis, readers might want to pick up the most recent issue of Imprimus, a publication of Hillsdale College. It features an essay by John Fonte of the Hudson Institute.
In it, he provides a useful lens that brings into focus not only national politics, but Cowboy State politics as well. What is most useful about Fonte’s analysis is that it guides the reader out of the mire of personal politics, and into the issues themselves.
Let’s face it. The political world—on all sides—is dominated by Donald Trump. His name is the shibboleth of our time. Some would have you prove your political bona fides by cursing it, others by blessing it. Either way, you cannot pass political checkpoints without speaking the name of Trump. This is not helpful.
Rather than orientation around a man, Fonte draws our attention to two statements of principle. Voters, pundits and politicians who are seeking a more objective and coherent discussion of the principles at stake in Cheyenne should take the time to read and compare those two statements.
The Freedom Conservative: Statement of Principles lists 10 bullet points, each with a short explanation: “Liberty; The pursuit of happiness; The foundation of prosperity; Full faith and credit; A nation of laws, not men; Americans by choice; Out of many, one; America’s promissory note; The shining city on a hill; Freedom of conscience."
This statement is signed by the likes of Dick Armey, Jeb Bush, Mona Charen, and Jonah Goldberg. It seems apt to represent the Wyoming Caucus and Americans for Prosperity, both in its tone and in its focus.
The National Conservative: Statement of Principles calls for a restoration of the virtues inherent in “patriotism and courage, honor and loyalty, religion and wisdom, congregation and family, man and woman, the sabbath and the sacred, and reason and justice” as the “prerequisite for recovering and maintaining our freedom, security, and prosperity.”
Signed by the likes of Larry Arnn, Victor Davis Hanson, Rod Dreher, and Charlie Kirk, this statement is an excellent summary of the direction that the Freedom Caucus seems to be heading.
Fonte’s informative essay gives an excellent introduction to the history and philosophy that brought us these two sets of principle. It is by no means redundant. Reading it in conjunction with the statements will expand and enrich your understanding of Wyoming’s new two-party landscape.
Jonathan Lange is a Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod pastor in Evanston and Kemmerer and serves the Wyoming Pastors Network. Follow his blog at https://jonathanlange.substack.com/. Email: JLange64@protonmail.com.
