Riverton-based state Rep. Joel Guggenmos cannot run for reelection to his district this year because he hasn’t lived within it since November as the Wyoming Constitution requires, the Fremont County Clerk said Thursday.
Guggenmos, a first-term Republican in the Wyoming House of Representatives, lived outside urban Riverton’s House District 55 for seven months, he confirmed in a Friday interview with Cowboy State Daily.
He’s said prior that his landlord increased his rent by six times, and he and his family moved into a camper west of Riverton — in the boundaries of House District 33.
Rep. Ivan Posey, D-Fort Washakie, represents that district.
Fremont County Clerk Julie Freese sent a letter Thursday to Guggenmos, pronouncing her official opinion that he’s not eligible to run for House District 55 in this year’s election.
But, Freese emphasized, the final decision of Guggenmos’ eligibility sits with the Wyoming Secretary of State.
‘You Will Not Qualify'
Secretary of State Chuck Gray did not respond by publication time to a text message request for comment.
He had requested the inquiry in text-message form during an in-person discussion at a Friday legislative meeting in Lander.
Freese’s conclusion follows a residency complaint by Fremont County Democratic Party Chair Julie Twist, and a subsequent investigation into the matter by the Fremont County Sheriff’s Office.
“Due to recent allegations and subsequent investigation, your recent living situation has disqualified you as a potential candidate for House District #55,” says Freese’s letter, which Cowboy State Daily obtained Friday via a public records request.
Gray’s office and the Wyoming legislative Management Council are also copied on the letter.
“Should you consider running for re-election in House District #55, it is my position that you will not qualify because you will not have resided in (the district) for 12 months on November 3rd, 2026, as is required by Article 3, Section 2 of the Wyoming Constitution.”
The state Constitution says that “no person" shall be a state representative "who has not, for at least twelve months next preceding his election resided within the county or district in which he was elected."
Freese wrote that she arrived at these conclusions “with the advice of counsel.”
Wants To Do This Right
Guggenmos has sought legal advice on the issue and is awaiting direction from that, he said Friday.
“I’m also in conversations (regarding) legal advice. I have not heard back yet. They are studying this before I do anything,” Guggenmos said. “Because I want to make sure my bases are covered; I don’t want to do anything that’s wrong. I’m waiting until I have more information.”
The candidate filing period spans from May 14-29.
Guggenmos said he’s considered backing another candidate if he can’t run, but hasn’t found anyone as of Friday.
Carl Manning, longtime member of the local Fremont County School District 25, declared his candidacy for the seat before Guggenmos’ residency controversy surfaced.
Democratic Party Officials
Wyoming and Fremont County Democratic Party officials were involved in bringing the residency complaint against Guggenmos, the Fremont County Sheriff’s Office investigative report says.
Erin O’Doherty, data director for the Wyoming Democratic Party, told Cowboy State Daily that she was trying to remove lawmakers from the party’s ever-changing list of registered voters and where they live.
That’s her standard practice, so that Democratic Party canvassers don’t knock on doors of voters who are already sitting legislators, she said.
When she tried to match the lawmakers to their districts by address to ensure she’d eliminated them all, Guggenmos kept showing up in outside his district, she said.
His new address wasn’t a postal box, she recalled.
“I thought, that’s kind of odd,” said O’Doherty. “That you’d get your mail several miles in a different direction?”
There could be “perfectly reasonable things,” however, like getting mail at a family member’s house.
Still it was odd enough, she referred it to the Fremont County Democratic Party Chair, Julie Twist, said O’Doherty.
Twist lives in HD55, the sheriff’s report says.
Her complaint says that Guggenmos wife “has reportedly told members of the Riverton Garden Club that they have moved out of the district.”
“This indicates that the situation is not a misunderstanding but a knowing departure from the requirements of the law,” the complaint says.
A “local community member” reported this to the Secretary of State’s office, says Twist’s complaint, “but did not receive a response.”
Twist passes regularly by the home under which Guggenmos registered when first representing the district and hasn’t ever seen any indication that it’s occupied, the complaint says.
She asked the authorities to investigate.
Fremont County Sheriff’s Detective Kingston Cole pulled a vehicle registration dated Oct. 23, 2025, and found it registered to 18 Blue Spruce Lane, the sheriff’s report says.
That’s within Posey’s district.
Cole requested documents from the Secretary of State’s Office, and the office sent him Guggenmos’s 2024 application for party nomination, his routine financial disclosure of this past winter and the winter prior.
In the January 2025 financial disclosure, Guggenmos listed his address as within his district, and in a Dec. 30, 2025 financial disclosure, he gave the Blue Spruce Lane address, says the report.
Guggenmos moved back into his district, onto East Madison Avenue, in late April, the report says.
Alert
Guggenmos told the Legislative Service Office last July that he had to move out of his district, the representative told Cowboy State Daily on Friday.
The Legislative Service Office (LSO) is a non-partisan staff entity for the Legislature whose staffers give law analysis but not personal legal advice to legislators.
Guggenmos also told House Majority Floor Leader Scott Heiner, R-Green River, during the 2026 legislative session that the new living situation was temporary, says the sheriff’s report.
Communications between Guggenmos and LSO are privileged and not public record, as the legislative branch has exempted itself from the state’s public records act.
But Guggenmos in a May 6 email gave LSO Director Matt Obrecht permission to speak with Cole about the situation, the now-public records show.
After that, Obrecht spoke with the detective and confirmed Guggenmos had contacted him in July to ask about the legal implications of having to move out of his district temporarily “while intending to move back later.”
Guggenmos described a situation where he might have to live outside the district “for a period of time.”
On Whether He Can Serve Out This Term
Obrecht explained to Cole a legal analysis that is also contained in a memo LSO produced in 2022 after a controversy involving the residency of then-Rep. Dan Zwonitzer, R-Cheyenne.
That memo focuses on how, and whether, lawmakers can be removed from office mid-term if they move out of their districts.
State law says representatives who move out of their districts trigger the vacancy-filling process. But the Wyoming Constitution’s grants of powers to the Legislature and specific list of qualifications for office probably render that law unconstitutional, that analysis says.
Obrecht sent Guggenmos a memo on the topic, the report says.
Wyoming election law defines “residence” as a person’s place of actual habitation. The law contains an exception that a person does not give up residence if he leaves, temporarily, with the intent of returning.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
