Governor Mark Gordon made headlines when the state canvassing board met to certify Wyoming’s recent primaries. He publicly impugned the Department of Justice for the election observers that it had sent to Cheyenne polling places.
If he had intended to coordinate with the nationwide campaign to delegitimize the DOJ, the timing could not have been better. The New York Times, Washinton Post, MSNOW etc. repeated his most incendiary words to spin the desired narrative: Even the reddest state in the Union opposes Trump and election integrity. Mirabile dictu!
The Daily Kos provided the headline: “Conservative WY GOP Governor Mark Gordon Criticizes Trump for Threatening Voting Rights.” The Swamp, no doubt, was as gleeful over this claim as when Mr. Gordon went to Harvard to align Wyoming with the “carbon negative” crowd.
I think that the citizens of Wyoming are tired of being used as extras in B-movie agitprops. We’ve seen this flick playing in Colorado since globalist millionaires flipped it from a reliably red state to a Rocky Mountain bastion of blue.
Gordon’s carefully crafted broadside deserves a closer look. At the end of an otherwise uneventful meeting, he was given the floor for final comments. He started by addressing Wyoming’s director of elections, “I was made aware on the morning of the 18th that the Justice Department had sent observers to polling places in Laramie County. Were you aware of that prior to Thursday morning?”
Notably, Gordon did not disclose who made him aware. Did he get a phone call from Laramie County Clerk, Debra Lee? Was it an email? Was it from someone else? That’s an important part of the story. But after scouring the news, I still can’t find the answer.
Be that as it may, the governor continued, “In talking with Lynn Budd, the Director of Homeland Security. . . she was unaware of it.” He further alluded to conversations with Debra Lee and the attorney general.
Curiously, Gordon did not claim to have talked to the U.S. Attorney for the District of Wyoming, Darin Smith. Nevertheless, he opined, “to my knowledge, [he] was unaware of it.” Upon what did he base his claim?
All of this paints a highly illuminating picture of what transpired between August 18th and the 26th. The governor communicated with a county clerk, his attorney general and his director of homeland security. But he did not raise the matter with the director of elections, the Chief Election Officer, Chuck Gray, or the U.S. attorney.
Why not? The people of Wyoming deserve better.
Clerk Debra Lee exhibited a similar pattern. When lawful federal observers showed up to Laramie County polling places, she called the Department of Justice and communicated with the governor’s office. But she never called her chief election officer or, apparently, the Laramie County sheriff—who actually has jurisdiction over her polling places.
Only eight days later, after the governor blindsided Secretary Gray at the canvassing board, did Lee go public. In a statement, she made claims about the intentions of the federal observers without specifying any of their actions or words to substantiate her claims.
Again, I scoured news reports to learn what these federal observers actually said or did that was objectionable. Nothing. Not a quote. Not a disruptive action. All we have is vagaries like, “I was informed,” and “They intended.” This is all we know about what the governor labeled “a bit aggressive” and “irregular.”
A year after Charlie Kirk was assassinated for “hate speech,” we all know how labels can be wildly inaccurate.
After calling Wyomingites “draconian” and “knuckleheads” for positions that turned out to be perfectly true and reasonable, Gordon’s labeling of the federal observers pales in comparison. Even so, I’m not buying this hype before I know what they actually said and did.
And that brings us to the “investigation.” The Associated Press hyperventilated: “Wyoming governor requests investigation into activity of Justice Department monitors.” That’s how they interpreted his words, “I have asked the attorney general to start looking into, you know, the kind of nature of the visits and all that sort of stuff.”
That seems an irregular way to announce a formal investigation. It raises, in my mind, statutory questions. If Sheriff Kozak was never asked to investigate the matter, on what basis does the governor involve the attorney general?
If the governor has statutory authority to investigate federal observers who did nothing to change votes, why did he never use the same authority to ask then-A.G., Bridget Hill to investigate the Weston County debacle?
Given these unanswered questions, I am not impressed with last Thursday’s performance.
Like numerous failed lawsuits against our Secretary of State, and far-fetched vetoes of election integrity measures, this entire operation feels like just another scripted attack on anyone who might lift a finger to enforce our election laws.
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.
