Three candidates are running to replace Chuck Gray as Wyoming's secretary of state. The seat has turned into a bit of a game of musical chairs. That's because Gray is leaving his role to run for the U.S. House seat, which is being vacated by Harriet Hageman, who's now running for Senate, as Cynthia Lummis is retiring.
Brian McCarty is the Democrat. Where he lacks political experience, he told Wyoming Public Radio, his time spent working for a Fortune 500 company, General Electric, as well as a train shipping company, prepares him to manage the office that oversees business registrations and elections.
Tamara Trujillo is the Constitution Party candidate. She served one term as a state representative from Laramie County, and she also has a lot of business experience working in the oil and gas industry as an administrator.
The third candidate is Republican Robert Short. He’s in his third term as a Converse County commissioner. He has worked in several industries and internationally as well.
All three said they want to ensure no fraud is happening amid Wyoming’s booming rate of new business filings, thanks to the state’s privacy laws and low filing fees. They all argued their varied business backgrounds prepare them to do that best.
When it came to voting, they shared different visions for what constitutes fair access and ballot security.
Trujillo said she was 50-50 on continuing to share voter data with the federal government as her predecessor has. Short said absolutely not. Brian McCarty agreed.
The secretary of state, as one of the five statewide elected officials, sits on the State Board of Land Commissioners and some other investment boards.
McCarty emphasized the importance of protecting public lands. Meanwhile, Trujillo and Short agreed that the priority needs to be protecting private property rights.
Excerpts of the general election candidates’ interviews are below. They’ve been edited for clarity and brevity.
McCarty spoke with Edwards for about 25 minutes on Sept. 23, 2026.
Melodie Edwards: Do you mind just saying your name and your title as it's related to this candidacy?
Bryan McCarty: My name is Brian McCarty, and my title is citizen.
ME: Why did you decide to run for this office?
BM: The zeroth thing I think I wanna say, which comes before the first thing, is just to thank you for this opportunity and to express my gratitude to you and your station for playing this role in the interest of a healthy democracy, just making sure that your audience has an opportunity to be informed and to hear what the candidates have to say in their own words.
To that point, where I like to try to start my campaigning when I'm at a campaign-type event, which I would consider this to be, is by not talking about myself. My view is that people in general, not so much in political terms, but just in general, are more interested and concerned about themselves than they are with me. The way those two intersect is what I can do as secretary of state to have a positive influence on the things that they are concerned about.
The real reason that I like to start there is because it tends to be rhetorical, but it's also a legitimate question, is to ask the members of your audience directly: ‘What is keeping you up at night these days personally?’ Things that you are concerned about around your kitchen table, so to speak. The reason that I start there in political terms is unless you voted for the current occupant of the White House, and even a lot of you that did, you constitute the majority all by yourself, and not just a majority, but a supermajority, to the tune of 75 or 80%. And you, all by yourself, can stop this nonsense in its tracks.
I personally believe just knowing that, or at least believing in it enough to go and validate it for yourself, 'cause this is the kind of thing that people really need to satisfy themselves of, go look it up. Look at the results of the last presidential election. Eighty-five, or I think it's 75%, of everybody that is of voting age in this country didn't vote for the incumbent.
Editor’s Note: In 2024, 49.8% of voters cast a ballot for Trump, compared to 32% of all eligible voters, according to an analysis by Pew Research Center.
I just believe that if people can satisfy themselves of that, that, all by itself, will get them to the polls in November. ‘You mean I can make all this nonsense stop?’ Yes, you can, and you do it by voting. So please do.
ME: I do have one more question that would be about your personal information, and so you can take it or leave it, but I'm gonna at least offer it to you. Do you mind talking a little bit about your experience and how your work has prepared you to lead the office of secretary of state?
BM: Oh, not at all. Be glad to. Appreciate the opportunity, and that's really the next thing that the people are gonna wanna know is: So why him? Just a campaigning anecdote: I was at a get-together of supporters not that long ago, and one of the supporters kind of took me to task because I haven't been a secretary of state before. That was a really good interaction, because it really got my mind to thinking.
Part of the answer is, I'm pretty sure my opponent in the election has never been secretary of state either. So if that is your perfectionist litmus test, what are you gonna do about it, contrarian voter? Because neither one of us satisfies your idealistic requirement. The way I have chosen to frame that is I want you, Mr. or Mrs. Voter, I want you to think about the person who is looking down the barrel of the gun of our own government that is about to kill you, because that is the kind of thing that is happening in our country right now, every single day, and I want you to think about your decision between two equally, quote-unquote, "unqualified" candidates and what you are going to do with your vote.
Are you going to not vote? Are you going to vote for the other guy because he's got more experience, even though it's not enough to satisfy your requirement? And how are you going to explain your decision to that person who is right about to get murdered by our own government, and in a way that will satisfy them that you're doing the right thing, and their family and their friends? Because that is the reality of where we are.
[I] haven't forgotten about your actual question. I will get to it, and I'm about to get in on that. One of the things that's been really kind of an unexpected pleasure about running for this office is how it is tying together so many aspects of my own personal experience in life and career and et cetera. Just a couple of the things that the office requires that I bring to the table is an appreciation for fulfilling the requirements of the office as they are defined by statute, basically. I mean, there's a couple other things that sort of roll into it, but that's the basics of it, and the incumbent is not doing that. He's doing a bunch of other stuff. He may be doing that as well, but that's the biggest part of the job, is [to] administer it according to the way it has been defined by the people who do that defining, the Legislature primarily. So how does my personal experience figure into that?
A couple of the major elements of my career experience are being a Six Sigma Green Belt with General Electric back when it was still what used to be known as the Real General Electric, the most profitable, most valuable business on the Fortune 500, one of the founding institutions on the Dow Jones Industrial, the last one that was still there that was one of the original ones. That has given me an appreciation for, and a methodology for, looking into problems and coming up with solutions and making sure that they work. It doesn't really seem to me that, from a definitional standpoint, there's that many issues with the secretary of state's office. The incumbent is a little bit of a different story.
It seems to me like the office is basically pretty stable in terms of how it is defined and administered, and I've got plenty of career anecdotes about identifying a problem, recognizing it, doing the brainstorming to come up with alternative solutions and choosing the one that seems to be the most appropriate in terms of matching up with what the crux of the problem is, and implementing it and looping back to make sure that the results are what you intend it to be. So that was, I would say, one of the main elements of my career experience that is gonna be pertinent in this office.
Also, coming from a culture that was very, very highly focused on regulatory compliance and integrity and all of that kind of thing. I really am delighted to talk about how my experience correlates.
One of the other pieces that was probably my favorite career experience in my entire career was in learning how to diagnose train derailments. Most of my career has to do with the railroad industry, and part of that, when I was starting out, was learning how to investigate and diagnose a derailment when it happens, and do the data collection and doing the data analysis, and coming up with the cause. Again, it's sort of like a criminal investigation, where the explanation that is the simplest one that most closely correlates with the actual evidence that you have been able to accumulate most often is the right one. The thing that just appealed to my nature about that was there's pretty much no way of politicking the root cause of a derailment. What caused it is what caused it, and it's based on facts and science and reality, and those are the values that I intend to bring to the execution of my responsibilities as secretary of state. Stay in reality, stay based on facts, and just let the investigation into whatever the issue might be play itself out, and do it authentically and not try to force my own personal views into whatever the solution I propose is. Just follow the evidence.
ME: What's the secretary of state's role when it comes to elections and ensuring Wyomingites are aware of their civic rights and their civic responsibilities?
BM: Gosh, I wish I knew the answer to that question. I'm just kidding. That is at least, I would say, 75% of the responsibility of the office: Make sure that elections are administered properly according to the actual law, not what we do illegally and pretend and claim is legal because it's just the complete opposite, which is kind of the thing that's happening these days around here.
Just make sure that everybody that is legally entitled to vote, which, by the way, current procedures basically require you can't get registered if you don't have the kinds of identification and proof of citizenship and residency and all that, that people are proposing as some new additional legislation. You already have to do all that if you want to register. When you go to vote, that's what gets checked when you go to the poll, is they look you up to see if you're on the rolls as a voter. If you're there, it means you've already complied with all that stuff that people are trying to create as additional requirements, which are a solution to a nonexistent problem. So making sure everybody that is legally permitted to vote has the opportunity to do so, that the results are tabulated accurately and in a timely fashion, and reported out to the public at large as well as to the governmental stakeholders.
What I have learned about the district clerks of the state is that they are really good at what they do. The one here in Washakie County has just been a treat to work with, has been completely neutral in terms of executing the responsibilities of her position, not doing anything special for me just because I happen to be a candidate for a statewide office living in her county, but sharing what she is legally authorized and obligated to share, and pointing me in the right direction when I had questions.
I have absolute faith in everything I've seen from our district clerks and their ability and intention to administer elections properly according to the way they have been defined. That is, by far, the biggest part of the job, and which I intend to do to the letter and spirit of the law.
ME: Let's do the rapid fire. You'll just answer with just a few words or a phrase. Do you support secure ballot drop boxes?
BM: If that's what the legislation that governs the office calls for.
ME: Do you support mail-in ballots?
BM: Yes.
ME: Do you support voters being able to change their political party at any time?
BM: I don't believe that is allowed under the current regulations, so my answer would be no.
ME: Do you support absentee voting for anyone who wants it?
BM: Yes.
ME: Do you support hand counting of ballots?
BM: Where there's any indication that that is required in order to validate the results, yes.
ME: And why would you say that you support hand counting of ballots?
BM: The main dynamic there is when it's a super close election. I don't know what the legal requirements are, in terms of fractions of the total number of votes cast, but if it's close enough, I think there's a triggering mechanism for hand counting under those circumstances. Beyond that, if there is any actual factual information that suggests something improper has taken place, then that would be another reason to go down the hand counting route. At least a sample to see what the sample says, and then kind of take it from there.
ME: Wyoming has a business-friendly system for anonymously setting up shop in Wyoming for $50 to $100 a pop. That's led to tens of thousands of new businesses registering here, often without actually stepping foot in Wyoming. What are the benefits and problems with Wyoming's less strict rules about registering businesses in the state?
BM: I trust you're not looking for a lightning answer to that question.
It gets back to, well, one of the things that I didn't mention about my background is that I have spent time in a role as an internal auditor for a multi-billion-dollar business enterprise. So I have a real appreciation and experience with getting to the source documentation for whatever the topic is that you are investigating. To the extent that the SOS office administers business registrations and reporting, that is the entry into doing a deep dive on any business, basically every business. Make sure that you can independently verify that the information that they are providing when they submit their application to be registered to do business in Wyoming is legitimate, and to drill all the way down to who is the ultimate beneficial owner, so to speak, of that business. Is it who they say they are? Is it some entity you've never heard of in terms of a business authorized to do business in Wyoming? Get to the bottom of it at the very front end.
Beyond that, there is a complaint mechanism built into the secretary of state's office for consumers and businesses to raise issues for the office to consider investigating, and investigating if the circumstances seem to warrant it. That's another mechanism by which we can ensure that businesses doing business in Wyoming are legitimate and are doing it legitimately. Valid concerns about [the] behavior of a business, whether it's reporting sales tax information and submitting their sales tax revenue to the state in a timely manner, or some sort of consumer mistreatment, that is the role of the secretary of state's office. I'm confident that the office's staff is well-versed in how to do that. If there's anything I can do based on my career experience to help things along, I'm more than happy to do that and ready, willing and able.
ME: We got about two minutes left. I think I'll try and squeeze in one more question. Wyoming residents have sometimes found their address being used by a business that they don't have connection to. What's the secretary of state's role in ensuring that that doesn't happen?
BM: I would say that the answer is rolled up into the answer to the previous question, is we've got the mandate and the resources to make sure that people, businesses that register to do business in Wyoming are who they say they are and what they say they are. If it doesn't pass muster, we go in and root it out and take appropriate remedial action, whether that's fines or court cases or legal action. We do what is the right thing to do to correct those situations when they come to our attention.
ME: Okay. I'm gonna squeeze in one more.
BM: You're cheating.
ME: I got one more minute, I think, so I'm gonna do it. If we go a little bit over, that's okay.
BM: You're the boss.
ME: A lot of land in Wyoming is owned by LLCs. What's the relationship between private property, privacy, and also transparency and accountability for land stewardship?
BM: There is my favorite. I'm gonna go at it a little bit sideways, because public lands is the avenue for fixing, really, the problem with our state and kind of our country is finding ways to work together with people that are on the other side of the aisle. Public lands defines our politics, it defines our culture, and it defines our economy.
Eighty percent of every person in Wyoming that is of voting age agrees public lands belong in public hands, and that is the direction I intend to take it with the office's seat on the State Board of Land Commissioners, is making sure that Wyoming's lands are used for the benefit of the people of Wyoming, and that any negative consequences of commercial use are mitigated by the people that are benefiting from it.
Short spoke with Edwards for about 25 minutes on Sept. 23, 2026.
Melodie Edwards: To start, do you mind just saying your name and your title?
Robert Short: My name is Robert Short. I am currently a county commissioner in Converse County, Wyoming, and I am the Republican nominee for secretary of state for the great state of Wyoming.
ME: I wonder if you can start by just talking a little bit about your experience and how that work that you have done has prepared you to lead the office of secretary of state.
RS: Great question. My experience is pretty vast, I think, not to sound egocentric or egotistical. I have a vast amount of international and domestic business experience transcending a multitude of industries, from agriculture to energy development to scientific research, hospitality and tourism, which I think really help.
I also have experience in manufacturing and retail and even in the restauranting world. So I think that that in [and] of itself is a nice wide kind of swath of business experience that I think helps my understanding of how to relate to different business concerns across our state, as well as look at different opportunities that the state may see that could potentially have positive impacts, especially for our younger folks.
That, coupled with my last almost 12 years of being a county commissioner, I think really helps me understand what the governmental role looks like and how to interact effectively with different stakeholders across different scenarios. I've served as a board member for a multitude of boards across the state – domestic violence, sexual assault, water quality, air quality, land quality, energy and the environment, workforce development, as well as a national board for the National Association of Counties, as vice chair for technologies telecommunications.
I think maybe very importantly, I was the driving force behind an initiative that has become an actual functioning process, and that is what we call the Wyoming County Commissioners Association Congressional Tour Initiative, where we bring staffers out from D.C. every year and bring them to a different part of Wyoming and educate them with boots on the ground, regular everyday humans to help understand how policy considerations in D.C. have real-world impact in Wyoming. In doing so, [we] try to help develop relationships so that folks in D.C., staffers who are considering policy can have a person, a group to reach out to in Wyoming to say, ‘Hey we're thinking about doing this. What are your thoughts? How might that impact you?’
As well, I'm the vice president of the Wyoming County Commissioners Association currently. So I feel like the whole of these experiences puts me in a great position, I believe, to be an effective leader who really understands a wide array of different concerns and viewpoints and be able to listen to all those viewpoints without a particular bias. So I think that's what puts me in a great position for this.
ME: What's the secretary of state's role when it comes to elections and ensuring Wyomingites are aware of their civic rights and responsibilities?
RS: That brings me to a point that I didn't even mention in that last long-winded answer, and that is the chief elections officer. I have served as an election judge multiple times, so I've really been on the front lines of elections to see how elections are run here in Wyoming. As well as a county commissioner on the other side of the equation, understanding what the processes look like, the timings associated with it, the funding mechanisms that are necessary, the collection of folks who are really the heart and soul of running elections in our state.
I think that as a good secretary of state, I partner with my county clerks, because the county clerks are charged with operating elections in the state, and I think that that's something that I absolutely take as a sacred opportunity. But also helping educate young people about what does the process of voting look like. Everything from registering to vote, to researching candidates, to actually getting into the ballot booth to cast your ballot. That's something that I'm very passionate about. My own kid, she's 25 now. I say kid, but she's finishing grad school overseas. She doesn't see voting as a right. She sees it as a responsibility, that she is so invested in making sure that her voice is heard. And I want other young people to recognize and to have that kind of opportunity to grow that passion about having their voices matter.
ME: Your predecessor has worked closely with the federal government, including sharing voter registration data and running registrants through a national database to check for citizenship. Do you plan to continue that precedent?
RS: I think that's a two-part question to me. As far as sharing voter data with the federal government, I think that's antithetical, and I think it's honestly an infraction on a few different levels, not the least of which is the Constitution clearly delineates the responsibility for the operation of elections, the process of elections, being delegated to the states. To somehow think that it's okay to submit all of our voter roll data outside of what is available to you and me and any other person who asks for voter roll data, but to submit that voter roll data with PII, that personally identifiable information, I think that's disingenuous and borderline criminal, especially since Wyoming statute says we shall not do such a thing. So that part, not interested.
As far as running voter roll information through, I think the acronym is SAVE – and not to be confused with the SAVE Act, but a database that checks for, I think, green card holders, H-1B visa holders, folks who are resident aliens. I don't find that to be particularly nefarious or derogatory, because only citizens should be voting in elections is the way I feel about it.
I guess that's a long-winded way of saying I would probably utilize whatever tools are necessary to ensure that we are doing our best to ensure that only citizens are voting.
ME: Let's do rapid fire [questions]. In a couple words, can you respond to these next few questions?
RS: Sure.
ME: Do you support secure ballot drop boxes?
RS: 100%.
ME: Do you support mail-in ballots?
RS: 100%.
ME: Do you support voters being able to change their political party at any time?
RS: 100%.
ME: Do you support absentee voting for anyone who wants it?
RS: 100%.
ME: Do you support hand counting of ballots?
RS: Now, that is an interesting one. If there are less than 10 ballots, sure, because I only have 10 fingers. I think that tabulating with machines is a far more accurate way to tabulate votes. However, if we need to do a simple audit to ensure that we can tell ourselves, ‘Yes, the machines counted just as accurately as we might,’ wonderful.
ME: Okay, that's our rapid fire section. Now, what, if anything, would you like to change about our primary system?
RS: At this juncture, nothing. Yeah, nothing at this moment.
ME: Do you have concerns about what some call ballot harvesting, one person or a group delivering other people's ballots to the polls? If so, how should that be addressed?
RS: So this is an interesting thing, because I really believe that we should be making voting as easy as possible, and, obviously, only for valid constituents, people who are legal to vote. But I think about people who are in mobility-limited situations. Let's take, for example, assisted living facilities. How on earth are folks who are wheelchair-bound, let's say, as just one example, who live in an assisted living facility, how are they supposed to be able to cast their ballot?
And if we disenfranchise those folks because we say, ‘Well, you have to march over to the ballot box or the courthouse or wherever to drop off your ballot,’ I find that insulting. Those folks worked hard to give us the opportunity to be where we're at right now. So in situations where we can obviously, justifiably say these folks need a mechanism in order for them to be able to cast their ballot, and we can securely say, ‘These ballots we know are pure, they were collected under a specific set of guidelines, and they were handled through a chain of custody that ensures that they weren't bastardized or otherwise altered en route from the person casting the ballot to the person tabulating the ballot,’ yeah, I am absolutely in favor of that.
Now, for Maggie Mullen to go running up and down the street in Greybull because she happens to be in Greybull and is volunteering to collect ballots, I may be a little less inclined to say that that's something we should just open arms embrace immediately. We do need to have some processes in place to ensure that the purity of the ballot is not corrupted.
ME: Wyoming has a business-friendly system for anonymously setting up shop in Wyoming for $50 to $100 a pop. That's led to tens of thousands of new businesses registering here, often without actually stepping foot in Wyoming. What are the benefits and the problems with Wyoming's less strict rules about registering businesses in the state?
RS: Obviously, the benefits are just what you said. It's simple to set up an LLC in Wyoming, and it's easy to then pop up your storefront, whether it's virtual or brick-and-mortar, et cetera.
The downside is exactly what you said. It's too easy to do that for some folks who may be willing to just utilize our very stringent privacy laws in order to shield themselves from any kind of responsibility associated with performing whatever it is they do business-wise.
I'll just use a simple example we've had in my part of the state. We're right here in Hailstone Alley. Obviously, we get massive storms on a periodic basis, and we've had companies show up and, miraculously, they can show up at your front door with a certificate that says they're a Wyoming business and, ‘By golly, we are going to replace your roof [for] half the cost of anybody else, and all we need is for you to give us a 50% down right now, and we will be back in week, a few weeks, to take care of your roof.’ And lo and behold, they never show up again. And unfortunately, because they're setting themselves up through a registered agent in Wyoming, there is no recourse for anyone who was defrauded, because there's no way to find out who actually was at the helm of that fraudulent operation.
We need to address that in a way that doesn't hurt legitimate businesses, but also makes sure that less than desirable actors are put on notice that we're not going to accept that kind of behavior in our great state.
ME: Lawmakers have considered but not passed bills in recent years that would require registered agents to share more detailed information about a business's owners. Would you push for legislation like that, or how do you think lawmakers or your office could address this?
RS: That's really a great question, and I think the right approach to that is a consortium of concerned stakeholders who we can convene together to actually develop a strategy, a path forward, so that we can codify a reasonable, balanced approach to solving this problem. Everybody's going to have a little less absolute positive feelings about [it], because, generally speaking, the best solution's one where nobody's actually very satisfied.
ME: A lot of land in Wyoming is owned by LLCs. What's the relationship between private property, privacy, and also just transparency and accountability for land stewardship?
RS: Obviously, private property rights in our state is supreme. I think it's important that we maintain that, because, quite honestly, we're a legacy state in a lot of regards, that we have multi-generational ranches and farms here, and those folks, to have them somehow impugned by maybe some less than desirable behaviors on behalf of some other operators would be disingenuous to who we are as a people, as our culture.
However, that all said, of course, some laws were passed recently to ensure that state actors who may be considered threats to us are not in the position to acquire properties that could be sensitive, both from a security perspective and from a perspective that could cause harm. I think that, again, we have to honor private property rights, but when it comes to investigating potential businesses that may be fraudulently operating, their private property rights should not be a shield against which they can deflect any inquisition into their behaviors or operations.
ME: Do you think that the office has enough staff to handle business registrations and oversight?
RS: That's a great question, and not really having been able to communicate directly with them at this point, because that would be not really appropriate yet because I'm a nominee, not an elect, I cannot say with specificity. I know that they are overwhelmed, and I think there may be multiple ways of helping reduce some of that burden.
Obviously, software, technology is a piece that is very important to me. Utilization and implementation of technologies that are both secure and well-proven can help efficiencies. But by the same token, ultimately, eyes from a human are critical for anything that we're doing. We don't trust AI, for example, to make decisions for us. We use it as a tool, not as a decision maker. So I think that [you should] ask me this question again towards the end of November, and maybe I'll have a better feel for that.
ME: Wyoming residents have not infrequently found their addresses being used by a business that they don't have any connection to. What's the secretary of state's role in ensuring that that doesn't happen?
RS: I think the secretary of state should be the first point of contact when a person finds out that their address is being used in a fraudulent manner, because, let's face it, if you have nothing to do with that business, and I'm using Melodie Edwards' home address as the registration address for my business, then immediately I should be put on notice that your business is under threat of being administratively dissolved for fraudulent activities, because, obviously, you are using an address that is not connected to you
ME: One of the phrases that you have used throughout your campaign is that it's important to make the secretary of state's office boring again. How would you go about doing that?
RS: My position has been and continues to be that I'm not really interested in accolades and awards and getting in front of the camera to espouse my greatness. It's to quietly do the work of the people and just keep my head down and do the job. Engage with anyone who wants to engage, but making a press release every time I change my tie doesn't really fit my style. I don't believe that it's necessary to have theatrics in order to have a performance. Do the job and just continue plugging along, doing the work of the people, rather than looking for opportunities to sing my self-aggrandizing praises to anyone.
ME: We just have one minute left. One last question might be: What would you say when you have had conflicts with some of the people that you work with? What's your style, in terms of how you deal with conflict?
RS: It's really important to understand the other person, the other side, the opposing view that's driving the conflict. I believe wholeheartedly I got two small holes on the side of my head and one great big one on the front of it, and that should be used much less than those. Understand where the problem's coming from. That's the fundamental basis of problem-solving. I don't have the answers to everything, and if I'm unwilling to listen to what the root cause [of the] problem is from your perspective, then I'm absolutely disingenuous in my willingness to solve problems. So listen first.
Trujillo spoke with Edwards for about 25 minutes on Sept. 23, 2026.
Melodie Edwards: To start, do you mind just saying your name and the title of the seat you're running for?
Tamara Trujillo: My name is Tamara Trujillo, and I'm running for secretary of state for the state of Wyoming.
ME: Why did you decide to run for secretary of state, and why did you decide to do it under the Constitution Party?
TT: I've always been interested in politics, and as you may not know, or some of the listeners might not know, but I was a representative for House District 44. With that, I took the interest, really, in helping my community at that point. Then while I was in office, I realized Wyoming isn't that big of a state, and pretty much we're all one community at the end of the day.
Picking the Constitution Party, when I got involved in Wyoming politics, I really didn’t know what party I wanted to belong to. As I started to explore politics and the parties, I realized I aligned a lot more with the Republican Party. But as elections started getting more and more involved, a lot of the Democrats started coming into the Republican Party, mainly for primary voting. But with that became a lot of chaos. I really just want to help the people and not become stuck to a party. So then I started to reevaluate, what am I doing? What’s going on in Wyoming? And I just felt it was better to represent the people in not such a big political, chaotic thing that’s going on with the Republican Party now. I mean, don’t get me wrong, there’s a bunch of great people that are involved in that party, and i kind of miss it. But at the same time, the Constitution Party focuses more on my Christian values and my conservative values on government’s role. I’m all about less regulation as much as possible, so that’s why I went with that party. I really just want to help the people more than I want to help the government. That's why I'm running.
ME: Can you talk a little bit about your experience and how that will help you to be a good candidate and fill this seat to the best of your ability?
TT: I don't have much experience in the political world. I'm not a politician. However, I've been an administrator in my private role, in my working, I've been an administrator. I've been part of contracts. I worked for a large oil company that's prominent in the state of Wyoming. I worked with them for 17 years, so I learned a lot about policy making, policy writing, improving processes, and I want to bring that. I saved multi-millions of dollars for this company and [wrote] processes that have streamlined the company as it grew.
My focus, even as a Representative, was to focus on upgrading the system, smooth-lining and being more cost efficient. If I could do that for a multi-billion dollar business, I think I can bring those attributes to the state and do that for the people. If the state can make more money and save more money on the back end, that's a better way to give people back their taxes.
The secretary of state role is really, I just have to follow the laws that are written. I don't have to make the laws; I just gotta follow them and have a good vote when it comes to SLIB [State Loan and Investment Board] and our investments and working with the governor and the treasurer, all those guys. I bring that talent to the table.
ME: Can you talk a little bit about what the secretary of state's role is when it comes to elections and ensuring Wyomingites that they're aware of their civic rights and their responsibilities?
TT: The election, to me, is one of the biggest things, because it's our U.S. citizen-given responsibility to be responsible with how we vote, and I believe that is one of the most important things to making sure that it is secure and available to all U.S., American, citizens.
Especially in the state of Wyoming, where we're a very rural country or state. Just ensuring that all our county clerks have the tools available for them to do the job that we require. I think getting that open communication with them and what they need. I want to upgrade everything to where it's just easier for everybody to be on the same page. I think Wyoming's small enough to make that happen.
ME: Your predecessor has worked closely with the federal government, including sharing voter registration data and running registrants through a national database to check for citizenship. Do you plan to continue that precedent?
TT: I plan to continue with the federal government as much as, or I should say, as least as possible. The states are their own sovereign. I don't even know how to say it. They're in charge of the elections.
However, in order for us to avoid fraud, it doesn't hurt to work with them for a little bit. I did hear that today the Supreme Court justice[s] did allow Pres. Trump to use Social Security information. There's already ways for them to get the information that they need, but I'm also not going to fight the federal government, if that makes any sense. I really don't know. It's a really hard thing, but I'm about voter integrity, so a little bit, I guess, 25%, 50%, but not 100%. They don't need to know everything.
ME: Here's the rapid fire section of the interview. You'll just answer very briefly with a couple words or a sentence or so to each of these questions. Do you support secure ballot drop boxes?
TT: No.
ME: Do you support mail-in ballots?
TT: Yes.
ME: Do you support voters being able to change their political party at any time?
TT: Ask me that one one more time.
ME: Do you support voters being able to change their political party at any time?
TT: That's just a hard one, because a voter should be able to vote however they want, but at the end of the day – yes, I do actually.
ME: Do you support absentee voting for anyone who wants it?
TT: Not for anyone who wants it, no.
ME: Do you support hand counting of ballots?
TT: Yes.
ME: That's the end of the rapid fire section. I'm just gonna ask a follow-up on that last one about hand counting of ballots. You said that, yes, you do support hand counting of ballots. Why do you support that one?
TT: I'm an auditor. At the end of the day, my brain works that way. I vote, and I don't like the way when I go and I vote, and I can't see what I vote for all the time, and it's just, I believe hand ballot, hand counting is always just another way to double-check the work. I had a calculator that I typed wrong numbers on each tape, but at the end of the tape, my totals were the same. It's always better to have that second look.
ME: Wyoming has a business-friendly system for anonymously setting up shop in Wyoming for $50 to $100 a pop. That's led to tens of thousands of new businesses registering here, often without actually stepping foot in Wyoming. What are the benefits and the problems with Wyoming's less strict rules about registering businesses in the state?
TT: The plus for it is bringing in revenue, I guess a little bit. We would take a little bit of that. The negative is the fraud that's available. I had this one incident where I had five companies, and they all use[d] the same P.O. Box. But that's how we can set them up now. When I want to get ahold of one of them, I don't even know how to get ahold of them, because they're using a P.O. Box. To me, that's just dangerous at the end of the day.
ME: Lawmakers have considered but not passed some bills in recent years that would require registered agents to share more detailed information about a business's owners. Would you push for legislation like that, or how do you think lawmakers or your office should address this issue?
TT: I believe that that's fine. I think that everybody should be transparent in anything. I don't understand why there would be any secrecy in anything that's happening, especially if they're applying for licenses in our state
ME: Wyoming residents have sometimes found their addresses being used by a business that they don't have any connection to. What is the secretary of state's role in ensuring that that doesn't happen?
TT: I believe that that's an important role, because that's a big part of avoiding fraud. Again, that's with upgrading technology. We bring all these data centers into Wyoming, I'm sure we can upgrade Wyoming's infrastructure to avoid that.
ME: A lot of land in Wyoming is owned by LLCs. What's the relationship between private property, privacy, and also transparency and accountability for land stewardship?
TT: That's a hard one, because we're going through all of that right now with everything that's going on, especially Mike and me. That's really hard, because you should have your privacy, right? Because it is your land.
However, bringing LLCs into it really does affect the community that it's being brought into. I don't believe that government officials should be signing NDAs, and I think the community should have more votes in what happens in their community, especially with bringing in LLCs that are trying to be very quiet about their intentions.
ME: Your competitor has this notion that he has been using in his campaigning, in which he's talked about making the secretary of state's office boring again. Do you agree with that assessment of the need for that in the secretary of state's office in Wyoming? And if so, how would you go about that?
TT: Honestly, I think his assessment of making it boring again is his – is a crazy personal opinion. I honestly think it is a boring position. It's just the loud noise. People like to make it more than it is. I don't have any qualms with how the current secretary of state has run the office. I think he has great staff. The state of Wyoming has a lot of – I learned that as a representative – we have amazing people that work for the state and know their job. So depending on them, really, if they want the office to be boring, then it'll be boring. But if we need to handle business, we'll be loud. It's really up to the people, what they want.
ME: What's your approach to addressing opposition or conflict when you encounter it?
TT: When I was a representative, I encountered conflict the whole entire time. But really, it's just trying to talk to somebody. What I noticed is a lot of the people that were pushing back at me didn't know my position, and then once I started talking to them, they're like, ‘Oh, okay. Now I get where you're coming from.’ But people right away have this opinion, because you vote on one thing one certain way, that they automatically assume that you're that person. Or if you talk to somebody in the hallway, you're right away associated to this person all the time, without giving you that fair conversation.
What I did is I focused on the people that actually make a difference and have value, and I made a point to become friends with them and talk to them and explain to them who I am and where I'm coming from, and things got a lot easier my second year as a representative. I'm hoping to have that open dialogue with everybody so they understand that I'm not coming in to destroy government, but to improve it like I have all my other companies that I've worked for.
ME: Can you give some examples of who your role models are for other politicians or other political figures that you aspire to serving like them?
TT: I'm gonna keep it local to Wyoming. In my experience in watching how government works, I really have to give a lot of credit to our treasurer, Kurt Meyer, because I watched him interact with everybody across the board in trying to get his job done, because he is our money guy. He's very knowledgeable, and I kinda like the way he does business.
As we look into the House and the Senate, I'd like to look like Sen. [Lynn] Hutchins (R-Cheyenne). She talks to everybody, but she stands her ground when needed. In the House, oh my gosh, there's so many in there, but Rep. Rachel Rodriguez [Williams] (R-Cody) was very thoughtful in all her actions that she has done, and in all her fighting for the unborn. Also, [Rep.] Chip Neiman (R-Hulette). He was [a] very good speaker of the house, and he really did try to be fair with everybody. Then there's also one other representative, Rep. Lloyd Larsen (R-Lander). He took me under his wing a little bit. He was questioning, why do you think like that? And I liked that, because he didn't judge me on the way I was thinking. He asked me why, and then we worked together, and that was one of my biggest takeaways.
ME: Well, thank you so much. We just have just a tiny bit of time left. Is there anything else that you feel like we didn't get to talk to that you would like to add? We have just a minute or so.
TT: No, not really. I just want the people of Wyoming to know that I may be part of the Constitution Party, I love my country, I love my state, but at the end of the day, I love my people, and I want Wyoming to flourish for them.
You can find more conversations with Wyoming’s candidates on our How Do I Vote? page.
