The Road to Cheyenne is our special series previewing the primary elections. This week, we’re previewing state legislative races in the southwest corner of the state and we’ll take a deeper look at the Republicans challenging Wyoming's lone house seat occupied by Harriet Hageman.
Kamila Kudelska: I have Caitlin Tan with me, our natural resources and energy reporter who lives in Pinedale. She’ll help parse out the races in that area. State government reporter Chris Clements is back. Welcome!
Caitlin Tan: Thanks for having us.
Chris Clements: Great to be here.
KK: So for the purposes of this show, we’re looking at two main races that encompass Pinedale, Big Piney, over to Cokeville, then to Kemmerer, Green River and down to the Utah border, west of the Flaming Gorge. Caitlin, you’ve been talking to people in these areas. How are they feeling?
CT: Yeah. So I posted up outside of the rec center in Pinedale. We’re well into the summer tourist season right now so I thought this would be a good place to find locals. But it turns out not really.
CT: Hi, sorry to bother you guys. My name’s Caitlin, and I’m just trying to talk to Wyoming people.
Anonymous: Oh, we’re from Idaho. Sorry.
CT: No Worries.
CT: I met others from Colorado, Utah, California. I bring this up because southwest Wyoming, especially Pinedale, is increasingly becoming a tourist hub, a place for second homes and an overflow area for people to live who can’t afford Jackson.
KK: So did you talk to any actual locals?
CT: Yes, of course. It just took a few hours. But actually tourism and housing were top of mind. I caught Brittany Williams – she’s in her late 30s and a lifelong Sublette County resident.
Brittany Williams: I don't like to see our community out priced. And to know that my kids probably won't be able to move back here ever or start a family here, because it's too expensive. That's my biggest concern locally.
CT: Since 2019, the average cost of a house has gone up more than $150,000, and the average cost is also about $100,000more than the state as a whole.
KK: Yikes, that’s a lot for five years.
CT: Yeah, and I think people partly blame this on tourism. This area has historically depended on natural gas and agriculture, but has increasingly leaned on tourism. It’s putting places like Pinedale on the map.
And it’s not just a feeling. The area is growing. A state report shows that Sublette County is the fastest growing county in Wyoming. Williams and others I talked to hope that local politicians can have some sway on the future of southwest Wyoming.
KK: Tell us a little bit about the candidates. There’s two main races, right?
CT: Yeah,two main races. I’ll start with the Senate District 14 seat. There are three candidates. The first is Republican Albert Sommers who most of you are probably familiar with.
KK: Yes, if you pay attention to the Wyoming legislature at all, you do. He’s had a lot of influence in the House of Representatives for sometime now.
CT: Totally. So Sommers was in his house seat since 2013. The last two legislative sessions he was the Speaker of the House. He’s a lifelong Sublette county rancher and well known for his conservation work.
KK: What are some bills he sponsored? And could we expect similar work from him if he wins this senate seat?
CT: A lot of his work has revolved around conservation and preservation of Wyoming lands. Just in Sommers’ personal life, he’s very open about how he put his ranch under a conservation easement so it can’t really ever be developed. But in the law-making world, he’s long tried to pass legislation that’d regulate commercially guided fishing boats. He talks about his concerns about fisheries being overfished, which is a growing issue in Sublette County. He was openly in favor of a new law that gave locals a headstart with the shed antler hunting season.
KK: He’s done a lot since he’s been in the seat for about ten years. Did he have any close runs for the seat?
CT: Not a lot. He’s pretty well loved in the area. He’s seen as a voice for ranchers and old timers and he has decent support from both Democrats and Republicans.
In past elections, he’s almost always won by a 98 percent vote. Although two years ago, candidate Mike Schmid gave him a run for his money in the primary. I do think that the last election could be a little telling.
KK: How so?
CT: Well, Sommers is seen as an old-school, traditional Republican. A newer, further right sect of the party, the Freedom Caucus, is growing in popularity,and honestly, made Sommers’ job as Speaker of the House tricky the last couple years.
KK: Right, Sommers actually wrote an op-ed in 2023 asking why does the Freedom Caucus tell its members how to vote. Then during this year's legislative session, he dealt with an unprecedented number of committee bills getting killed the first day due to alignment of freedom caucus members. The budget only got approved the last day of the session.
CT: Sommers might have his work cut out for him. He’s running against Laura Pearson of the Kemmerer area. Now, I should say, she’s not officially part of the Freedom Caucus, but she shares a lot of their content on her campaign’s Facebook page.
KK: Who is she? I don’t think I've heard of her in a political office before?
CT: That’s right. Pearson stresses she’s not a politician. On her website, there’s a big emphasis on the fact that she’s a fourth generation sheep rancher, a school bus driver and a small business owner.
KK: Just curious, what’s her business?
CT: New trend hats. They’re basically hats that have holes for high pony tails.
KK: Definitely not politics. But okay, she’s running so what’s her political stance?
CT: She’s pro-gun, pro-life, anti-transgender rights, pro-limited government. She also has shared content on her campaign’s Facebook page that pushes back on climate change, a stance that’s increasingly popular in the Freedom Caucus party.
KK: Okay, and there’s one more candidate?
CT: Yeah, Bill Winney, a Sublette County Republican. He’s run for a house seat six times and never won. But he keeps trying this time with the senate. Notably, he is a familiar face in the legislature. Winney has been known to move to Cheyenne temporarily for the session. He notoriously testifies on most topics, just as a Wyoming resident, not as a lobbyist or anything.
KK: What’s his stance on things?
CT: Well, he really leans into his experience from being a 30-year Navy veteran. He was involved with the country's Navy Nuclear submarine program and some of its financial involvements. He draws a line between that and Wyoming, saying that puts him in a position to help the state spend its money wiser.
KK: There’s another race to debrief right?
CT: Yeah,the House District 20 seat. This one represents Pinedale, Big Piney and La Barge. This is Sommers’ former seat. Remember, earlier, I mentioned Mike Schmid?
KK: Right,the guy who gave Sommers a run for his money two years ago.
CT: Yeah, well, he’s running again. A little background on Schmid: he started an oil and gas service company, based in LaBarge. You might’ve heard his name over the last year, he’s been pretty vocal on wildlife issues. He’s a self-proclaimed wildlife advocate, but has pushed back on further protections for big game in western Wyoming. He’s openly against any official state designation of the Sublette pronghorn migration corridor, which could potentially limit energy development along it.
KK: Wasn’t he involved with the Wyoming Game and Fish?
CT: Yes, he was a board member for the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission from 2017 to early 2021. Gov. Mark Gordon actually removed him suddenly, citing that Schmid was undermining the effectiveness of the board. Interestingly, it was shortly after news came out that Schmid had attended the pro-trump January 6th rally that resulted in an attack on the capital. The governor's office insists that didn’t play a role in their decision to dismiss him.
KK: What are some of his stances?
CT: Well he’s not officially part of the Freedom Caucus and his stances align with them. He’s historically been involved on the party’s Facebook page. A couple of his positions: property tax relief and supporting the oil and gas industry.
KK: Okay, and then running against him?
CT: Sheep rancher Cat Urbigkit from Boulder, Wyoming. She’s also a photographer and author. She’s penned several books on wildlife and local ranching culture.
KK: What are her political stances?
CT: She’s definitely the more moderate of the two. She’s endorsed by Sommers actually. So Urbigkit’s main issues: transparency in government and limited government. She’s also a big proponent of state management of wildlife, not federal.
KK: Awesome, thanks, Caitlin, for that deep dive into those two pretty important races in the southwest. Now, Chris, Harriet Hageman is up for reelection. She is finishing up her first term as Wyoming’s lone congressional representative. What has she done since she was elected in 2022?
CC: Well, she didn’t waste time in joining the far-right House Freedom Caucus, which some Democrats and even Republicans describe as an obstructionist and polarizing faction of the GOP. As a former water rights litigator, Hageman has sponsored a number of bills going after the federal government’s land and energy policies in the state.
She’s also routinely either a sponsor or cosponsor of legislation having to do with controversial social wedge issues, like one that would abolish so-called ‘woke’ awards from the National Institute of Health, and another that would ban transgender athletes from competing in the Olympics. For that last one I mentioned, Hageman was the only legislator carrying the bill in a pretty combative committee hearing on Capitol Hill a few months ago. When I asked her about it, Hageman pushed back. She told me she sees that legislation as being pretty straightforward:
Harriet Hageman: If you want to describe that as a divisive social issue that's fine. Go ahead and do it. I'm just telling you, I'm going to continue to sponsor bills that are designed to protect women.
CC: Then I followed up by asking how common an occurrence she thinks it is for trans women, who she refers to as men, to compete alongside women in the Olympics, and she said:
HH: Too common. If it's one person, it's too much.
CC: Critics and LGBTQ advocates call that bill harmful and discriminatory against trans folks, and that it addresses a situation so rare it basically amounts to a non-issue.
Switching gears for a second, Hageman also chairs the Subcommittee on Indian and Insular Affairs, which oversees all 574 four federally recognized tribes in the U.S. That includes ... the Northern Arapaho and Eastern Shoshone tribes [located in Wyoming]. In that capacity, she’s sponsored a lot of legislation centered on the tribes, like a bill that was introduced this week that would mean Indian Health Service employees must receive training in tribal history and culture. I asked Hageman about that measure:
HH: We heard from tribal leaders from around the country. It was very interesting, as they talked about some of the challenges that they have, and how to be a bit more culturally sensitive when we're providing services, say, with Indian Health Services.
KK: Okay, so Hageman has done a lot but she still has one Republican challenger, Steven Helling. Can you tell us a little bit about him?
CC: Sure, Steve Helling is an attorney in Casper and a former registered Democrat, actually. He ran as a pro-Trump Democrat for this same seat in the 2022 primaries against Lynette Greybull, and lost. But this time, he’s running as a Republican. I asked Helling why Republican voters should trust him after running for the opposing party.
Steven Helling: Looking back, I would say that was a mistake. The voters saw through that, and rejected my ‘Democrats for Trump.’ I was hopeful that the Democratic Party in Wyoming would want to send a message to Washington.
CC: He told me his main focus, if elected, would be to pass legislation to stop the construction of nuclear energy plants like the one planned for Kemmerer. Helling describes them as unsafe for Wyomingites.
KK: Does Hageman seem at all worried about her seat? Has she been campaigning in the state?
CC: If she’s worried about losing her seat, Kamila, it didn’t come across to me. She was at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee when I spoke with her, and she told me she’s been holding campaign events and town halls across the state. She said she’s going to be in Cheyenne this weekend for Frontier Days. In general, she told me she’s made it a priority to hold a town hall in every county in Wyoming, every year.
KK: If Hageman loses does that show that Wyominig isn’t happy with anyone in Congress?
CC: Look, I think her odds of losing are very low. As her only primary challenger, Steve Helling just doesn’t have the same kind of name recognition and support that Hageman has, especially after she defeated Cheney in 2022 and won an endorsement from Donald Trump, and the affection of a lot of Wyomingites.
KK: We are talking about the primaries but there is a Democrat on the ballot so who will the final Republican be against in the general?
CC: That’ll be Kyle G. Cameron. She told Northern Wyoming News her main reason for running is to expand reproductive rights, especially after the state’s abortion ban passed. That ban is held up in [district] court right now, along with a few other abortion-related measures, so the procedure remains legal for right now.
KK: And that’s a wrap for this edition of the Road to Cheyenne. Thanks for being here with me, Chris and Caitlin. If you have a question about voting, electoral process, specific races or candidates feel free to give us a call and leave us a voicemail at 307.766.4314. We may use your voicemail on the show! Or go to Wyoming public media.org and scroll down to our America Amplified banner to fill out a form to ask questions. The Road to Cheyenne will be back on the next Open Spaces, August 2 We will be looking at the last quadrant of the state in the southeast.
