An emotional Wyoming Senate President Ogden Driskill told the members of his chamber Monday to not overturn a decision he made in the interim to remove the chairman of a committee, saying it would amount to a vote of “no confidence” in his leadership.
But despite pleas from Driskill, R-Devils Tower, and other legislators, the Senate voted to overturn the removal of Sen. Dave Kinskey, R-Sheridan, from his position as chairman of the Appropriations Committee.
Driskill had appointed Sen. Tara Nethercott, R-Cheyenne, to replace Kinskey, who retained his membership on the committee. Since last April, Nethercott has served as co-chairman of the Appropriations Committee, overseeing with the House co-chairman from the House all discussions of the 2025/2026 biennial budget.
In a 17-14 decision, the Senate voted to revert the original appointment Driskill made in 2022 to have Kinskey chairman, which the chamber ratified shortly after. Monday’s vote also essentially stripped Nethercott of the position.
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The Joint Appropriations Committee (JAC) is one of the integral committees during a budget year as it is most directly involved in crafting the state’s biennial budget.
Driskill made the decision to replace Kinskey in April 2023 after what he described as a recurring pattern of poor communication from the Sheridan legislator.
An Apology, And A Plea
His voice choking with emotion at numerous points, Driskill apologized for putting the Senate in a position to question his decision, but also expressed grave disappointment his fellow legislators would consider overturning his decision, which basically amounts to a vote of “no confidence” in his leadership and decisions for the Appropriations Committee.
“You effectively told me I don’t make good decisions as far as that committee, and we have a personality problem between me and the chairman,” he said. “It’s on all of us.”
He urged the Senate to vote against the motion and asked what benefit it would serve the state of Wyoming and the Legislature to reverse his action.
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“You’re going to fix a wrong that I did, at least that’s what this vote is, you’re going to fix a wrong I did, I take ownership of that,” Driskill said. “And by fixing it, you’re going to create another one.”
Sen. Cheri Steinmetz, R-Lingle, made the motion objecting to Driskill’s move Monday and reappointed Kinskey as chairman. Steinmetz and others who supported the motion said they did so not as a personal slight against Nethercott, but because they believed the rules did not allow Driskill to make the decision he did.
“I object on the basis of process, not personalities, or the people this will affect today,” Steinmetz said. “We only steward the public trust for a short time and must preserve the institution for the people and their representatives in the state to come.”
Sitting about 10 feet away from Steinmetz as she made her motion was Nethercott.
Nethercott took the high road when reached by Cowboy State Daily after the vote.
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“I was honored to serve as chair of Appropriations and have a conservative practical budget bill for the Senate,” Nethercott said. “I look forward to assisting the vice president in fulfilling our constitutional obligation to pass a budget.”
Kinskey said he was “gratified” to receive the support of the majority of his colleagues.
“The effort to remove me as JAC chairman was unfortunate, and now it’s time to put that behind us and get to work delivering a fiscally responsible budget for the state of Wyoming,” he told Cowboy State Daily.
Sens. Larry Hicks and Dave Kinsey talk during the first day of the 2024 legislative session. The first order of business for the Senate was overturning a decision by Senate President Ogden Driskill in the interim to remove Kinskey as chairman of the Appropriations Committee. (Matt Idler for Cowboy State Daily)
Point Of Divide?
Legislators on both sides of the vote Monday expressed concern that it could create a divide within their chamber.
Whether the vote is a sign the well-documented division in the Wyoming House is starting to trickle over to the Senate remains to be seen.
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“I’ll leave that up to everybody’s self determination,” said Sen. Larry Hicks, R-Baggs, who voted in favor of the reversal.
Those against the motion spoke about the importance of keeping relationships in the Senate and warned that re-inserting Kinskey would be disruptive. While the divide in the House has been well documented, the Senate has been a more united body.
Laramie Democrat Sen. Chris Rothfuss said Steinmetz’s motion was inappropriate because of its timing and argued against even having a floor debate on the matter.
“This is not the time, this is not the method, and this is not the place,” he said.
Rothfuss also warned that the move could take away from what he sees as the balanced and humble nature of the Wyoming Legislature.
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“This is a challenge to that sensibility,” he said. “It’s certainly not a way to start the day off, start the Legislature off this session.”
Shouldn’t Be Personal
The vote to reject debating the motion was defeated 18-13. Nethercott was one of the 18 people to vote in support of having a debate, but later voted against removing herself as chairman.
Sen. Charlie Scott, R-Casper, also expressed disappointment that the Senate was being asked to handle this matter, but voted to return Kinskey and told Cowboy State Daily afterward he believes Driskill didn’t rule correctly.
He urged the Senate to start and end the debate as friends.
“I really dislike the personal aspect of this,” Scott said.
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Hicks and Scott later told Cowboy State Daily they saw the vote as purely a reaction to the move Driskill made, which they didn’t believe was allowed by the Senate rules.
Nethercott apologized to the chamber for having to take the vote and offered full support for Kinskey after he was made chairman again.
“I am confident that we will all move forward with our history behind us,” she said on the Senate floor. “We are the Senate, and we will move forward.”
Kinskey, who endorsed Nethercott’s 2022 campaign for secretary of state, said he told his committee on Sunday that no matter what happened in Monday’s vote, he would hold no hard feelings.
Driskill also apologized to the Senate for the situation they were put in, but implored his fellow lawmakers to choose maintaining the status quo and stability by voting against the reversal. He and others commended the job Nethercott did chairing the Appropriations Committee, which Driskill said was a responsibility she never wanted.
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He apologized to Nethercott during the discussion and expressed fear he had harmed her life. Driskill urged the Senate to consider removing him as president rather than taking the vote to remove Nethercott.
“I’m the one who caused this and I’m responsible for it at the end of the day,” Driskill said.
Sen. Tara Nethercott was removed as chair of the Appropriations Committee after the Senate on Monday voted to overturn Senate President Ogden Driskill’s decision in the interim to remove Dave Kinskey as chairman and appoint Nethercott. (Matt Idler for Cowboy State Daily)
How It Got To That Point
Driskill said four members of the Appropriations Committee approached him last session and complained about Kinskey’s performance as chairman because of a lack of communication. When he approached Kinskey about the issue at the Capitol, Driskill said it did not go well and resulted in a shouting match.
After the session, Driskill said he continued receiving complaints, so he drove to Sheridan to meet with Kinskey to try and resolve the issue in person. Kinskey was not able to meet with Driskill at this time and Driskill eventually informed him he was removing him as chairman.
When he got home to Devils Tower, Driskill said he received what he said were “a dozen” voicemails from the press already asking him about the situation at Kinskey’s behest.
Further and recent attempts to meet with Kinskey, Driskill said, went unanswered.
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“What will be better for the state of Wyoming and our state budget, and our relations with the other side and the people of the state, by changing chairmen again?” Driskill questioned.
After speaking with several past governors, former committee chairmen and a Senate president, Driskill said they all backed his decision. The only person from the Senate who complained about the move, Driskill said, was Steinmetz.
“I don’t want to fuel any hate or discontent, but I feel very compelled to put facts out there,” Driskill said. “I still made the right decision, folks.”
Although Steinmetz said never in the history of the Wyoming Legislature has a chairman been removed, Driskill said that’s not right. He said when Diemer True was president of the Senate, he removed former legislator and future state governor Jim Geringer from his role as a committee chairman in the early 1990s.
Driskill also mentioned a commitment he received from all his committee chairmen upon becoming Senate President in late 2022 that they would immediately resign if Driskill didn’t like their performance.
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The Rules
Although Senate Rule 2.8 clearly states Driskill is not allowed to remove a senator from a committee without a majority vote from the entire Senate, there’s nothing that prevents him from removing a chair while keeping him on the committee, as that scenario is not specifically addressed.
“We need clearer rules, clearer concise rules,” Hicks told Cowboy State Daily. “The ambiguousness on rules is in itself its own poison pill.”
Hicks later brought a rule proposal that states no changes can be made to committee membership without a vote from the full Senate.
The Senate’s rules committee will discuss this issue at a later date.
Sen. Charlie Scott makes an appeal for the Senate to conduct business in a civil manner during the 2024 session, which began Monday. (Matt Idler for Cowboy State Daily)
Leo Wolfson can be reached at Leo@CowboyStateDaily.com.
As a plaintiff in the 2022 lawsuit that kicked off years of legal sparring over Wyoming abortion rights, Dr. Giovannina Anthony had waited a long time for Tuesday’s Supreme Court decision on the state’s abortion bans.
“It has been a long road,” she said. One with ups and downs, drawbacks and delays. And even though the high court ruled against the state’s abortion bans, she’s not under the illusion that the fight for abortion access is over.
“But at least today, we can claim a victory and say, it was really worth it,” said Anthony, a Jackson obstetrician. “It was worth it to go four years and keep it up and keep raising money and keep the awareness going. I’m really proud of our team. I’m really proud of what we accomplished.”
In reading the Supreme Court’s decision siding with plaintiffs, Anthony said, “Clearly, this is a court that holds a lot of respect for our constitution.”
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That’s because much of the decision hinged on constitutional language.
Anthony and other plaintiffs argued that abortion is enshrined in the “right of health care access” in Article 1, Section 38 of the Wyoming Constitution. The clause states, “Each competent adult shall have the right to make his or her own health care decisions.”
The state’s attorneys, meanwhile, countered that abortion isn’t health care.
But in deciding what that language means in this case, “all five Wyoming Supreme Court justices agreed that the decision whether to terminate or continue a pregnancy is a woman’s own health care decision protected by Article 1, Section 38,” the court’s summary stated.
As abortion rights activists in Wyoming and beyond celebrated the decision, the anti-abortion camp decried it and called for legislative action.
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“This ruling is profoundly unfortunate and sadly serves to only prolong the ultimate proper resolution of this issue,” Gov. Mark Gordon said in a statement. While the ruling may settle a legal question for the time being, Gordon said, “it does not settle the moral one, nor does it reflect where many Wyoming citizens stand, including myself.”
Anti-abortion activists in the silent March for Life in Cheyenne in January 2020. (Nadav Soroker, Wyoming Tribune Eagle/Wyoming News Exchange)
Gordon asked the Attorney General’s office to file a petition for rehearing the decision, which it will file within 15 days.
The voters of Wyoming should settle the matter once and for all, Gordon argued. “A constitutional amendment taken to the people of Wyoming would trump any and all judicial decisions.”
He called on the Legislature to pass such an amendment during the upcoming session and deliver it to his desk. A constitutional amendment requires a two-thirds vote in both the House and Senate to appear on the ballot in the following general election.
Gordon may get his wish during the Legislature’s 2026 budget session, which convenes Feb. 9.
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State lawmakers are already preparing a bill to modify the Wyoming Constitution and clear a path for another attempted abortion ban. Speaker of the House Chip Neiman, a Republican from Hulett, said that he’s been workshopping language with Torrington Republican Sen. Cheri Steinmetz.
“I’ve got to run it by a lot of other people,” Neiman said.
Reps. Rachel Rodriguez-Williams and Chip Neiman listen during a 2023 hearing on their request to defend Wyoming’s abortion ban. (Brad Boner/Jackson Hole News&Guide/Pool)
Ideally, he added, a single constitutional amendment would be considered, although the legislative strategy is still up for discussion.
“We’ve got a little over a month before we have to be in session,” Neiman said. “That’ll give us time to kind of see which is maybe the best plan of action.”
A constitutional amendment would have to navigate the legislative process in a 20-day session geared toward passing Wyoming’s budget. Then, in the 2026 general election, more than half of Wyoming voters who cast a ballot would have to agree to the constitutional change.
Neiman struck an optimistic tone about an amendment’s prospects of passing the first hurdle during the session in Cheyenne.
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“I can’t speak for the other chamber,” he said, “but in my chamber I’ve got a lot of phone calls and a lot of texts from a lot of my legislators who are just beside themselves at what happened.”
Senate President Bo Biteman did not return a phone call before this story published.
Victorious
Chelsea’s Fund, an organization that helps pay for abortion services, was another of the plaintiffs that challenged Wyoming’s abortion bans. Executive Director Janean Forsyth said Tuesday’s decision affirms what her organization has long known: “that abortion is essential health care, and Wyoming women have a constitutional right and the freedom to make their own health care decisions, and that should be without government interference.”
Forsyth was flooded with messages and calls Tuesday, she said, especially from the community of reproductive rights organizations.
“I think that [the news is] a beacon of hope for, not only Wyoming communities and families, but also nationwide,” she said.
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Christine Lichtenfels was Chelsea’s Fund executive director when the original suit was filed and throughout much of the legal battle. Relief wasn’t quite the word to describe how she felt Tuesday, she said.
“In reading the decision, there is just a sense that, ‘Oh, there is reason in the world,” she said. “It makes me think that, yes, Wyoming is the Equality State. We can say that now without cringing.”
(Disclosure: Lichtenfels is currently working with WyoFile on an unrelated legal matter.)
The Wellspring Health Access clinic in Casper is pictured in December 2022, and shows signs of May 2022 arson, including boarded up windows. (Dustin Bleizeffer/WyoFile)
Wyoming’s only abortion clinic, Wellspring Health Access in Casper, was also a plaintiff in the lawsuit. Knowing the decision would directly impact the facility’s fate, Clinic President Julie Burkhart was nervous when she opened it. Reading quickly dispelled her fears, she said, as it dawned on her that the justices sided with the plaintiffs’ legal team.
“We are delighted,” she told WyoFile.
Many people questioned her 2021 decision to open an abortion clinic in such a conservative state, she said. The court decision solidifies an intuition she felt back then about Wyoming residents’ sense of what’s fair and right.
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Burkhart and colleagues expect future challenges to arise, however.
“While we celebrate today’s ruling, we know that anti-abortion politicians will continue their push to restrict access to health care in Wyoming with new, harmful proposals in the state legislature,” Burkart said in a statement. “Patients should not have to live in fear that their health care decisions will be suddenly upended at the whim of a judge or lawmaker.”
Across the state in Jackson, Dr. Anthony anticipates the Wyoming Freedom Caucus will attempt to pass laws that impose targeted restrictions against abortion providers — such as forcing patients to hear a fetal heartbeat or wait a certain time period before the procedure.
“Unfortunately, the fight’s not over,” Anthony said, “but this is a great moment for us.”
Heartache
Abortion opponents expressed sadness Tuesday and vehemently disagreed with the court’s opinion.
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State Rep. Rachel Rodriguez Williams was lead sponsor of one of the abortion bans. The Cody Republican and chair of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus did not respond to a request for comment, but posted about the decision on X.
“My heart aches for Wyoming today,” Rodriguez Williams posted. “Thanks to the decision of four unelected, unchecked attorneys, it’s open season in Wyoming for innocent, preborn babies. Make no mistake: courts can get things wrong, and they sure did get this wrong. I’ll never stop fighting to protect life.”
Anti-abortion billboards can be seen along some Wyoming highways. (Tennessee Watson/WyoFile)
Wyoming Secretary of State Chuck Gray also protested the decision, which he called “outrageously wrong” and “a leftwing activist decision totally out of touch with the Wyoming Constitution.”
Natrona County anti-abortion activist Bob Brechtel, a former Wyoming House member, also expressed frustration with the courts, criticizing the nearly two-year-long wait for a decision and saying he was “ashamed” of the outcome from the high court.
In 2011, Brechtel co-sponsored the bill authorizing a later-successful constitutional amendment ballot measure that now protects individuals’ rights to make their own health care decisions. Born out of opposition to the Obama-era Affordable Care Act, what became Article 1, Section 38 caused some lawmakers to worry about potential unintended consequences.
Fifteen years later, one unintended consequence came to fruition. Reached Tuesday, Brechtel confirmed that he did not intend to protect women’s right to have an abortion in Wyoming.
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“There was nothing in the legislation about killing innocent human beings,” he said. “This whole thing has been completely regenerated into something that it was never intended to be.”
It is Week 4 in the 2026 Wyoming High School boys’ swimming and diving season. It features several medium-sized competitions. After a dual in Douglas on Tuesday, Friday and Saturday are packed with meets. Jackson hosts its two-day invitational with four teams heading to Teton County. There are three-team events in Casper, Gillette, and Sheridan on Friday, plus two five-team meets at Cody and Rock Springs.
WYOPREPS BOYS SWIMMING AND DIVING WEEK 4 SCHEDULE 2026
Saturday also has swim invites at Evanston, Powell, and Sheridan. The schedule for Week 4 of the prep boys’ swimming and diving season in the Cowboy State is below. The schedule is subject to change.
RAWLINS AT DOUGLAS – dual
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CASPER TRI at NCHS – Cheyenne East, Kelly Walsh, Natrona County.
CHEYENNE, Wyo. — A Wyoming man died Dec. 22 in a motorcycle-versus-truck collision in Laramie County.
According to a recently released incident report from the Wyoming Highway Patrol, 24-year-old Wyoming man Kyle Pandullo was headed west on a motorcycle as a van approached from the opposite direction. The WHP reports that the van attempted to turn left into a business entrance, forcing Pandullo to brake in an effort to avoid a crash. His bike tipped over onto its side, sliding into the van.
The WHP lists driver inattention as a possible contributing factor in the wreck.
This story contains preliminary information as provided by the Wyoming Highway Patrol. The agency advises that information may be subject to change.
