Montana
Montana could be a model as more GOP states weigh Medicaid work requirements • Stateline
Two decades ago, Jeff Beisecker and his family returned to Great Falls, Montana, from a religious mission to the Philippines. Beisecker had no health insurance and no steady source of income, and neither did his wife. Fearful of being without coverage, Beisecker enrolled himself, his wife and their four children in Medicaid for nearly a decade while he worked his way to a steady, full-time job.
Having the extra help made a difference for his family, recalled Beisecker, 53. “And people might have looked down on us. I don’t really care, because it was there to help us along the journey.”
For Beisecker, Medicaid coverage was a launching pad to stable work; now he helps others make that leap. As an employment and training coordinator for Opportunities Inc., a Great Falls-based nonprofit, Beisecker connects Montana Medicaid recipients to job training, career counseling, transportation and child care. Opportunities Inc. is one of several nonprofits that run a state-created voluntary program called the Health and Economic Livelihood Partnership Link, known as HELP-Link.
“When folks come in, we can meet with them and say, ‘Hey, maybe you can take this training that we can help pay for, and you can come out and start making 28 or 29 dollars an hour,” Beisecker said.
An increasing number of Republican-led states want to require Medicaid recipients to work, arguing that doing so will help them rise out of poverty. Democrats and health advocates note that most people on Medicaid already work either full time or part time. They argue that states shouldn’t deny health care coverage to people who don’t have jobs, especially since many face serious barriers to employment.
With HELP-Link, Montana might have found middle ground.
Holdout states consider expanding Medicaid — with work requirements
When Montanans enroll in Medicaid, nonprofit organizations such as Opportunities Inc., which receives state funding, can offer career guidance and job training from professionals like Beisecker. A key part of that process is identifying barriers to work — such as a lack of training, child care or transportation — and finding ways to overcome them.
“There are ways to support work without taking away people’s health coverage,” said Joan Alker, executive director of Georgetown University’s Center for Children and Families, which researches health care issues.
“Montana is the most concrete example of a work-support connection,” she said. “That’s one place to look to make sure people are connected to work supports and job training.”
Montana Republican state Rep. Edward Buttrey, who crafted the HELP-Link program with Democratic state Rep. Mary Caffero in 2015, said it adheres to GOP principles.
“Republican administrations typically want to ensure that if somebody’s getting a benefit from the taxpayers, that they’re earning it and in return providing a benefit back to the state and themselves,” Buttrey told Stateline. “I think that’s what this is about.”
Caffero said that in reaching a compromise, legislators “put the people of Montana above party politics.”
“We created our own majority,” she said, “and extremists were kind of out on a plank.”
Increasing interest
Medicaid is a program that provides health insurance for low-income people and is jointly run by states and the U.S. government. Any state that wants to add a work requirement to Medicaid must ask the federal government for permission.
Grassroots groups help Medicaid recipients regain lost coverage
The Biden administration has repeatedly turned down states’ requests to impose work requirements. It also has rescinded the approvals granted by its predecessor, which signed off on 13 of them. (Only one state, Arkansas, implemented its rule before courts blocked states from imposing them.) But with the election fast approaching, the prospect of a second Trump administration has prompted more GOP states to reconsider the idea.
That includes states such as Arkansas, Idaho and Louisiana that opted to expand Medicaid to more people under the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare. It also includes states that are still debating whether to expand Medicaid under Obamacare, among them Kansas and Mississippi.
Georgia and South Carolina, neither of which has expanded Medicaid under the ACA, both have sought federal permission to include work requirements in partial expansions of Medicaid that are more limited than what is envisioned under Obamacare. Only Georgia, which is fighting the Biden administration in court, currently has a strict work rule for any of its Medicaid enrollees.
How it works
Montana, which expanded Medicaid during the Obama administration, in 2019 sought federal permission to apply work requirements to the roughly 100,000 adults who were newly eligible for the program. Under the proposal, beneficiaries would have had to work at least 80 hours each month, be looking for a job, or be doing volunteer work. There would have been exemptions for pregnancy, disabilities and mental illness.
In 2021, however, the Biden administration rejected Montana’s request. Buttrey told Stateline that if former President Donald Trump wins in November, it is likely that Montana will try again. But whatever the outcome of the election, the voluntary workforce training in HELP-Link has emerged as a possible compromise.
Beisecker said that Opportunities Inc. has been working with the Help-Link program for about a year and a half. The nonprofit has been able to help people do things such as get a commercial driver’s license, start a welding certificate program, take classes on medical coding, and join construction training programs.
When folks come in, we can meet with them and say, ‘Hey, maybe you can take this training that we can help pay for, and you can come out and start making 28 or 29 dollars an hour.
– Jeff Beisecker, employment and training coordinator for Opportunities Inc., a Montana nonprofit
The nonprofit also has a community resource center that can help Medicaid recipients get access to vouchers for food, laundry facilities and other needs.
“We get referrals from other nonprofits we work with,” Beisecker said. “We have flyers that we send out so people know about the program. We go to job fairs.”
According to data from the Montana Department of Labor and Industry, more than 2,200 people have participated in the HELP-Link program since its inception. Many have gone on to get jobs as registered nurses, dental hygienists, real estate agents and computer programmers, among many other professions.
HELP-Link has built relationships with large local employers such as manufacturers and health care providers, said Heather O’Loughlin, executive director of the Montana Budget & Policy Center, a nonprofit group that examines budget and tax issues. O’Loughlin said a dip in participation since 2021 is evidence that the program has moved many participants into stable jobs.
Caffero, the Democratic lawmaker, agreed.
“The program was doing exactly what we intended. People get jobs and jobs with benefits, jobs where they make a living wage, because they have education and training through HELP-Link,” she said. “That’s the goal. We don’t want the [Medicaid] rolls to go up.”
Buttrey noted that prior to the pandemic, Montanans stayed on Medicaid for an average of less than two years. “We’ve given people some job skills,” he said. “We’ve gotten them preventative care and help with addiction.”
Despite federal warnings, red and blue states aggressively cull Medicaid rolls
Robin Rudowitz, who oversees Medicaid research at KFF, a nonpartisan health research organization, praised Montana’s program for encouraging people to find a job — and get off government assistance — without denying them health care while they do it.
She contrasted HELP-Link with the strict work requirements Arkansas briefly had in place for Medicaid recipients during the Trump administration, before a federal court struck them down. Those rules knocked roughly 18,000 people off the rolls. “Arkansas was really the only state that actually implemented to the point of where individuals were disenrolled for failing to comply,” she said.
Rudowitz and other health experts also have been critical of Georgia’s Pathways to Coverage program, launched last summer, which extended Medicaid coverage to some low-income Georgians on the condition that they work or participate in another qualifying activity 80 hours each month. Under that program, which is not considered full expansion under Obamacare, 4,000 people have gained coverage, out of the roughly 350,000 who would qualify based on their income.
Georgia Republican Gov. Brian Kemp has defended the program and blamed the Biden administration for its slow start. The program is set to expire next fall, but several months ago, Georgia sued the federal government in a bid to extend it.
“It’s fiscally foolish, and anti-family,” Georgetown’s Alker said of the Georgia program. She noted that the state is leaving federal dollars on the table by eschewing a full-fledged expansion under Obamacare.
“It’s not been a pathway to coverage for anybody,” she said.
The Ole’ Mercantile is a busy place by Grass Range, Montana, standards.
The community of roughly 125 people sits along a long, lonely network of two-lane highways connecting Billings with points north along Montana’s Hi-Line.
For drivers pushing toward Lewistown, Malta or Glasgow, the store’s lights are often the first sign of anything for miles.
Of late, they may also offer a chance of identifying the person driving a truck local women say is stalking these roads.
Owner Krista Manley told Cowboy State Daily her store is outfitted with a top-of-the-line camera system that offers a 360-degree view with no blind spots. Four overlapping cameras capture her property, the Wrangler Bar and the full stretch of Highway 87 frontage running through town.
Fergus County investigators now hope that footage — and Manley’s willingness to comb through hours of it — can help identify the driver of a newer white Ford four-door pickup with dark tinted windows, no front license plate and a chrome grill guard.
The truck is at the center of the most recent reported highway stalking incident.
Lizette Lamb, a 48-year-old traveling health care worker, says she was nearly run off the road the evening of April 10.
Now a growing chorus of similar accounts from women across north-central Montana are popping up on social media.
At The Ole Merc
Travis Lamb, Lizette’s husband, took to Facebook to post about what happened to his wife on one of the loneliest stretches of highway in Montana.
Travis told Cowboy State Daily Lizette pulled into the Ole’ Merc Conoco in Grass Range between 7 and 8 p.m. to grab a drink. She later remembered a pickup was backed in alongside the cafe: a newer white Ford four-door.
“Kind of gave her the heebie-jeebies,” he said. “My wife has worked in a prison and stuff like that, so she’s used to kind of going with her gut.”
She bought a drink, got back in her Ford Bronco Sport and headed north on Highway 19 toward Glasgow.
About a mile and a half down the road, she realized the white pickup was behind her. Through the dark tint, she could make out the silhouettes of two men.
She slowed down and edged toward the shoulder to let them pass. They slowed with her. She sped up. They sped up.
By the time she reached Bohemian Corner 23 miles up the road, Travis Lamb said, his wife knew something was wrong.
There were no other vehicles in the lot, so she didn’t bother pulling in. She tried to call Travis. No service.
She tried 911. The phone beeped, displayed a red message and disconnected.
Truck Gets Aggressive
The white truck continued to shadow Lizette along Highway 191. About two miles from where the road crosses the Missouri River, coming into a construction zone, the pickup got aggressive.
Travis said the truck rode so close to the Bronco’s bumper that his wife could no longer see its windshield, only the grille.
Then it pulled out as if to pass and swerved into her, he said, in what he described as an attempted PIT maneuver — the law-enforcement technique of clipping a fleeing vehicle’s rear quarter to spin it out.
PIT stands for Precision Immobilization Technique, and this tactic is used to stop a fleeing vehicle by forcing it to turn sideways, causing the driver to lose control and stop.
“She was fortunate, kind of timed it to when they went to turn into her and hit her, she sped up,” Travis Lamb said. “And they missed.”
That’s when Lizette Lamb pulled her Springfield XDM 9mm pistol out of the center console. She didn’t point it, but she made sure they could see it.
The white pickup hit its brakes, threw a U-turn in a spray of dust and gravel, and headed back toward Grass Range.
The Video
“I thank God that it did happen to her and not somebody else, because I know my wife is more than capable of defending herself,” said Travis Lamb, an Iraq War combat veteran, who eventually reached out to Manley at the Ole Merc.
Then, when Manley reviewed the surveillance video from the Merc’s camera system, she found no sign of a white Ford truck.
“We have not found evidence of them at our store or at the three businesses that come along the highway right there,” Manley said. “That doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.
“My default is to absolutely believe women, and she (Lizette) was, she was rattled.”
Manley holds a Ph.D. in cognitive psychology and ran the research team at Procore Technologies before going into business for herself.
When reviewing the video, Manley logged the times Lizette arrived and left, and then watched the highway for an hour after.
“We’re absolutely not arguing the authenticity of the report in any way, shape or form,” said Manley. “In my previous life before I had the store, I actually was a memory and cognition researcher. I understand how stress impacts memory.”
The Echoes
Travis Lamb’s Facebook post went off like a flare.
He tallied 36 accounts of similar experiences in roughly the same swath of country stretching across prairie and badlands in one of the least populated parts of Montana.
The pattern in many of the comments was consistent enough to be unsettling: a white pickup, often a Ford, sometimes with out-of-state plates, tailgating women on isolated stretches of two-lane after dark.
One commenter described being followed by a white truck north of Grass Range three years ago around 10 p.m., tailgated with brights on at more than 80 mph until the truck peeled off in a different direction.
Another described a white Ford pickup near Harlowton trying to force her to stop, then waiting for her at a gas station. Another recalled a white pickup with North Dakota plates in the same area.
In Wyoming, one poster described two men in a white truck with Washington plates on Highway 120 between Cody and Meeteetse who tailgated her, tried to push her off the road, then cut in front and slammed on the brakes.
Other women described different vehicles — a dark Escalade, a small white car, a black double-cab — but the same script: tailgating, refusing to pass, brake-checking, dead zones with no cell service.
Easter Night
One name in that Facebook thread was Joni Hartford of Lewistown, who told Cowboy State Daily she had her own near-identical encounter on Easter evening just days before Lizette Lamb’s.
Hartford, who works in insurance, had dropped off some belongings to her son, a football player at Rocky Mountain College in Billings.
She stopped at a gas station on her way out of town “for a pop,” climbed back into her red 2014 Ford F-150 and headed north on Highway 87 around 7:30 or 8 p.m.
“I noticed it right after I left Billings,” Hartford said of the pickup behind her. “It was right behind me and I kept thinking, ‘God, this vehicle is super close.’”
About 15 miles out of town, past the racetracks, she pulled toward the white line and slowed to 60 mph on a long straightaway, hoping the truck would go around. It wouldn’t.
“He was so close behind me, I couldn’t see his taillights, but I could see his marker lamps on his mirrors, his tow mirrors,” Hartford said. “So I knew it was a Ford pickup, and I knew it was like a three-quarter or a 1-ton. It was a big pickup.”
She couldn’t make out the color in the dark. She called her husband.
“I said, ‘This pickup is tailgating me,’ and said, ‘It’s really kind of making me nervous, because if I had to stop for a deer, it would run me over. It would run me off the road,’” Hartford said.
“And he goes, ‘Well, just stop.’ And I said, ‘I am not stopping. I’m in the middle of freaking nowhere,’” she added.
She made it through Roundup with the truck still on her bumper.
North of town, climbing toward Grass Range, Hartford caught a lucky break with an Amish buggy sluggishly clapping up a blind hill and slowing traffic.
“I darted around the Amish buggy, right before the blind hill, and he couldn’t get around them, and I just gunned it, and I was going probably 90 mph just to put space between us,” Hartford said. “I never seen him again.”
Hartford carries a .380 pistol. She had it out and on the seat. She didn’t show it — between the dark and her tinted windows, she wasn’t sure the driver behind her would have seen it anyway.
When Lamb’s post crossed her Facebook feed, Hartford said the parallels stopped her cold.
“It’s the same exact situation,” she said. “I can’t say for certain it was the same person, but it sure seems like it was the same person.”
Hartford said she believes the driver is hunting for circumstance: single women, after dark, on a corridor he knows is desolate and short on cell coverage.
“They’re targeting them at gas stations,” she said. “That’s the only place they could have found me, because it’s the only place I’ve stopped.”
The Candidate
Penny Ronning, cofounder and president of the Yellowstone Human Trafficking Task Force, had a similar drive in 2022.
She remembers it as the only time in nearly a year of solo campaign travel across 41 Montana counties that she felt afraid.
Ronning, then a Democratic candidate for U.S. Congress, was driving from Billings to Havre for a campaign event.
Instead of taking the interstate, she chose the back roads — north out of Winifred on Highway 236, a route that runs about 30 miles of gravel through some of the most remote country in the state before dropping into the Missouri River Breaks, which Ronning compared to a Montana version of the Grand Canyon.
As she entered the gravel, a four-door white pickup with blacked-out windows pulled in behind her.
“That was what made it frightening,” Ronning said. “It was that I was followed.”
Ronning, who has spent years working on human trafficking policy and prevention, was careful to push back on the framing that has circulated on Facebook around the Lamb case — that the white-pickup encounters are likely abduction attempts tied to trafficking networks.
“Human trafficking is the use of force, fraud or coercion to compel a person into commercial sex acts or labor against their will,” Ronning said. “Just because someone is being followed, that doesn’t rise to the level of human trafficking.”
The most prevalent form of human trafficking in the United States, she said, is familial trafficking, one family member trafficking another.
In Montana, she said, labor trafficking is also common in construction, nail salons, illicit massage businesses, hospitality and domestic servitude in pockets of high-end real estate.
Sex trafficking almost always begins with someone the victim knows.
The Watch
Back in Grass Range, every white pickup that rolls past the four-corner blinking light is now turning heads.
Manley said her store has worked closely with the Fergus County Sheriff’s Office on past incidents, and her cameras are essentially a standing resource for investigators.
She also said the response on social media has dismayed her, commenters questioning whether these highway stalking incidents happened at all, or suggesting Grass Range itself isn’t safe.
She believes her store, and others like it in remote pockets of Montana, are informal refuges.
“We’ve all been there, whether it’s in a snowstorm or where we’re just uncomfortable driving like this where we’re just like, ‘Oh my gosh,’ you see the big lights and you’re like, there’s a beacon of safety, essentially,” Manley said.
She said that her eyes are open to potential threats along the isolated highways connecting Grass Range to the rest of the world.
“We know that it is a highway that has a reputation for, you know, trafficking, drug moving, all of those different things, and that’s why we are as diligent as we are,” said Manley. “We really care about the safety of our community, our employees, and our customers.”
Manley remains in contact with the Lambs.
“She told me, ‘I’m not going to quit looking,’” said Travis, explaining how Manley is arranging for the Lambs to review the footage themselves.
Travis figures that perhaps, “Instead of a white Ford, maybe it’s a tan Dodge.”
He added, “I’m hoping somebody’s like, ‘I know that pickup.’ That’s what I’m praying for.”
So is Lizette, who told Cowboy State Daily, she’s thankful for the response to her story. She’s also thankful she was traveling with her sidearm.
“Unfortunately, that’s the world we live in now. You know, Montana, in the middle of nowhere,” said Lizette, who encouraged anyone else with similar encounters to come forward.
“This is just a reminder that it is happening,” she said. “It is real.”
David Madison can be reached at david@cowboystatedaily.com.
The Montana Lottery offers multiple draw games for those aiming to win big.
Here’s a look at April 18, 2026, results for each game:
Winning Powerball numbers from April 18 drawing
24-25-39-46-61, Powerball: 01, Power Play: 5
Check Powerball payouts and previous drawings here.
Winning Lotto America numbers from April 18 drawing
18-21-22-32-42, Star Ball: 10, ASB: 03
Check Lotto America payouts and previous drawings here.
Winning Big Sky Bonus numbers from April 18 drawing
10-16-29-31, Bonus: 13
Check Big Sky Bonus payouts and previous drawings here.
Winning Montana Cash numbers from April 18 drawing
06-08-09-20-22
Check Montana Cash payouts and previous drawings here.
Feeling lucky? Explore the latest lottery news & results
When are the Montana Lottery drawings held?
- Powerball: 8:59 p.m. MT on Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday.
- Mega Millions: 9 p.m. MT on Tuesday and Friday.
- Lucky For Life: 8:38 p.m. MT daily.
- Lotto America: 9 p.m. MT on Monday, Wednesday and Saturday.
- Big Sky Bonus: 7:30 p.m. MT daily.
- Powerball Double Play: 8:59 p.m. MT on Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday.
- Montana Cash: 8 p.m. MT on Wednesday and Saturday.
- Millionaire for Life: 9:15 p.m. MT daily.
Missed a draw? Peek at the past week’s winning numbers.
This results page was generated automatically using information from TinBu and a template written and reviewed by a Great Falls Tribune editor. You can send feedback using this form.
Montana
Between Bozeman And Billings Is Montana’s One-Of-A-Kind Historic Mill Filled With Cheese – Islands
Montana may be well known as a top destination for nature enthusiasts and adventure seekers thanks to its outdoor activities like hiking and paddling, but there are some unique foodie gems to be found here, too. One of the best ways to experience Montana’s local food scene is with a visit to Greycliff Mill, between Bozeman and Billings. Here, you can discover a one-of-a-kind cheese attraction along with a number of other things to see on site during your visit to Big Sky Country.
Greycliff Mill is housed in a restored 1760s barn, which features a water-powered gristmill and pretty scenery like ponds framed by rock formations. You may see bison wandering the site — there are five that live here. You may also catch a glimpse of a 10-foot-tall bear, but no need to panic as it’s only a statue, carved by a chainsaw. The pretty cafe, a mix of modern and rustic decor, serves from a menu that includes coffee, milkshakes, and pastries, plus paninis like “The Cattleman” and breakfast sandwiches like the “Sheepherders Sandwich.” Book in advance for a special farm-to-table dinner in the evening — these are only offered on select dates throughout the year, and may sell out. But one thing you shouldn’t miss here is the cheese cave.
Discover Greycliff Mill’s cheese cave
Greycliff Mill has an underground cheese cave, which is a must-see on any visit. It’s possible to see experts making artisan cheeses while you learn about the cheesemaking process and sample a few products. The cheese is aged in the cave at a temperature of 50 degrees with 85% humidity to create the perfect environment for a tasty product. It’s possible to buy some cheese at their market — which also sells seasonal produce, bread, and lots of other Montana-made products.
Besides the food-based spots, Greycliff Mill is also home to a small wool-weaving studio, and there are accommodations if you want to spend the night in restored log cabins or reclaimed farm silos. Greycliff Creek Ranch offers horseback rides and a chuckwagon dinner for more authentic Montana experiences. Whether you’re visiting especially to see the cheese cave, or road tripping and need a break, Greycliff Mill is a quirky and special spot. One Google reviewer summed up the experience well, praising the “amazing rustic atmosphere,” and saying, “I stopped for a coffee and ended up staying just to enjoy the view. Great coffee, peaceful place, and such a unique spot. Definitely worth the stop if you’re driving through Montana.”
Greycliff Mill is between Bozeman and Billings, the largest city in Montana and surrounded by natural beauty. It’s almost equidistant between the two cities — 1 hour to Bozeman and 1 hour to Billings. The closest major airport is Billings-Logan International Airport, although Bozeman Yellowstone International Airport, Montana’s mountain gem of an airport, is also a convenient option.
-
Utah1 minute agoGolden Knights vs. Mammoth Game 1 prediction: NHL odds, picks, best bets for Stanley Cup Playoffs
-
Vermont7 minutes agoVermont lawmakers reject digital lottery initiative – Valley News
-
Virginia13 minutes agoVirginia’s special election redistricting battle is next week and has national impacts
-
Washington19 minutes agoThe Church of Jesus Christ has announced its 384th temple
-
Wisconsin25 minutes agoWisconsin authorities put total arrests from clashes at beagle breeding facility at about 25
-
West Virginia31 minutes agoThis week in West Virginia history: April 19-25
-
Wyoming37 minutes agoIdaho semitruck driver involved in fatal accident at Wyoming FlyingJ – East Idaho News
-
Crypto43 minutes agoUpcoming ‘Bitcoin’ Movie With Casey Affleck, Gal Gadot Probes Satoshi’s Identity