This is an evolving story and Wyoming Public Radio will update this story as we learn more.

Real estate leases for five federal offices in Wyoming are supposedly being terminated, including one intended to keep miner’s safe, according to a Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) website. There are conflicting reports and details have been hard to confirm. One office was unaware of the supposed closure.

There have been reports indicating inaccuracies on the DOGE website.

Over the last few days, at least 748 real estate leases for federal offices across the nation were added to a terminated list on the DOGE website, as part of Pres. Trump’s plan to reduce the size of the federal government.

One of those was the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) field office in Green River.

“Just like the language they use to identify the spending being reckless and wasteful, this is reckless and irresponsible,” said Marshal Cummings, a Green River trona miner and local union president.

The website also listed 28 other MSHA offices nationwide. They are scattered across the country and near areas with heavy mine activity.

“Say there is a disaster, and MSHA needs to be there right now. That’s what the field office is there for,” Cummings said.

The Green River office is in Sweetwater County and near Lincoln County. Both areas have heavy trona and coal mine activity. MSHA oversees that companies and workers are complying with safety standards – everything from silica dust standards to prevent the deadly black lung disease, to proper use of machinery equipment, to updating old electrical systems to prevent fire.

“If people that I represent, or any of my fellow miners in southwest Wyoming have injury or, God forbid, they die, because someone decides that they can cut MSHA, I hope we have the resources to go after them [DOGE] criminally,” Cummings said.

He added that prior to MSHA forming in 1977, there was one of the worst mining incidents in American history: the Sunshine Mine disaster in Kellogg, Idaho. In 1972, a fire broke out in the mine and killed 91 miners. It served as a catalyst for forming MSHA.

Cummings said he spoke to the Green River office and as of now it’s open and unaware of the closure.

The following are all of the Wyoming federal offices included in DOGE’s list, along with Wyoming Public Radio’s (WPR) attempts to verify the information. WPR sent a list of specific questions, including whether leases were set for termination, how many people work in the office and whether those employees would be moved or also terminated. Agencies responded with the following statements.

• Social Security Administration in Rock Springs
  • Response from a Social Security spokesperson: “We are working with GSA (General Services Administration) to review our leases and ensure they are used efficiently. Most of the leases we are not renewing are for small remote hearing sites that are co-located with other Federal space. As the majority of our hearings are held virtually, we no longer need as many in-person hearings locations. In fact, in FY24, twenty percent of these offices held no in-person hearings. Other offices are non-public facing, being consolidated into nearby locations, or we had planned to close. Social Security continuously monitors and evaluates the use of our office space to maximize efficiency for the American taxpayer.”
• Office of U.S. Attorneys in Lander
  • A public information officer (PIO) for the U.S. Attorneys Office District of Wyoming said the GSA contacted the Lander office early last week to notify them that their lease would not be renewed. Later that week, GSA called again, saying they had received misinformation and that the Lander office would not be affected. 
  • In a follow-up email, the PIO said the Dick Cheney Federal Building in Casper, where the U.S. Attorney’s Office has a branch, is going to be sold. The GSA site the PIO shared no longer shows the list of “non-core property” slated for disposal, but did earlier in the week when WPR reviewed it. A previous version of the webpage from March 4 to 6 is accessible through the Wayback Machine.
• Geological Survey in Cheyenne
• Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration in Cheyenne 
• Mine Safety and Health Administration field office in Green River 
  • WPR called. Someone answered and said they’re not allowed to speak about the DOGE listing and hung up. 
  • WPR reached out to the owner of the building who didn’t reply to an email and hung up when WPR called.

One additional office was not listed on DOGE, but included in a list of office terminations compiled by U.S. House Natural Resources Committee Democrats.

• U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Lander
  • No comment. 
  • The Lander Fish and Wildlife Conservation Office assists the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho Tribes of the Wind River Reservation with fisheries and wildlife conservation, according to its website.

Several of the offices directed WPR to reach out to the GSA, as they oversee government real estate leases. The following was their response:

“Acting Administrator (Stephen) Ehikian’s vision for GSA includes reducing our deferred maintenance liabilities, supporting the return to office of federal employees, and taking advantage of a stronger private/government partnership in managing the workforce of the future. GSA is reviewing all options to optimize our footprint and building utilization. A component of our space consolidation plan will be the termination of many soft term leases. To the extent these terminations affect public facing facilities and/or existing tenants, we are working with our agency partners to secure suitable alternative space.”

WPR will work to continue to verify the information.

CHEYENNE, Wyo. — Women planning pill abortions in Wyoming will need to get an ultrasound after lawmakers overrode the governor’s veto of the law.

Wednesday’s 22-9 vote by the state Senate followed a 45-16 vote by the House on Tuesday to override. In vetoing the bill Monday, Republican Gov. Mark Gordon questioned whether it was reasonable and necessary, especially for victims of rape and incest.

Lawmakers cited concerns about women’s well-being Wednesday in voting to override, and they cleared the two-thirds majority requirement.

“He’s very concerned about the psychological effects of this procedure,” Republican Sen. Darin Smith of Cheyenne said of the governor, “but what about the psychological effects of having an abortion, for the rest of your life?”

The new requirement, which takes effect right away, was criticized by abortion rights advocates.

“We are saddened so many legislators lack empathy and respect for women’s decision-making authority, but we stand ready to fight this unconstitutional, unnecessary and unreasonable bill in court,” Christine Lichtenfels, executive director of the Wyoming abortion access advocacy group Chelsea’s Fund, said in a statement.

Wyoming is the first state to explicitly outlaw pill abortions, though that and other abortion bans over the past three years are on hold pending a case before the Wyoming Supreme Court.

Ten other states require abortion providers to perform ultrasounds on women seeking abortions, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research organization that supports abortion rights.

Under Wyoming’s new law, pregnant women planning pill abortions will have to drive potentially long distances to get an ultrasound and have it documented. They would have the opportunity but not be required to view the image of the fetus at least 48 hours before a pill abortion.

Existing state law already requires abortion providers to offer an ultrasound to women getting abortions.

Pregnant woman who do not get an ultrasound will not be penalized under the new law, however. Instead it is medical providers who face up to $9,000 in fines and six months in jail for not arranging it.

But there are few if any active abortion providers left. Last week the state’s only full-service abortion clinic stopped providing any abortion care, surgical or medicinal, after Gordon signed a bill requiring such facilities to be licensed as surgical centers.

Wellspring Health Access in Casper is wary of running afoul of the law while it challenges it and others in court, President Julie Burkhart said.

It was not clear whether Wyoming’s only other clinic providing medication abortions, a family medicine practice in Jackson, continues to do so. There was no response to phone messages left with the clinic seeking comment Tuesday and Wednesday.

Pill abortions remain possible in the state through remote services: Women have access through the Just the Pill telehealth service and online providers such as Abuzz, The Massachusetts Medication Abortion Access Project, and Aid Access, according to Chelsea’s Fund.

The Guttmacher Institute found that more than 3 in 5 abortions carried out in the U.S. through the formal health care system in 2023 were medicinal. Wyoming had the biggest portion of abortions via pill that year: 19 in 20.