Wyoming
Wyoming Chapter Of National Libertarian Group… | Cowboy State Daily
Former state legislator Tyler Lindholm is well-known at the Wyoming Capitol, easily recognizable by his tall frame and frequent presence in the halls. His organization, Americans For Prosperity, was less known by most until recently.
Libertarian conservative political advocacy group Americans For Prosperity has emerged as a major player in the state’s political scene this election cycle, campaigning around Wyoming and endorsing more than a dozen candidates in legislative races.
The choice of those candidates has drawn some attention from supporters and detractors.
AFP has endorsed 14 Republicans for the Wyoming House and Senate so far, and this week plans to officially announce three more. They are House Speaker Albert Sommers, R-Pinedale, in his bid for the Senate, and state Reps. Martha Lawley, R-Worland, and Sen. Ed Cooper, R-Thermopolis, in their bids for reelection.
The top goals for AFP Wyoming this election season are to remove what it sees as barriers to improving school choice and reducing governmental regulation in Wyoming.
Lindholm said the major factor in deciding whether AFP will engage in a race is whether the group believes it can make a difference in the final result.
Of all the candidates it’s endorsed, only two are members of the farther right Wyoming Freedom Caucus. Many are members of the Wyoming Caucus, a group of Republican legislators that have organized in opposition to the Freedom Caucus.
Rep. Daniel Singh, R-Cheyenne, is one of the two Freedom Caucus members endorsed by AFP. He told Cowboy State Daily he is very enthusiastic to get AFP’s endorsement and considers himself politically aligned with the group.
Lindholm said that for what it’s worth, he hopes both caucuses fail.
“I think the only caucus you should belong to is your constituency,” he said.
Point Of Contention: Civility
What seems to be a particular point of contention about AFP getting involved in Wyoming races for some is that the group is endorsing some candidates who are opponents of legislators that scored higher on AFP’s own 2023 scorecard rankings.
For instance, the group is endorsing two challenger candidates taking on incumbent Reps. Ben Hornok, R-Cheyenne, and Rachel Rodriguez-Williams, R-Cody, despite both legislators receiving respectable scores in the rankings.
Conversely, the group is also endorsing Reps. Barry Crago, R-Buffalo, and Ken Clouston, R-Gillette, despite both doing worse than Hornok, Rodriguez-Williams and Rep. Mark Jennings, R-Sheridan, Crago’s opponent.
“AFP has endorsed candidates that score poorly on their own legislative scorecard, further proving that their out-of-state money is simply being used to help Lindholm’s liberal friends,” Sen. Cheri Steinmetz, R-Lingle, told Cowboy State Daily.
Lindholm said the reason for that discrepancy is because his group considers another factor with equal weight — civility. He said the whole AFP Wyoming team studied each legislator’s behavior on social media and discussions during the legislative session when deciding who to endorse.
“We place civility just as high as principle,” Lindholm said. “We’ve got a lot of folks out there that are really good on principles, not so hot on civility, so we don’t engage in those races.”
Steinmtez, who’s not up for reelection, said she has a big problem with the consideration of civility, which she believes furthers a “liberal stance on policy — at best.”
“At worst, it enables AFP to lie openly about candidates that stand in their way,” she said.
Although Sommers did not score particularly well on the AFP scorecard, Lindholm said he ended up serving as a valuable ally during the 2024 session in helping get school choice legislation passed into law despite opposing those efforts the year before.
“After looking at it all summer long and doing a bunch of research on it he became one of our biggest champions,” Lindholm said. “Because of that, his ability to put his nose down and get to work, we’re pretty proud to endorse Speaker of the House Albert Sommers.”
During the last legislative session, Lindholm believes certain people voted against the bill expanding school choice in Wyoming simply because of who sponsored the bill: Clouston, a member of the Wyoming Caucus.
“That’s a big flag for us,” Lindholm said. “That means it’s not about principles and about politics, and we’re damn sure we’re going to show up in those races.”
Many of those who opposed Clouston’s bill argued it didn’t go far enough to expand school choice.
Who Is AFP?
AFP was founded by the Koch brothers of the political dynasty family behind Koch Industries. Historically, the group has supported rescinding energy and environmental regulations and expanding domestic energy production, lowering taxes and reducing government spending.
Although AFP gained significant popularity for its alignment with the Tea Party movement that sprouted under former President Barack Obama’s administration, it appears to have shifted its policies a bit over the last five years.
According to a 2019 Politico story, the organization said it was considering supporting Democrats in the 2020 United States elections as part of a broader effort to adjust its strategy.
Three years later in 2023, AFP opposed then-President Donald Trump’s reelection as president and sought out an alternative to Kari Lake in her 2024 Arizona Senate run, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Later that year, the group supported Nikki Haley in her Republican bid for president but stopped giving her money as soon as she lost the primary in South Carolina, her home state.
AFP Wyoming’s grassroots engagement director is Amy Womack, who served as the political director for former congresswoman Liz Cheney until 2022. In 2014, Womack was a field director for former Nebraska Republican Sen. Ben Sasse, who later went on to openly criticize Trump after his attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
“The organization is a front group for liberal policy,” Steinmetz said. “Funded entirely by out-of-state mega donors and supporters of Nikki Haley and Liz Cheney. The people of Wyoming will reject them at the ballot box, like they did Cheney and Lindholm.”
Although AFP may not be as conservative as some like Steinmetz would like, it would be hard to argue they don’t at least lean to the right.
During the 2024 legislation, AFP Wyoming made expanding school choice one of its top priorities, a position supported by most Republicans and opposed by every Democrat in the Legislature.
Over the past year, AFP Wyoming has also put out numerous ads and campaigns speaking firmly against President Joe Biden’s policies, which it believes can be blamed for the current levels of inflation.
Extensive Efforts
The basic overarching priorities for the group are improving liberty and reducing governmental regulation. More specifically, 2023 surveys conducted by AFP show that school choice, inflation, the economy and immigration are the biggest issues for Wyoming voters, which it’s using to guide its campaigning.
“As far as what we’re talking about, that’s all put together by people right here in Wyoming,” Lindholm said. “We drive our priorities based on what we’re hearing at the doors.”
Now, the group has about 20 local volunteers working around the state, knocking on doors seven days a week and informing people about the candidates AFP is supporting in their area.
Since June 1, Lindholm said the group has hit more than 21,000 doors and made direct contact with 4,375 people in Wyoming. He finds canvassing efforts like these one of the most effective forms of campaigning.
“The biggest question we always ask is, ‘What’s the biggest way government impacts your life?’” Lindholm said. “Whether that’s a positive or negative interaction, we want to know those things.”
It’s also his goal for AFP Wyoming to be the top grassroots advocacy organization in the state. Lindholm believes to truly be grassroots in a cause, local people must be involved. His group provides various seminars and classes on how people can get involved in various forms of political advocacy.
By the time the election season is over, Singh said he expects AFP to be one of the biggest players for money spent.
According to Facebook ad data, AFP Wyoming has spent $15,482 in Facebook ads since 2023.
Lindholm said since the group’s digital and mail efforts in support of its endorsed candidates are still in progress, it’s difficult to produce an accurate estimate of expenditures to date. These numbers will be available through the Secretary of State’s office in mid-August before the primary election.
Leo Wolfson can be reached at leo@cowboystatedaily.com.
Much of Wyoming outside of Yellowstone and Grand Teton also struggles with emergency response time.
By Katie Klingsporn, WyoFile
Wyoming’s U.S. Sen. John Barrasso is pushing legislation to upgrade emergency communications in national parks — a step he says would improve responses in far-flung areas of parks like Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks.
“This bill improves the speed and accuracy of emergency responders in locating and assisting callers in need of emergency assistance,” Barrasso told members of the National Parks Subcommittee last week during a hearing on the bill. “These moments make a difference between visitors being able to receive quick care and continue their trip or facing more serious medical complications.”
The legislation directs the U.S. Department of the Interior to develop a plan to upgrade National Park Service 911 call centers with next-generation 911 technology.
Among other things, these upgrades would enable them to receive text messages, images and videos in addition to phone calls, enhancing their ability to respond to emergencies or rescues in the parks.
Each year, rangers and emergency services respond to a wide range of calls — from lost hikers to car accidents and grizzly maulings — in the Wyoming parks’ combined 2.5 million acres.
Outside park boundaries, the state’s emergency service providers also face steep challenges, namely achieving financial viability. Many patients, meantime, encounter a lack of uniformity and longer 911 response times in the state’s so-called frontier areas.
Improving the availability of ground ambulance services to respond to 911 calls is a major priority in Wyoming’s recent application for federal Rural Health Transformation Project funds.
Barrasso’s office did not respond to a WyoFile request for comment on the state’s broader EMS challenges by publication time.
The bill from the prominent Wyoming Republican, who serves as Senate Majority Whip, joined a slate of federal proposals the subcommittee considered last week. With other bills related to the official name of North America’s highest mountain, an extra park fee charged to international visitors, the health of a wild horse herd and the use of off-highway vehicles in Capitol Reef National Park, Barrasso’s “Making Parks Safer Act” was among the least controversial.
What’s in it
Barrasso brought the bipartisan act along with Sens. Angus King (I-Maine), Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss.) and John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.).
The bill would equip national park 911 call centers with technological upgrades that would improve and streamline responses, Barrasso said. He noted that hundreds of millions of visitors stream into America’s national parks annually. That includes more than 8 million recreation visits to Wyoming’s national parks in 2024.
“Folks travel from across the world to enjoy the great American outdoors, and for many families, these memories last a lifetime,” he testified. “This is a bipartisan bill that ensures visitors who may need assistance can be reached in an accurate and timely manner.”
The Park Service supports Barrasso’s bill, Mike Caldwell, the agency’s associate director of park planning, facilities and lands, said during the hearing. It’s among several proposals that are “consistent with executive order 14314, ‘Making America Beautiful Again by Improving our National Parks,’” Caldwell said.
“These improvements are largely invisible to visitors, so they strengthen the emergency response without deterring the park’s natural beauty or history,” he said.
Other park issues
National parks have been a topic of contention since President Donald Trump included them in his DOGE efforts in early 2025. Since then, efforts to sell off federal land and strip park materials of historical information that casts a negative light on the country, along with a 43-day government shutdown, have continued to fuel debate over the proper management of America’s parks.
Several of these changes and issues came up during the recent National Parks Subcommittee hearing.
Among them was the recent announcement that resident fee-free dates will change in 2026. Martin Luther King Day and Juneteenth will no longer be included in those days, but visitors won’t have to pay fees on new dates: Flag Day on June 14, which is Trump’s birthday and Oct. 27, Theodore Roosevelt’s birthday.
Conservation organizations and others decried those changes as regressive.
At the hearing, Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-NM), assured the room that “when this president is in the past, Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Juneteenth will not only have fee-free national park admission, they will occupy, again, incredible places of pride in our nation’s history.”
Improvements such as the new fee structure “put American families first,” according to the Department of the Interior. “These policies ensure that U.S. taxpayers, who already support the National Park System, continue to enjoy affordable access, while international visitors contribute their fair share to maintaining and improving our parks for future generations,” Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum said in an announcement.
WyoFile is an independent nonprofit news organization focused on Wyoming people, places and policy.
Wyoming
Evacuations spread from fires in South Dakota, Wyoming due to strong winds from coast-to-coast storm
CLIMATE TECH: As wildfires grow stronger, faster, and more expensive, a California-based startup is taking a high-tech approach to fight these fires using autonomous drones designed to extinguish flames before they turn deadly. Founder & CEO Stuart Landesberg joins FOX Weather to discuss Seneca’s firefighting drones.
Large, fast-moving fires are causing evacuations in South Dakota and Wyoming due to the impacts of a coast-to-coast storm.
The FOX Forecast Center said winds have been gusting up to 70 mph in the Pennington County, South Dakota area, which has caused the wildfire to spread rapidly.
COAST-TO-COAST STORM CAUSES TRAVEL ISSUES DUE TO HURRICANE-FORCE WINDS, HEAVY RAIN ACROSS NORTHWEST
The blaze, known as the Greyhound Fire, is approximately 200 acres in size. The fire is burning two to three miles south of Keystone and is moving east, according to the Pennington County Sheriff’s Office.
The Greyhound Fire in South Dakota spans 200 acres.
(FOX Weather / FOX Weather)
Highway 40 and Playhouse Road are closed as crews work to contain the fire.
People living along the highway between Playhouse Road and Rushmore Ranch Road have been evacuated, officials said.
TWO KIDS WAITING FOR THE BUS CRITICALLY INJURED DUE TO STRONG WINDS IN IDAHO
Crews are asking anyone in an evacuation zone to leave the area. Officials are advising people in the area to check the Pennington County Public Safety Hub.
A grass fire has caused evacuations in the Winchester Hills section of Cheyenne, Wyoming.
(FOX Weather / FOX Weather)
People in the Winchester Hills area of Cheyenne, Wyoming, have also been evacuated due to a grass fire.
The FOX Forecast Center said winds are gusting up to 75 mph in the area.
The National Weather Service has issued a Fire Warning and says there is a shelter at South High School for evacuated residents.
Check for updates on this developing story.
The University of Wyoming filed a lawsuit this week seeking $2.5 million from an energy company it partnered with to research enhanced oil recovery.
The university in 2024 signed a contract with Houston-based ACU Energy to advance research at the university’s Center of Innovation for Flow Through Porous Media, according to the university’s complaint filed Monday in Wyoming’s U.S. District Court. ACU Energy agreed to pay the university $15 million over the six-year research period. The company, according to the complaint, was to pay the university $2.5 million annually with two payments each year.
While the university kept up its end of the bargain — by assembling a research team, training research members and incurring costs to modify laboratory space — ACU Energy “failed to pay the University even a cent owed under the Agreement, leaving $2,500,000 outstanding in unpaid invoices,” the complaint alleges.
ACU Energy did not respond to a WyoFile request for comment before publication.
The company notified the university in February that it was terminating the contract, and the university notified ACU Energy in May of its breach of contract, according to court filings. The university asked the court for a jury trial.
Enhanced oil recovery refers to methods used to squeeze more crude from reservoirs that have already been tapped for primary production, extending the life of an oilfield.
The university commonly accepts money from private businesses in return for lending resources and expertise to advance research. The Center of Innovation for Flow Through Porous Media is part of the university’s Research Centers of Excellence in the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences.
The Center of Innovation for Flow Through Porous Media, led by Mohammad Piri, a professor of petroleum engineering, bills itself as “the most advanced oil and gas research facility in the world.” The center conducts research at the university’s High Bay Research facility, which “is funded by $37.2 million in state dollars and $16.3 million in private contributions, with an additional $9.2 million in private gifts for research equipment,” according to the center’s website.
The center has received donations from oil industry heavyweights like ExxonMobil, Halliburton and Baker Hughes.
Piri was tapped to serve as “principal investigator” for the UW-ACU Energy partnership, according to the university’s complaint. As of press time, ACU Energy had not filed a response to the lawsuit.
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