Common Sense Solution: Money in Politics

By Gabriel Green

Summary: Money in politics is out of hand, and ruining our state. An easy solution is to restrict spending on elections to folks who actually live where the election is taking place. If you can’t vote for the candidates, why do you get to spend money on ‘em?

I'm just gonna put this at the top because I'm yet to meet anyone who disagrees. If you do, PLEASE tweet me @DinoWyo or email me at dinowyo@gmail.com because I'm curious.

One Sentence Solution

“If you don’t live where the election is happening, you can’t spend money on it.”

Let's Dig Deeper

Support for “getting money out of politics” is and always has been popular with the American people. So, why is it so hard to accomplish?

In our own state of Wyoming, traditional Republicans have admitted feeling ambushed by the recent primary which saw a record amount of out-of-state donations to their primary challengers.

In one of the most egregious examples, a group sent blatantly false flyers to voters claiming that an incumbent had voted to keep President Trump off the Wyoming ballot…

HOT TIP FOLKS: Not even the establishment Democrats here are stupid enough to vote to keep Trump off the ballot, and they’re plenty willing to make politically suicidal decisions.

Voting against Poison Pill Amendments is not the same as voting "for" something...

The Partisan Problem

The core of the problem is national, but Wyoming is now suffering the consequences.

Radical-Red Partisans have realized that they’d rather spend money on Wyoming primaries that practically guarantee general election victories, than spend money on tightly fought races in competitive districts. And, Blinded-Blue Partisans do the same thing…That’s why folks who try to volunteer for the Democrats in Wyoming are often tasked with calling voters in Colorado.

Current political parties insist that EVERY member stand for the same things regardless of location or life circumstances; they calcify into contented cadres of homogeneity that don’t represent more than 10-20% of the people at best. And, it makes them increasingly willing to abandon “lost” states and concentrate on either deep-red or deep-blue states.

In places that are single party [cough China cough] there is no room for open dissent.

But, there is a lot of room for subterfuge and obfuscation.

In Washington, DC — about as deeply blue as it gets in America — everyone runs as a Democrat, even the conservatives. In Wyoming — about as deeply red as it gets in America — everyone runs as a Republican, even the liberals. And it results in confused voters, who aren’t able to reliably use the parties as a proxy for values. It’s also why everyone’s signs seem to be competing over how many synonyms for “real Republican” they can squeeze in.

A Wyoming Weakness

If everyone’s a Republican, nobody is.

That’s why labels like “RINO,” “Redcoat,” “secret-Democrat,” and so many more are thrown around willy nilly. And it’s why good-ol’-fashioned traditional Republicans are suddenly branded “leftists” when they refuse to back the monoculture of the current party. Heck, folks who are 97% aligned with the current party get labeled traitors and replaced with folks who are better Reds. 100% loyalty is the bare minimum for the party these days.

In a state like ours, everyone is trying to prove they’re a better Red than the next; or, more accurately, that their opponent is a worse Red. And, since we’ve historically had cheaper elections than most states — though still prohibitively expensive for most average working-class people to compete —  it’s really easy for outsized swells of out-of-state money to tilt the race.

If it’s all about who gets in front of voters first to bash their opponent and prove they’re not a “real conservative,” then having deep pockets from out-of-state that can get propaganda materials out fast is a good way to buy influence in Wyoming.

And, if you buy that influence, you can take traditional Wyoming values and turn them into something unacceptable by elected officials.

Supporting the Police is leftist now?

I’ll offer a specific story from my own experience to illustrate the point.

As many know, I got to participate in a pre-session training with several members of our legislature; especially members of the Wyoming House of Representatives. All of these folks were members of the Freedom Caucus. The training was hosted by Young Americans for Liberty (YAL), and run by a guy nicknamed “Bylaw Bill.”

I’ll admit right now that I actually really liked Bylaw Bill, and most everyone in the training. There was plenty I didn’t like too, but I can get along with anyone who wants to help, even if we disagree on exactly how.  And, there was plenty to agree with, like when Rep. Singh talked about a bill he’s pitched to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) to “Defend the National Guard,” from abuse and misuse by aspiring tyrants.

I’ll talk about the training more in another post, but I want to share a bit about my pre-training dinner with Bylaw Bill. I got to take him out to Firerock in Casper, where we had some delicious steak and some of those bangin’ firecracker shrimp. He didn’t believe me that Wyoming could have a good shrimp dish, so I was glad to surprise him.

Over the course of the dinner we talked about the goals of the training, how I could support him best and still plug the Center for Practical Federalism’s Scorecard detailing the states’ vulnerability to federal influence, and what his experience had been like with similar trainings where the Freedom Caucus did not have the majority.

Eventually we had hammered out logistics and were talking personal beliefs. At one point I admitted that I support the police — while advocating for reforms — and that I wanted them to have way more funding not less.

“That’s leftist,” he said.

I was taken aback. I figured that a leftist wanted to defund the police, resist police, etc. I thought conservatives “backed the blue.” If anything, I thought this was one of my more traditionally “Republican” viewpoints.

But the thing is, Bill is from Massachusetts. He’s probably used to arguing with New Englanders. Not Wyomingites. And Bill feels that the police and legal system are all liberal. Probably because, back home, they are.

See, to Bill, anyone who disagreed with him is a “leftist.” He even admitted as much, saying, [paraphrased] “we win by convincing people that anything we don’t stand for is leftist.” He also talked a lot about how “liberal” was too soft, and only “leftist” would do to show what the enemy really are.

Don’t get me started on the irony of conservatives using French Revolution descriptors…

I tried to explain to Bill that even the most ~liberal~ folks in Wyoming — for the most part — are pretty conservative. Most of the Democrats are “gun toting Democrats,” who would never restrict 2nd amendment rights. Most folks go to church, hate taxes, and believe in strong family values. While the parties try to make us all into exact copies of Texas Reds and New York Blues, we are all just Wyoming Traditionalists at heart.

While Bill is a brilliant parliamentarian, whose model of “confrontational politics” is certainly effective for stifling the opposition, he’s also not from here. He doesn’t know how we work.

And that was on full display in the training when he repeatedly instructed the members of our Freedom Caucus to “disregard” tradition.

“If it’s not a rule, you don’t have to do it.”

But, more than a few members were clearly uneasy with this. And, I’ll actually give Speaker Chip Neiman a huge credit for pushing on this a few times and eventually saying, “you know, Bill, we kind of like traditions here.”

Simple Solution: A Little Wyoming Common Sense

My story above should illustrate some of the issue. Out of state groups have bought a lot of influence with our leaders. It’s not that our leaders are incapable of pushing back. But, those who do aren’t going to stay in office for long.

The out-of-staters will buy new leaders who listen better.

And, when they own enough leaders, our rhetoric goes from working together to better Wyoming, to fighting the leftists, squashing the woke agenda, and eventually suppressing our own speech in a fear of sounding like we might not be “true conservatives.”

So, my solution is simple (and stolen from one of many conversations with smart people). It’s one that almost everyone I’ve ever met agrees with. The only folks who don’t are the wealthy donor class that likes buying politicians.

Here’s a simple rule that would fix things:

“If you don’t live where the election is happening, you can’t spend money on it.”

If that sounds good to you, let me know! Or, if you hate it, let me know that too!

Tweet me @DinoWyo, comment on the form at the bottom of the page, or email us directly at dinowyo@gmail.com.

Personally, I’d like to see some very simple language like this — with no extra additions or misleading wording — on our 2026 statewide ballot. Put the matter to the people, not the bought-and-sold politicians, and see what they think.

If there’s enough support for this sort of thing, I just might start circulating a petition and putting the work in to make this sort of Wyoming Common Sense reform a reality.