by Jasmine Taylor | Jun 6, 2024 | Elections
Great Falls voted in the primary election, determining which candidates will go on to the general election in November, and it was a bad day for MAGA Republicans. As official results rolled in, far-right ringleaders started falling like dominoes. For the past two legislative sessions, Republicans have held a strong majority. They’ve used this muscle to attack reproductive rights and raise our property taxes through the roof. Montana is worse for all they have done.
The tides have turned! Despite protests from folks who prefer business as usual, many Democrats crossed over and voted in the Republican primary. The strategy? Eliminate the far-right leaders, and keep them off the ballot in November. Looking at the primary results, it pays to think outside of the box.
Enjoy this list of far-right losers who will not be appearing on the ballot in November.
Rae Grulkowski
Grulkowski was the puppeteer behind the chaos and dysfunction that plagued the elections office last year. She’s been finishing out a partial term as County Commissioner. Lucky for us, Grulkowski WILL NOT BE ON THE BALLOT THIS NOVEMBER.
Lola Sheldon-Galloway
Sheldon-Galloway is a long-time legislator whose bad hats and even worse beliefs have plagued Montana for years. Nobody’s spent more time trying to control your uterus than Lola. Best known for claiming that you can’t get pregnant from rape, Lola hoped to jump from the House to the Senate. However, she had a big loss last night and WILL NOT BE ON THE BALLOT THIS NOVEMBER.
Steven Galloway
Steven served his first term in the House last session, and he used every minute of it to try and make himself richer. He focused on laws targeting renters and benefiting landlords. Slack-jawed Steven rode his wife’s coattails into one win, but this year he pissed off fellow Republican George Nikolakakos. According to local gossip, George then recruited his wife to run, and run she has. While we’ll be working hard to defeat her in November, right now we’re going to celebrate that Steven Galloway WILL NOT BE ON THE BALLOT IN NOVEMBER.
Randy Pinocci
When he’s not trying to fist-fight voters or engaging in (alleged) felony witness tampering, Pinocci is making over $100,000 per year as our Public Service Commissioner. This cycle, Pinocci was on the ticket with Tanner Smith running for Governor, and Pinocci as Lieutenant Governor. Not only did the Smith/Tanner ticket lose big, Pinocci couldn’t even win the election for local precinct person. Love that for him. After two big losses, Pinocci WILL NOT BE ON THE BALLOT IN NOVEMBER.
Sandra Merchant
It’s a really bad time to be Sandra Merchant. Late last year, the County Commision voted to remove all election duties from Merchant (the current Clerk and Recorder) due to her gross incompetence. Now, Merchant will be without her bodyguard, Grulkowski. In an embarrassing turn of events, Merchant was also unable to win her election for local precinct person. Admittedly, precinct races don’t have much weight, but it’s mighty fun to watch this particular fall. Let’s hope that with Grulkowski on her way out, Merchant will finally find the sense to resign.
Now what?
Looking ahead to November, it’s clear that Democrats have a lot of work to do. The worst Republicans have been ousted, but we don’t want to elect the ones remaining either. Despite the tantrums of Republicans bemoaning the crossover votes, what we’ve seen is that Democrats are finally ready to fight back. Now let’s go kick some ass.
by Ken Toole | May 3, 2024 | Elections
It seems like all of the old rules went out the window with the election of Donald Trump in 2016. With the resources and energy of far-right groups like the Freedom Caucus, Moms for Liberty, American for Prosperity and others, the right flank of the Republican Party has taken over most of state and local government.
Here in Cascade County there is a long standing feud between far-right Republicans, known as the Freedom Caucus, led by legislators like Steven Galloway and Lola Sheldon-Galloway, and more traditional pro-corporate Republicans like Ed Buttrey and Steve Fitzpatrick. This election almost all legislative seats have contested Republican primaries pitting these two factions against each other. In addition, there is a hotly contested County Commission primary race between far-right incumbent Rae Grulkowski and local businessman Eric Hinebauch.
At the same time there is only one contested Democratic primary, the race for the Eastern Congressional District. The unfortunate fact is, no matter which Democratic candidate wins the primary, he will have virtually no chance of winning the seat in the general election. In short, there is not much reason to vote in the Democratic Primary here in Cascade County.
That brings us to the talk around town urging Democrats in Cascade County to vote in the Republican primary for the more reasonable of those candidates. Some folks are arguing that a few votes could make the difference between more nuts and more reasonable people in public office. They may be right, and the fact is that there is really nothing to lose given the lack of contested Democratic primaries here. Advocates of Democrats voting in the Republican primary, which is perfectly legal, say, “desperate times call for desperate measures|.”
The following is a list of the contested primaries and who are the more far-right candidates.
Cascade County Commission
Rea Grulkowski- Far Right
Eric Hinebauch
Senate District 13
Lola Sheldon-Galloway- Far Right
Josh Kassmier
House District 19
Hannah Trebas- Far Right
Darren Auger
House District 20
Steven Galloway- Far Right
Melisssa Nikolakkas
House District 21
Josh Osterman- Far Right
Ed Buttrey
House District 22
James Whitaker- Far Right
George Nikolakkas
House District 23
John Proud- Far Right
Pete Anderson- Far Right
Josh Denully
Eric Tillerman
by Jasmine Taylor | Apr 15, 2024 | Energy/Utilities
We’ve talked about Randy Pinocci a lot on this blog. If you aren’t familiar, suffice it to say he’s Northwestern Energy’s bestest pal, and he really loves raising your utility bills. His greatest hits include napping during public meetings, acting like a slumlord, and most recently committing crimes via text message.
Montana Republicans get arrested a lot. So don’t be embarrassed if you need a refresher on Pinocci’s wrap sheet. Pinnoci initially had a dispute with a tenant, and he received disorderly conduct charges. Pinocci failed to appear in court, ultimately resulting in Pinocci being arrested at Home Depot due to an active warrant.
In another keen display of believing he’s above the law, Pinocci then tried to compel a witness (who also appears to have been his tenant) to change their statements to police. Pinocci allegedly refused to refund the witnesses deposit, and even stated in writing that “you’re going to have to recant your testimony with the sheriff’s department.” He got two felony counts of witness tampering for that one, but maybe Pinocci’s onto something here. He can seemingly intimidate witnesses in writing, and the county will drop all but the smallest charges. Despite what appears to be literal written evidence of witness tampering, somehow the county was compelled to “take another look” at the case. Pinocci has to pay a mere $200, and he gets a six-month deferred prosecution agreement. As long as he behaves for six months, then the two felony charges will go away. Maybe being a Public Service Commissioner does come with perks?
Read the full story and see the court documents here: https://dailymontanan.com/2024/04/12/randy-pinocci-pleads-no-contest-to-misdemeanor-felonies-dropped/
by Ken Toole | Apr 6, 2024 | Elections
Libertarians have been making a bit of a splash here in Cascade County. While Libertarians rarely get elected to public office, their presence in political races often detracts from serious public discourse thanks to their rather odd positions on many issues and philosophical view of extremely limited government.
The Pseudointellectual, Tony Rosales
The Chair of the local Libertarian Party, Tony Rosales, is running for a “non-partisan” position on the school board. Rosales attracted attention by accusing a school district employee of having a conflict of interest, because the person served on the board of a local non-profit. See our post on Rosales’ spurious allegations, and his own conflict of interest as a volunteer on the school debate team. https://wtf406.com/2024/04/school-board-candidate-attacks-gfps-employee-in-tik-tok-video/.
Rosales is running an aggressive social media campaign consisting of technical looking columns of numbers to make the case that the school board is somehow violating the public trust. Not surprising since he shoves his PHD in chemistry in everything he possibly can. Problem is, a PHD in chemistry doesn’t mean he knows anything about school budgeting, finance or administration.
The Conspiracy Theorist, Randy Pinocci
Randy Pinocci has signed on as the Lieutenant Governor with Tanner Smith of Kalispell at the head of the ticket. Pinocci has been active in the local Republican Party, getting elected to the state legislature and the Public Service Commission. From those positions Pinocci has established himself as one of the most far right and intemperate people in public office. Pinocci has a long history of attracting public attention with his conspiracy theories and promoting far-right events like the Red Pill Festival, an annual gathering of far-right activists. Most recently Pinocci was arrested for felony witness tampering related to a dispute he had with a tenant. He is currently scheduled to go to trial on those charges on April 30th here in Great Falls. The county is bringing in Judge Jim Manley from Polson to hear the case. As an aside, the facts of the case are well established since Pinocci threatened the witness via text message. We can only hope the County Attorney doesn’t plead this one down because Pinocci is a local elected official.
All the King’s Men (And One Woman)
If you looked at the candidate filings with the Secretary of State’s office the morning after the filing deadline, it looked like the Cascade County Libertarians were on the move. But on closer inspection it seems to be a lot of smoke and mirrors, all arranged by Tony Rosales. In addition to Tony Rosales and Randy Pinocci, four Libertarians filed for local legislative seats. These included House Dist 21- Joshua Rosales, House District 23- Kevin Leatherbarrow, House District 24- Annie Leatherbarrow and House District 25- Lui Salina. In addition, Tony Rosales also filed to run in House District 24, but the Commissioner’s office now shows his legislative campaign as “closed”.
If you look today you will see that all but Kevin Leatherbarrow have been removed from the ballot. They were removed for failing to file the proper paperwork with the Commissioner of Political Practices The Commissioner’s office informed WTF406 that numerous attempts are made to make sure all candidates know about the filing requirements. It may not be surprising that Libertarian candidates wouldn’t follow the rules since they don’t believe most rules should exist.
The campaign treasurer for all of the Cascade County Libertarian candidates is Tony Rosales. It is highly unusual for numerous candidates to have the same treasurer. Though there is nothing wrong with filing for office then withdrawing, it makes one wonder what is going on to cause such a change of heart. Combined with Tony Rosales’ aggressive, unfounded attacks on Great Falls Public Schools, we are getting a glimpse at how he would perform in public office. . . .poorly.
Correction- Our original post misidentified the Tanner/Pinnocci ticket as Libertarian. In fact it is Republican. We have made the correction and we apologize for the error.
by Ken Toole | Mar 15, 2024 | Elections
Let’s start with a little definition of terms used in this Post.
Far-Right Republicans– Republicans who advocate ideas and policies which are coming from extreme groups like the Freedom Caucus and local Pachyderm Club. They are driven by conspiracy theories including rhetoric about the “Deep State” and stolen elections. The Galloways, Public Service Commissioner Randy Pinocci, Sheriff Jesse Slaughter and County Commissioner Rae Grulkowski are in this group. Also known as Tin Foil Hat Republicans
Corporate Republicans– Republicans who generally fit into the more traditional frame of Republicanism. They promote privatization of public services and institutions, deregulation of industry, and cutting taxes. Fitzpatrick, McKamey, Buttrey, Nikolakos, Commissioners Briggs and Larson, Republican Central Committee Chair Eric Hinebauch are in this group. Also known as Corporate Lapdog Republicans.
If you follow local politics in Cascade County, you are probably aware of the feuds within the local Republican Party. We’re not going to go into in much detail here, but we provide this quote from Matthew Monforton, Republican activist, former legislator, and attorney who was representing the Far-Right Republicans here in a lawsuit over control of the Republican Central Committee in 2019. “What it comes down to is, there’s a group of fake Republicans in Cascade County that are really Democrats, but they know they can’t get elected to office as Democrats. Their goals are vastly different than those of the Republican Party.”
https://www.greatfallstribune.com/story/news/2019/02/05/tensions-gop-threaten-boil-over-county-committee-fights-steve-fitzpatrick-sheridan-buck-monforton/2782214002/
A quick look at the filing for this election cycle indicates that the feud is still going. There is a contested Republican primary in every legislative district except one. Equally telling, only one current legislator and Corporate Republican, Steve Fitzpatrick, does not face a primary challenger. Also interesting that four Libertarians have filed.
To our readers who are gleefully rubbing their hands together over the discord within the Republican ranks, we have to say, “not so fast.” The truth is that contested primaries make for stronger candidates in the general election cycle. They have already been raising money, meeting voters, buying materials and garnering media attention, and they bring those assets with them to the general election.
So, we leave you with a little unverified gossip. Word is that Far-Right Republican legislator Steven Galloway recruited James Whitaker to challenge incumbent George Nikolakos in House District 22. Nikolakos was so angry that he got his wife to file against Steven Galloway at the last minute. We don’t know if this is the real story, but we do know that Melissa Nikolakos filed against Galloway on the last day to file at 3:38 p.m. Hmmm.
HD 19
Jane Weber- D
Hannah Trebas – R
Darren Auger- R
HD 20
Rina Moore – D
Steven Galloway-R
Melissa Nikolakos-R
HD 21
Lela Graham-D
ED Buttrey-R
James Osterman-R
Joshua Rosles-L
HD 22
Ronald Paulick- D
George Nikolakos-R
James Whitaker- R
HD 23
Sandor Hopkins-D
Pete Anderson- R
John Proud-R
Josh Denully- R
Kevin Leatherbarrow- L
HD 24
Steve Fitpatrick- R
Annie Leatherbarrow- L
HD 25
James Rickley- D
Darren Auger- R
Steve Gist- R
Loui Salinas- L
SD 13
Lola Galloway-R
Joshua Cashmier- R
