Another year, another missed opportunity to make Wyoming better
Every year, we hope to be encouraged by the work of Wyoming’s citizen lawmakers. Often, we end up disappointed.
Unfortunately, 2025 was no exception.
We still believe that most elected officials enter the Capitol with the intention of serving all Wyoming residents. However, once the session gets underway, the pressures of the process set in. Positions harden, compromise becomes elusive, and progress on key issues stalls.
The result this year: No supplemental budget, broad property tax cuts that raise concerns about potential impacts on public services, and yet another year without meaningful action on pressing issues like affordable housing. This session, even more than in previous years, was defined by sharp ideological divides.
Based on our pre-session scorecard, here are our final grades for the 68th Wyoming Legislature’s general session:
Supplemental budget
Score: 0 (out of 20)
Key measures of success: Fund programs to help average Wyoming residents; balance short-term and long-term savings with wise expenditures; avoid cutting essential programs for the most vulnerable Wyoming residents.
Reasons: We considered granting a few points for the fact lawmakers approved the full $66.3 million external cost adjustment for K-12 education (but only after a Laramie County district court judge issued a 186-page decision siding with plaintiffs who argued the state wasn’t adequately funding schools), more than $22 million to replenish money used to fight last year’s historic wildfires, and millions more for the property tax refund program, special education funding, K-12 capital construction projects and a new state shooting complex through multiple bills.
But the bottom line is that, for the first time in recent memory, the Legislature failed to pass an adjustment to the biennium budget. (No budget, no points.)
Senators like Tara Nethercott, R-Cheyenne, will tell you that’s no big deal, since the 2025-26 biennium budget passed in 2024 was adequate to cover the bulk of the state’s bills. That may be true, but the supplemental budget serves an important purpose: it allows state agencies, the governor and legislators to make adjustments in the second year to cover needs that weren’t anticipated in the first.
Regardless of which side dug in its heels the hardest, both chambers are responsible for the fact that no supplemental budget was approved this year. And legislative leaders and longtime members know it’s improper and often unconstitutional in Wyoming to add spending to unrelated legislation.
Even though some emergency expenses were funded, others were not, and lawmakers are to blame.
Property tax relief
Score: 2 (out of 20)
Key measures of success: State lawmakers should resist the urge to pass more property tax relief measures, since they haven’t given the ones passed in 2024 time to prove if they are sufficient. If they do pass more, they must ensure that measures are taken to backfill lost revenue to keep local governments whole and ensure K-12 education funding is adequate.
Reasons: We said before the session that it made no sense to approve more property tax cuts before allowing those approved last year to go into effect and evaluating whether they sufficiently addressed the pain felt by those at the lowest income levels.
Yet the majority of lawmakers came to the Capitol determined to pass additional cuts this session, regardless of which local government services were impacted. Although they amended Senate File 69 at one point to provide a 50% cut to taxable assessments up to $1 million on residential property, legislators ultimately passed a 25% cut.
Gov. Mark Gordon signed the legislation, saying that unlike the bill he vetoed last year, this one “provides tax relief without transferring the burden to our core energy industry.” But he acknowledged that it could have repercussions, writing, “Now the practical impacts of this legislation will need to be navigated by our cities, counties, special districts and citizens.”
We have several concerns about the passage of SF 69, the largest being how the resulting loss of revenue could impact critical local services like rural fire districts. Sure, some local government entities have enough reserves to weather the cuts, at least for the time being. We encourage them to avoid cutting essential services and instead postpone “it would be nice to …” projects.
In the interim, lawmakers need to study whether this measure — which contains no sunset date — is good for the state or should be repealed.
Election security/integrity
Score: 10 (out of 10)
Key measures of success: Pass bills that further enhance election security and boost voter confidence in the system. Reject bills that unnecessarily limit the ability of Wyoming residents to participate in their democracy.
Reasons: Overall, lawmakers avoided passing nearly all of the bills that would have been harmful to Wyoming’s election system, and most of the ones they did pass are designed to make the system even more trustworthy than it already is.
Among the bills that died: banning ballot drop boxes, requiring hand counting of ballots for recounts, banning electronic voting machines, setting a voter threshold requirement for bond elections and creating a runoff election process in the governor’s race.
Those that passed included a prohibition on using private funds to conduct elections, requiring proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote, a 30-day residency requirement to vote in Wyoming elections, and banning “ballot harvesting,” with an exception for senior center staff to deliver residents’ ballots to the local elections office. As of this writing, Gov. Gordon hasn’t decided what to do with a bill that would prohibit everyone in the state from using ranked-choice voting (we hope he vetoes it, since it infringes on local control).
We sincerely hope this session has satisfied state leaders, who will avoid wasting more time pushing for additional changes.
Addressing key local needs
Score: 7 (out of 20)
Key measures of success: Lawmakers should focus their attention on legislation that will help address key local needs, such as affordable housing and public safety.
Reasons: The biggest reason this score isn’t higher is the failure of every piece of legislation that would have addressed the need for affordable housing in most Wyoming communities, including Cheyenne. This included bills developed over the interim to change the requirements for petitioning against a proposed development and expanding tax increment financing to allow it to be used for affordable housing projects that aren’t in blighted areas.
We gave seven points for the passage of pro-business bills, as well as bills related to protection orders, the treatment of animals, and reading assessment and intervention, among others.
Members of this board come down on both sides of the benefits or potential harm of bills that regulate the use of bathrooms based on gender at birth, universal school vouchers of up to $7,000 and requiring an ultrasound before chemical abortions. But our consensus is that lawmakers should do a better job of focusing on the urgent needs of Wyoming residents.
Hot-button topics
Score: 5 (out of 10)
Key measures of success: Attend to issues that will have the most impact in Wyoming, but avoid passing bills simply for the sake of scoring political points.
Reasons: Earlier this week, during an online meeting with media throughout the state, Gov. Gordon said he was saddened by how much national agendas seemed to override the necessary work of the Legislature.
While acknowledging that some national issues are important to Wyoming residents, he said “there was a certain amount of absolutism that I think maybe got in the way of the best outcomes for Wyoming people.”
Most of us agree, which is why we gave legislators half-credit in this category. Some lawmakers are simply parroting the talking points given to them by national organizations, rather than explaining why these issues are important for Equality State residents. This applies both in public committee meetings and on the chamber floors, as well as the fact that many lawmakers aren’t bothering to respond to constituent emails about many of these topics.
We also are concerned about the lack of balance between protecting individual rights and upholding community values. Now that so many of this year’s legislators have a year of experience under their belt, we hope they will do better going forward.
Cooperation/diplomacy
Score: 15 (out of 20)
Key measures of success: Elected officials work together in the best interest of Wyoming residents, remain respectful of one another and show the same respect to their constituents, even when they disagree.
Reasons: Considering the aforementioned 2024 election season animosity, we were pleasantly surprised lawmakers remained civil toward one another — at least for the most part.
Other than a dust-up between two lawmakers early in the session that resulted in an apology during a floor session and a social media disagreement between two other legislators, the session included some good cooperation and diplomacy.
We were tempted to knock off points due to the lack of agreement on a supplemental budget, but compared to some prior years, this group did pretty well.
Final grade: 39 out of a possible 100 points, which is clearly an F.
Overall, most of us couldn’t help but come away from this year’s legislative session with a feeling of disappointment. Important issues weren’t addressed, time was wasted on national agendas, and some lawmakers simply refused to participate at times — whether as a member of a committee they didn’t want to be assigned to or by declining to vote on a bill because they hadn’t taken time to understand the issue.
Heading into this year’s interim period leading to the 2026 budget session, we hope to see better informed, more engaged representatives and senators doing what’s best for Wyoming. If they do, next year’s grade will almost certainly be better.