Changes proposed — Neiman runs election canvassing boards bill suggested by sheriff

In the wake of an error being discovered in the initial results that were reported for the county’s most recent election, Rep. Chip Neiman, R-Hulett, is introducing a bill in the Wyoming Legislature to require that local parties — not the county clerks — designate the individuals who serve on local election canvassing board.

The bill calls for each major party, which in Weston County are the Democrats and the Republicans, would appoint a person to the local canvassing board, with the intent of adding “another layer of transparency and accountability” to the election process, Neiman said on Nov. 4.

“Those (precinct committeemen and women) are duly elected people that would submit that name and provide somebody,” Neiman said.

Currently, Wyoming law holds that a county canvassing board consists of the county clerk and “two electors of different political parties resident in the county,” whom the county clerk appoints, but the bill would take that power away from the clerk and give it to the political parties in each county.

Neiman said he is bringing the bill after receiving input from Weston County Sheriff Bryan Colvard, who said that he suggested the change to Neiman when the two discussed an issue in the 2024 general election that resulted in Weston County Clerk Becky Hadlock reporting inaccurate results in at least two races, including Neiman’s.

As the NLJ previously reported, the offices of Gov. Mark Gordon and Secretary of State Chuck Gray are conducting separate investigations into Hadlock’s actions, which included utilizing three different ballots for the House District 1 race, in which Neiman was running unopposed.

Upon the request of the Weston County Republican Party Central Committee, several residents wrote a letter to the governor asking for Hadlock to be removed from office, under Wyoming Statute 18-3-902. If the governor decides that it appears that Hadlock is “guilty of misconduct or malfeasance in office,” he can instruct the attorney general to prosecute.

“We’ll see how that all shakes out,” Neiman said. “I’ve tried to kind of stay clear of that and not get too deep in the middle of that, but there’s plenty of eyes on that right now. I know they’ll do the right thing.”

Colvard said he saw the clerk’s responsibility to choose election canvassing board members as “a spot for some corruption.” He hypothesized that a clerk could select a friend to serve on the board, assure the person that “everything’s fine” and the friend would just believe the clerk.

“Not that anything went wrong here, but that’s one of the little spots I saw that it could,” Colvard said.

Neiman said that holding the local parties responsible for selecting election canvassing board members benefits multiple stakeholders.

“It gets (the local parties) in the loop, makes them more accountable and responsible,” he said, noting that clerks could then tell anyone with concerns regarding election certification that the local parties, not the clerk, selected the board members. He hopes the change will provide another layer of security and “some peace of mind” for voters.

Neiman said that he checked with the Secretary of State regarding the proposal, and “he didn’t see a problem at all with that.” According to Neiman, Gray expressed some disbelief that such a change had not been made in election law previously.

Neiman expressed confidence in the bill, and that it would be prepared within a week and ready for the session. He also said he was not going to invest time in trying to find legislators to co-sign the bill because it’s “just a small change.”

“Everybody else will support it,” he predicted. “I’m not going to go spend two weeks trying to get co-signers.”

Weston County Republican County State Committeewoman Ann Slagle said that while she hasn’t read the bill, which hadn’t been posted on the website by the time she spoke with NLJ on Jan. 6, she believes that having local political parties choose the election canvassing board members would be a great idea. It adds “checks and balances” and more transparency, she said, indicating it helps both political parties get more involved, and also benefits the clerk.

“It just adds accountability all around,” she said.

Weston County Republican Party Secretary Stan Jasinski said in a phone interview Jan. 7 that having the canvassing board consist of the county clerk and two people he or she handpicks is “not a very good situation.” He thinks that is especially true when the county clerk is on the ballot to be elected or re-elected, considering the clerk oversees the election.

Jasinski testified at the Wyoming State Canvassing Board’s Nov. 13, 2024, meeting regarding his observations about the process that had unfolded in Weston County. He requested that Gordon and Gray not certify the state election results until at least Weston County had conducted a complete audit of the election.

In his response to Jasinski, Gray seemed to foreshadow Neiman’s bill as he said that one state statute that “we do need to look at” as a measure for “checks and balances” is “the fact that the clerk is a member and then also appointing those two other members and it’s any elector from each of the two parties and that’s what’s supposed to be a check on that county process.” He also noted that the canvasing board had just certified the state’s election.