Citing court losses, Freedom Caucus turns attention to Wyoming judges

FROM WYOFILE:

As legal rulings block the Legislature’s ban on abortion and allow lawsuits against Freedom Caucus initiatives to proceed, the caucus has called for reforming the courts.

Like President Donald Trump’s efforts to detain immigrants in an El Salvadoran prison and slash the federal government through executive orders, the Wyoming Freedom Caucus’s agenda has hit roadblocks in the courts.

And like the president, the caucus is targeting the court system in response.

Trump has responded to adverse rulings by calling for federal judges to be impeached. His allies in Congress — including Wyoming’s delegation — then introduced bills to curtail the judicial branch’s power.

Following suit, the Wyoming Freedom Caucus is taking aim at Wyoming’s appointment process for state court judges. In a pair of recent blog posts, the caucus argued that recent court decisions it disagrees with are the result of a biased system, dominated by “insiders” with a political agenda.

“For far too long, the judicial branch has been seen as untouchable, outside the realm of criticism,” an April 30 post to the group’s substack read. The posts are not signed by a particular author.

“As our founders knew well, all human institutions are capable of corruption,” the post continued. “It’s time for judicial reform in Wyoming in a way that gives the people a stake in our bench.”

The Freedom Caucus opened its offensive on the judiciary at a time when Wyoming’s courts are weighing momentous cases — with perhaps the most politically significant one being abortion access. The caucus’s call to reform the courts comes as the state waits for a Wyoming Supreme Court ruling on the constitutionality of abortion bans the Legislature passed in 2023.

A Teton County judge last year ruled the ban conflicted with a provision of the Wyoming Constitution and halted its implementation. And last month, a Natrona County judge suspended two new laws passed by the Legislature in 2025 — one that sought to require women get ultrasounds before taking abortion pills and another that placed new regulations on Wyoming’s only abortion clinic that opponents said would force the facility’s closure.

The Freedom Caucus cited those abortion rulings, as well as others that haven’t gone in their favor in both state and federal courts, as evidence the judicial system has become somehow corrupted.

“A lack of public buy-in to the judicial selection process has left Wyomingites feeling confused, upset, and blindsided by the decisions reached by many on the bench,” the caucus wrote.

Critics say the group is trying to remove checks on its political and ideological agenda.

“This boils down to them not appreciating the Wyoming Constitution, and at times, the U.S. Constitution,” Rep. Karlee Provenza, D-Laramie, said. “If you don’t appreciate what the Constitution says and how it’s interpreted, then your goal becomes to change the court.”

Sweetwater County Republican lawmaker Cody Wylie also questioned the Freedom Caucus’s increasing invocation of “liberal courts” at the state level.

“Maybe — just maybe — the problem is the bills themselves,” he wrote in a letter to the editor published by various Wyoming news outlets. “When legislation is unconstitutional or doesn’t fit within Wyoming law, it doesn’t stand. The solution: Do the work. Make sure the bill fits Wyoming laws.”

Exactly what judicial reform the group might pursue remains up in the air. Last legislative session, the Freedom Caucus members who lead the Wyoming House held back a bill that would have placed a constitutional amendment on the ballot to make judges elected officials — a dramatic measure that would mark a sea change for Wyoming’s court system and politics.

Elections and appointments

The Freedom Caucus does not appear aligned behind the idea of elections for judges, though two leaders of the group told WyoFile they were open to whatever the legislative process brings about. Both House Appropriations Chairman John Bear, R-Gillette, and Rep. Rachel Rodriguez-Williams, R-Cody, the current Wyoming Freedom Caucus chairwoman, support the state adopting the federal government’s model — where the president is largely free to pick the judges he wants, provided the U.S. Senate ratifies them.

Presidents tend to pick federal judges who align with their political party. Trump appointed three U.S. Supreme Court justices in his first term — with Republicans in control of the Senate — and significantly altered the composition of the nation’s highest court.

Wyoming operates under what is commonly called the Missouri Plan, where a commission reviews applicants and sends a limited set of choices to the governor for a final pick. The Missouri Plan’s advocates say appointment commissions take partisan politics out of judicial selections and ground the decisions in legal expertise and temperament.

In Wyoming, the Judicial Nominating Commission is composed of six people. Three lawyers are elected by members of the Wyoming State Bar, and three non-lawyers are appointed by the governor. The seventh member, who serves as chairperson and tie breaker, is the chief justice of the Wyoming Supreme Court — a post now held by Kate Fox.

But the Freedom Caucus claims both the Wyoming Bar Association and commission are “a victim of left-wing institutional capture,” as the caucus wrote in its blog posts.

Two members of the commission, one a lawyer and one not, told WyoFile they were surprised by the Freedom Caucus’s allegations. “Our process is apolitical, merit-based and it digs deep on candidates,” Sheridan attorney Clint Langer said.

Describing himself as having “serious Republican roots,” Langer disputed the Freedom Caucus’s depiction of the commission as a left-wing political apparatus.

“You would have to get lawyers and citizens appointed by a Republican Governor all agreeing to infuse left-leaning politics into the system,” he said. He does not know the political affiliation of his fellow commission members, he said. Nor does Richard Fagnant, a longtime Lander accountant who is one of the non-lawyer members of the commission.

Fagnant, who was appointed by Republican Gov. Mark Gordon, told WyoFile he is semi-retired and spends large chunks of his time reviewing judicial candidates — about two hours per applicant, he said.

On Monday, the commission met to consider an open seat in Goshen County. Fagnant said there were 12 applicants, and the board would interview perhaps five or six candidates before sending three choices to the governor.

Fagnant feared the Freedom Caucus would politicize the judicial nominating process in exactly the way members say they’re seeking to stop — particularly if lawmakers pursue judicial elections. Campaign war chests and the political red meat issue of the day would sway elections, he said.

“You’re looking at who has the biggest bankroll, who is the best baby kisser, and who is going to stand out in the public eye based on issues that may not be related to judicial temperament,” he said.

Bear said he too had questions about judicial elections. But if the governor had wider latitude to make choices, then voters could hold the chief executive accountable when judges start to drift from the will of the people.

“There’s just no real reason to restrict the executive, whether it’s this executive or a future executive who might be more conservative,” Bear said.

Those skeptical of the caucus’s interest in judicial reform are “the very same elites and bar officials who have long enjoyed unchecked control over judicial selection in Wyoming,” Rodriguez-Williams wrote to WyoFile in an email. “They’re not defending the people’s right to fair courts—they’re defending their own influence.”

Despite the Wyoming Freedom Caucus’s statements that trust in the state’s judiciary is at a low, more residents approve of how the state’s judges handle their jobs than disapprove, according to the Wyoming Survey and Analysis Center. In polling conducted last September and October, only 13% of respondents told the center they disapproved of how judges handle their jobs, while more than 40% of respondents said they approved.

Meanwhile, national polls conducted after the first 100 days of Trump’s second term suggest that people want to see the different branches of government check each other, and indicate a majority of voters oppose the president ignoring court orders.

Bias or lawmaking?

To support the caucus’s allegations that the state’s legal institutions are permeated by left-wing politics, Rodriguez-Williams pointed to recent selections by the judicial nominating commission for the state supreme court. In recent cycles the commission has put forward former Republican lawmaker Tim Stubson and former state bar president Anna Reeves Olson as candidates for recent seats.

Stubson has remained politically active since leaving office, and has opposed the Freedom Caucus’s rise in past election cycles. Gordon did not select him for the open state supreme court seat. Reeves-Olson was among 41 attorneys who signed a letter in 2022 criticizing U.S. Rep. Harriet Hageman for promoting the false idea that the 2020 election was rigged against Trump. The lawyers who signed the letter said Hageman was violating her obligation to uphold respect for the law by continuing to claim the election was stolen after a number of federal judges found no evidence of tampering.

Rodriguez-Williams wrote that Reeves Olson had denounced Hageman “simply for expressing conservative political views that diverged from the Bar establishment.”

The state bar chose not to open a disciplinary investigation into Hageman, though an attorney filed a report against her, WyoFile previously reported.

If Reeves Olson fell afoul of the state’s right-wing conservatives in that instance, the Freedom Caucus’s blog post itself shows that the judges and lawyers can cut both ways.

In its posts, the caucus listed three active lawsuits in which it argues Wyoming courts are letting “free speech [come] under attack.” One example is a defamation lawsuit against a Freedom Caucus political action committee for mailers sent during the last election. Another is the lawsuit a former Campbell County librarian brought against people she says ousted her from her job for refusing to remove certain library books. One of the defendants in that case is Bear’s wife, Sage Bear.

And the third case is a lawsuit Artemis Langford, a transgender University of Wyoming student, brought against two conservative lawyers who sought to have her removed from her sorority.

After a federal judge dismissed the case seeking to toss her from the sorority, Langford sued the lawyers who brought it, claiming wrongdoing and judicial persecution.

The conservative attorneys are represented in court by Reeves Olson.

Reeves Olson did not respond to a WyoFile request for comment Monday.

WyoFile is an independent nonprofit news organization focused on Wyoming people, places and policy.

This story was posted on May 12, 2025.