The Wyoming Republican Party is a big RINO

The Wyoming Republican Party platform contradicts what traditional Republicans stand for. I say this as a registered Wyoming Republican voter. 

The platform has 23 “timeless truths that will always inform and direct our party and our country…” Meanwhile, unlimited guns threaten life, its anti-abortion fixation drives the government to enforce specific religious interpretations and many of these “timeless” principles emerged in the last century.

The first and highest principle listed, Life (No. 1 in the platform), declares the government’s “only purpose” is protecting individual rights. But then the platform immediately begins a series of demands for government control and violations of those same rights.

Real Republicans believe in limited government, defend individual liberty and respect religious freedom. Yet Wyoming’s GOP thinks it knows better than everyone and forces one narrow interpretation of Christianity. They want you and your doctor to follow their interpretation of their religion.

Many Christians, Jews and others differ on when a fetus becomes its own life. (See Genesis 2:7, Job 33:4, etc.). Ancient religious law treated miscarriage as property damage, not murder (Exodus 21:22). But Wyoming’s GOP encodes a specific Christian view. Their theology “trumps” everyone’s law. Consider: Even 60% of Catholics believe abortion should be legal in most cases.

Real Republicans defend property rights. The government can’t touch your land, business or money without due process. But according to the Wyoming GOP, you don’t own your own body. That’s government property now. A rancher’s cattle have more bodily autonomy than Wyoming women under this “Republican” platform.

Here’s the kicker: After claiming their highest value is life, they abandon every policy that helps children survive and thrive — health care, education, childcare, nutrition programs. They chain women to pregnancy and then abandon the children. The contradictions multiply from there.

The second platform principle, Equality, is then violated through many of the rest of the principles. The largest political party in the Equality State, right after declaring equality for all under the law as a principle, goes about carving out special treatment for gun owners, Christians and businesses.

Consider principle No. 3: Second Amendment. First, the GOP platform omits the first half of the actual amendment’s wording, “a well regulated militia,” and then declares there will be no restrictions on arms or ammunition. This undermines their first principle, Life, by exposing schools, churches and public forums to needless gun violence. How can our militia be “well regulated” when driving a car has more restrictions and training requirements than the Wyoming Republicans’ Second Amendment interpretation? No insurance, licensing or background checks required, or even able to be considered.

Equality again is denied in the platform’s sixth plank: Religious Freedom, which gives privilege to Judeo-Christian viewpoints. Thomas Jefferson, who coined the phrase “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” in the Declaration of Independence, was also the author of the foundational idea of separation of church and state. The First Amendment says “no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Instead, the platform elevates Christian beliefs and pushes specific versions of those beliefs on women and others. Women may have first gained the right to vote in Wyoming, but the Republican party platform denies them religious equality now.

Another notable example, Right to Work (plank No. 20) effectively discriminates against workers attempting to engage in collective action while ignoring that employers engage in what amounts to collective action through PACs, lobbyists and other means on a regular basis. Their wealth advantage, unbound from living paycheck-to-paycheck, enables them to generate governmental and business pressures on employees that need unions or similar structures to achieve equal consideration.

The history of these so-called “timeless truths” is mind-boggling. Gun control was considered common sense by the NRA and most Americans until the 1970s. Now, school violence is a multibillion dollar industry. 

Then there are the changes over time in the beliefs on unborn children. In 1968, Christianity Today issued the following statement regarding abortion: “Whether the performance of an induced abortion is sinful we are not agreed, but about the necessity of it and permissibility for it under certain circumstances we are in accord.” It wasn’t until the 1980s that abortion became the wedge issue that it is today.

Right to Work laws originated in the 1940s as a strategy to weaken labor unions and was encoded in the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947. Timeless? Not even close. Michigan repealed right-to-work in 2023, showing that it is not a settled question. Judeo-Christian principles? Christians, including Martin Luther King Jr., have decried right-to-work as “a law to rob us of our civil rights and job rights.”

Limited government — except when controlling women. Individual liberty — except for medical decisions. Religious freedom — except for other religions. Constitutional government — except when the Constitution is inconvenient.

Ask yourself who benefits from these principles, and who they harm. A platform with these biases removed would be attractive and defendable by all Wyoming Republicans, not just the most extreme activists.