Wyoming can still deny Trump his cronies in Congress

My fellow Wyomingites, you’ve seen President Donald Trump try to buy your votes for $5,000, pledge to cheat to win in the midterms, and fortunately lose a battle in the U.S. Supreme Court to take away the votes of millions of Americans by banning mail-in ballots.

Are you finally ready to stand together and do something about it?

Because Trump has already told us he’s not about to stop if the Nov. 3 election doesn’t go his way. If you don’t believe me, read what he wrote on Truth Social a year ago about the potential loss of Republican control in both chambers of Congress in 2026: 

“[The states] must do what the Federal Government, as represented by the President of the United States, tells them, FOR THE GOOD OF THE COUNTRY, to do.”

And why is this imperative? Because as Trump warned House Republicans in February: “You got to win the midterms, because if we don’t win the midterms, it’s just going to be, I mean they’ll find a reason to impeach me. I’ll get impeached.” 

Last week, the president sunk to new lows at a GOP midterm convention in Dallas and showed how desperate he is. Trump promised to give $5,000 to every American adult if Republicans maintain control of both the House and Senate. He called it the “Trump dividend.”

Some news organizations called it a joke and tried to claim Trump wasn’t serious, or that it technically wasn’t a bribe. Some legal scholars said it was just a campaign promise, not a violation of bribery statutes.

It’s a blatant bribe. He knows it, and we do too. We also both know that Trump doesn’t have the authority to order it on his own, and that he’d never pay up if it happened. That’s the only “joke,” and we’re all in on it.

The only question is if we care enough to end this madness. 

Norm Eisen, an ethics advisor to former President Barack Obama, stated the obvious to USA Today: Trump tied a specific payout to a specific voting action.

He called it a “cynical, desperate stunt to financially incentivize Republicans, independent voters and even traditional Democrats who may be facing financial hardship to vote for Republicans in the midterm.”

The vice chair of the Wyoming Republican Party, Bob Ferguson, told Cowboy State Daily that characterizing what Trump said as a bribe is “an outright lie.”

“The point people are missing is, if Republicans don’t win, then Democrats aren’t going to approve that dividend,” Ferguson said. 

But if that’s the case, Trump and his Republican allies in Congress could simply make the dividend a reality now. Why make it contingent on the GOP winning both chambers and doing it next year?

Campbell County Commissioner Scott Clem, a Republican and former state legislator, told the news outlet that Trump essentially offered a bribe. “I think that he knows that’s probably not going to happen, as far as retaining the House and the Senate,” Clem said. “So maybe it’s just an empty promise. Trump is Trump, but I do think it was not a very good thing to say.” 

When a progressive like myself and a conservative like Clem start agreeing, the times really are a-changing in Wyoming.

As the keynote speaker at the Republican midterm convention, Trump led a pledge to “the greatest president in the history of the United States” — himself, of course — and told his supporters to go out with family and friends to vote.

“I don’t care if I’m registered to vote or not, I’m going to try to cheat like hell like [Democrats] do,” Trump said, with his right arm raised. “So help me God.”

Vice President J.D. Vance explained that the “Trump dividend” would be paid for with money from the president’s higher tariffs. But in the current fiscal year, tariffs have only added an estimated $167 billion to U.S. revenue, while the Congressional Budget Office estimated giving every American adult $5,000 next year would cost $1.2 trillion and increase inflation.

Let that last number sink in. The national debt eclipsed $40 trillion last month, and under Trump it has increased by more than any other U.S. president: $7.8 trillion during his first term and $3.6 trillion so far in his second. And now he wants to potentially bring his total share to $12.6 trillion with the Trump bribe.

For decades, Wyoming’s all-GOP congressional delegation has claimed that Democrats caused the explosion in the national debt and demanded reduced spending. But those same politicians voted to wildly increase the national debt whenever Republicans gained White House control.

Wyoming voters know that U.S. Rep. Harriet Hageman and Secretary of State Chuck Gray — respectively the Republican nominees for the state’s U.S. Senate and U.S. House seats this year — will do anything Trump tells them to do.

Hageman and Gray have arrogantly refused to participate in Wyoming PBS debates with their opponents, taking away the opportunity for voters to compare candidates side by side. There will still be a U.S. House debate, sans Gray, but since Hageman has only one challenger, Democrat James Byrd, the U.S. Senate debate has been canceled.

Hageman and Gray said they will both take their campaigns directly to the voters.

But what if voters take their disdain for the pair’s all-encompassing loyalty to Trump and decide to make a statement of their own, denying the president his cronies in the state that is most expected to back him?

Few thought last month’s Wyoming Republican primary would result in the far-right Freedom Caucus being kicked out of power only two years after it took House control. It happened because more traditional Republicans looked at the debacle the Freedom Caucus made of its chance to govern and sent most of its members packing.

Just because Hageman and Gray have an “R” behind their names on the ballot doesn’t mean Republicans have to automatically put them in office — especially if the leader of their party openly bribes voters and announces his plan to “cheat like hell” to win.

Gray handed over sensitive Wyoming voter data to Trump and did not object when the president said it might be necessary to federalize elections. Are only Democratic voters upset about this?

Republicans in Wyoming are just as negatively impacted by Trump’s misguided war against Iran and rising gas, grocery and healthcare costs as the rest of the state. Why is it assumed that everyone will bow down to him, like our delegation does?

What’s even more concerning than Trump’s statements is his effort to do anything he can to keep more people from voting, like his lawsuit to ban states from mailing out ballots after many have already been delivered.

With its 7-2 decision Monday against Trump, the U.S. Supreme Court — even the three members he appointed — voted to preserve democracy under the U.S. Constitution and let the states run elections, not the federal government.

There’s serious concern that Trump will not allow the U.S. House to certify election results unless Republicans stay in power. U.S. Rep. Mike Johnson, R-Louisiana, is the most gutless House speaker in history, and given what Trump tried during the certification process and siege of the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, we should be more afraid today.

If Wyomingites have the courage and wisdom to rid our Capitol of most of the Freedom Caucus, anything could happen in our congressional elections. I may be a dreamer, but I hope I’m not the only one.