Free Republic

How many does this make now? Somewhere in the range of 130? It’s easy to lose track, given how many Democrats have tossed their hats in the ring, but now they have even more company. Montana Governor Steve Bullock jumped into the race today. His main claim to fame seems to be electability because he was able to win in a fairly red state as a Democrat. (NBC News) If Democrats care as much about electability in 2020 as they tell pollsters they do, then Steve Bullock has a case to make, even with 21 other candidates in the race.The...

Touting his ability to pass a progressive agenda in a conservative state, Democratic Gov. Steve Bullock of Montana announced his candidacy for president on Tuesday. Bullock, who won re-election to a second term in 2016 at the same time as PresidentTrump carried Montana by 20 percentage points, highlighted in a video launching his White House campaign that “I don’t have the luxury of just talking to people who agree with me.” “I go all across our state’s 147,000 square miles and look for common ground to get things done,” Bullock emphasized. “That’s how I was able to bring Democrats and...

Montana Gov. Steve Bullock teased a 2020 presidential run on Saturday, promising to position himself in a crowded Democratic field as the only candidate who can win the support of rural America. “Coming soon, the only Democratic contender who won a Trump state will make a big announcement," reads the narration in a video posted to Bullock’s Twitter account. The 39-second video urges viewers to “be the first to know” about his plans by visiting stevebullock.com.

You wouldn’t normally associate the world of dutiful natural history preservation with sporadic bursts of all-caps letters and exclamation points – or at least not until last month, when the fossil of an infant Tyrannosaurus rex, potentially the only in existence, went on sale on eBay for the “buy it now” price of $2.95m. The listing reads: “Most Likely the Only BABY T-Rex in the World! It has a 15 FOOT long Body and a 21” SKULL with Serrated Teeth! This Rex was very a very dangerous meat eater. It’s a RARE opportunity indeed to ever see a baby REX…”...

“Overwhelming” is the only word which properly describes the growing list of 2020 Presidential candidates vying to unseat Donald Trump. To date, there are the officially declared, the yet to declare, and a handful of teetering outliers. The outliers aren’t in the running per se, but in the event no Democrat is able to garner the party nomination, one of them might be persuaded to step up to the podium. The Declared Candidates:Bernie Sanders, Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren, Robert O’Rourke, Pete Buttigieg, Corey Booker, Amy Klobuchar, Andrew Yang, Julian Castro, Kirsten Gillibrand, Jay Inslee, Tulsi Gabbard, John Hickenlooper, John Delaney,...

BILLINGS, Mont. — A judge blocked oil and gas drilling across almost 500 square miles in Wyoming and said the U.S. government must consider climate change impacts more broadly as it leases huge swaths of public land for energy exploration. The order marks the latest in a string of court rulings over the past decade - including one last month in Montana - that have faulted the U.S. for inadequate consideration of greenhouse gas emissions when approving oil, gas and coal projects on federal land. U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras in Washington appeared to go a step further than other...

n the first significant check on the Trump administration’s “energy-first” agenda, a US judge has temporarily halted hundreds of drilling projects for failing to take climate change into account. Drilling had been stalled on more than 300,000 acres of public land in Wyoming after it was ruled the Trump administration violated environmental laws by failing to consider greenhouse gas emissions. The federal judge has ordered the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), which manages US public lands and issues leases to the energy industry, to redo its analysis. The decision stems from an environmental lawsuit. WildEarth Guardians, Physicians for Social Responsibility,...

U.S.A. –-(Ammoland.com)- Many people have a difficult time changing their minds once they have formulated an opinion, especially once they have committed to the opinion on the record. I am happy to say fellow writer Wes Siler is of better material than that. In a June 2017 article, Wes was of the opinion that firearms, all firearms, were worthless as a defense against bears. He opined that statistically speaking, a person, when attacked by a bear, was as well off without a firearm as with one. He depended on research which had some problems with selection bias. Wes, quite generously,...

A decade ago, folks in northern states such as Minnesota, South and North Dakota, Montana, Wyoming and Idaho were watching large swaths of their pine forests die off due to invasive pine beetles. The pine beetles bored beneath the bark of pine trees and introduced a fungus and larvae which weakened and then killed the trees.

Montana should be sold to Canada to help pay off some of the U.S.'s national debt, according to a petition on Change.org. Ian Hammond, the petition creator, wants to sell The Treasure State to the nation's neighbor to the north for $1 trillion. “We have too much debt and Montana is useless. Just tell them it has beavers or something,” the petition description read. More than 7,000 people have already signed the petition as of Tuesday. The petition was looking to garner at least 7,500 online signatures.

GREAT FALLS— Brett Bruggeman is a Great Falls dentist who specializes in root canals. But, what may come as a surprise, is that he owns 36 sled dogs and is a musher who competes in sled dog races. Brett and his son, Spencer, coincidentally were both reading books about sled dogs at the same time about seven years ago. Spencer, being born with a birth defect in his right leg, left him unable to do traditional sports. After reading these books on sled dogs, they both realized they wanted to start a sled dog team. This is when Skinny Leg...

They’re not just in Oregon. University students from Saudi Arabia have vanished while facing criminal charges here and in at least seven other states as well as Canada — evidence that a growing number of defendants from the wealthy Persian Gulf kingdom have fled justice in the United States. There are likely more to be discovered. The Oregonian/OregonLive uncovered five examples in Oregon and began searching other states in late January. We’ve found similar cases in Montana, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Utah, Washington and Wisconsin. We also found two cases in Nova Scotia: Saudi students in two separate incidents skipped bail...

A very lucky cat in Montana is happy and healthy after thawing out -- literally -- at an animal clinic over the past week following a miraculous rescue. The owners of Fluffy, who live in Kalispell, Montana, in the far northwest of the state, found her in a snow bank on Jan. 31 -- unresponsive, with her fur matted with ice. The low in nearby Whitefish was a bone-chilling 8 degrees on Jan. 31, and they had received about 16 inches of snow for the month.

Customers of Wells Fargo are reporting an outage affecting the big bank's ATMs as well as online and mobile banking. A customer service representative said it is a nationwide outage. KULR-TV in Montana is reporting that a bank employee said the outage is a result of a fire at a server farm located in Shoreview, Minnesota

More Senate skullduggery, Trump’s role in this, straight lines, and the Bundy case again Senate chicanery Last month I wrote of the skullduggery applied by both political parties in trying to pass a 680-page federal lands package in the waning moments of the last Congress. Up stepped our hero, Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) who just wanted to add two words to the legislation. Alaska and Wyoming are by statute exempt from the Antiquities Act that has been so abused by recent Presidents. Senator Lee wanted to add “and Utah” to that statute. The leadership said no to his amendment,...

In a rare move, the Senate voted late Tuesday to silence Sen. Elizabeth Warren from speaking out against Sen. Jeff Sessions, President Trump’s nominee for attorney general. The Republican-led Senate voted 49-43 to uphold a floor ruling that Warren (D-Mass.) violated Senate Rule 19 by “impugning” the character of Sessions during her lengthy speech against his confirmation. A separate vote to allow Warren to continue to speak failed — effectively silencing the outspoken progressive from continuing her anti-Sessions speech. The dust-up on the Senate floor began shortly before 7 p.m. when Warren took the microphone to make a long, impassioned...

Washington, D.C. – Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT) spoke with Townhall Friday just prior to his speech at the March for Life rally. He explained why he’s optimistic about pro-life efforts in the Senate and why he considers President Trump to be the most pro-life president in our country’s history.“We have the most pro-life president that we have seen in the history of our country,” he told Townhall, “when you look at both the administrative actions he’s taken as president within the White House but also moving through thirty, thirty circuit court judges, conservative judges, the most circuit court judges moved...

Arizona state politicians will introduce model legislation this week to encourage states to prevent children of illegal immigrants from being granted citizenship under the 14th Amendment. Lawmakers in at least 14 states have said they are committed to passing the legislation targeting birthright citizenship. Arizona's anti-illegal-immigrant bill, SB-1070, was also based on model legislation that could be easily copied by states, and at least seven states are likely to pass bills similar to the first Arizona immigration overhaul this year, according to one analysis by an immigrants rights group. Arizona state Senator Russell Pearce will unveil the bill Jan. 5...

Details about Scott’s disappearance have been slow to surface. Montana’s Department of Justice confirmed Friday that it issued a “missing or endangered person advisory” on Dec. 26, the day the FBI requested one, which was nearly two weeks after Scott went missing. The Bureau of Indian Affairs had entered Scott into the missing persons database Dec. 13, meaning she was in the system, but her disappearance wasn't broadcast to the media until the day after Christmas. The advisory ended Dec. 27. Local, non-federal, law enforcement officers weren’t familiar with the specifics of the report Friday.

The Keystone Pipeline is once again facing legal hurdles. A federal judge in Florida told a developer working on the project that they couldn’t even ship pipe to the construction site. The judge is an Obama-appointee who recently blocked a permit for the long-awaited project in November (via The Hill): A federal judge said the developer behind the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline can’t even haul pipe in preparation for the project. Judge Brian Morris of the federal District Court for the District of Montana rejected TransCanada Corp.’s request Friday to complete various “preconstruction” activities in preparation for building the...