Big Sky Times

Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte recently signed legislation that limits a governor’s authority to change the state’s election laws during a declared state of emergency, including allowing the blanket use of mail-in ballots ordered by his predecessor during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The new law requires that any changes to the state’s election law during a declared emergency must meet be approved by a majority of the members of the Montana House and Senate. The bill comes after Gianforte’s predecessor, Democrat Steve Bullock, closed in-person polling stations during the pandemic and directed that all voters use mail-in ballots primary elections. He did the same in the general election.

“The ability for one individual to unilaterally change the law in elections, when elections matters are critical to this form of government, caused great angst on the ground,” said state Rep Llew Jones (R-Conrad), sponsor of the bill, during a committee hearing on the legislation. “We have a lack now of public confidence in some of our election outcomes, not because there’s any proof of that, but because the public perceived a weakness.”

Former President Donald Trump carried Montana with nearly 57% of the vote.

The Helena Independent Record reported that “all but 11 counties in the state ultimately chose to conduct the general election by mail ballots only.”

Absentee or mail-in ballots were cited as the “largest source of potential voter fraud,” by the Commission on Federal Election Reform, established in 2004 under former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, a Democrat, and James A. Baker, III, a top official under former Republican Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush.