The Session Subscribe: Apple Podcast | Spotify The Session: We’re back. So are newly elected party leaders. EPISODE DESCRIPTIONThe Session is back for the 69th Montana Legislature. This week, we preview lawmakers work that starts January 6. Reporters talk about new party leaders, legislative rules, and how the governor wants to spend public money.EPISODE TRANSCRIPTShaylee Ragar: We are less than a month out from the start of the 69th Legislative Session. Lawmakers will spend 90 days tinkering with Montana’s laws, creating new ones, and crafting a two year budget. This is The Session, a look at the policy and politics inside the Montana Statehouse. I’m Shaylee Ragar, I cover the statehouse for Montana Public Radio.Tom Lutey: I’m Tom Lutey with Montana Free Press. Eric Dietrich: And I’m Eric Dietrich, I’m also with Montana Free Press. Shaylee Ragar: We’re back! Tom, you’re a longtime Montana journalist, but a new addition to this podcast. Would you mind introducing yourself to our listeners? Tom Lutey: Yeah, thanks, Shaylee. I’m happy to be here. I’m a long time listener to the program and happy to be back to the legislature. I think the last time I covered a legislature in person was probably in 2002.It was right about the time that the legislature had crafted the big bill, which still sort of is determining the way things are funded in Montana. Shaylee Ragar: Well, we are very excited to have your expertise. We need some of that institutional knowledge here at the legislature. I don’t want to neglect you, Eric.It’s been a while since you and I have recorded an episode of this show together. Almost two years now? So what have you been up to? Eric Dietrich: I’ve been renovating a house that’s a couple blocks from the Capitol that I happen to live in. I have a new puppy that is slowing down that process and will force me to get out and exercise once the legislature kicks in full force.But I guess now it’s time to get back to politics. Shaylee Ragar: Absolutely. That’s what we’re here for, aren’t we? On this episode, we want to set the scene for the upcoming session. There’s a lot that happens before day one. There are new and returning legislators, the governor has proposed his budget that he’d like lawmakers to pass, and debate is underway over the rules that regulate the session.Tom, you were at the Capitol for party caucuses last month. Remind us, what’s the point of those? Tom Lutey: If you think about the general election as sort of being the invites to the event, thereafter, the table is set and it’s time to sort of determine who the new leaders are going to be.So shortly after the election, everybody gathers in Helena and they decide who’s going to lead their caucuses. Those leadership votes, it’s usually a foregone conclusion. The caucus picks their leaders and that usually sticks. Shaylee Ragar: Okay, right. Let’s dive into those election results. I think we should note that Republicans hold majorities again in both chambers of the legislature, but Democrats were able to dilute some of their power.They flipped nearly a dozen seats in this last election. And that could definitely make a difference in both parties’ political strategy. So let’s talk about who will lead each caucus through the session. Republican representatives in the House chose Brandon Ler of Savage for Speaker. What do we know about Ler? Tom Lutey: It’s kind of funny, I think a lot of members of the press were surprised that Brandon Ler was elected House Speaker because they simply didn’t know a lot about him, but when I spoke to Brandon, he told me that he has been sort of planning to be in leadership since 2022 after being reelected then and really saw an opportunity to run for speaker after the 2023 Speaker Pro Tem Rhonda Knudson lost her election to represent Northeast Montana and at that point in time really started aggressively pursuing it and really he’s on track. It was not a surprise for him, probably not a surprise for members of his caucus who he’s been basically lobbying for a couple of years. Shaylee Ragar: It’ll be really interesting to see how Ler approaches the job compared to his predecessor, who is Matt Regier of Kalispell.Regier is actually moving over to the Senate this session and he’s kind of already making a splash in that upper chamber. He beat out two more senior senators to become Senate president. Tom, how would you describe Regier and what do you make of his election to that top spot? Tom Lutey: I think the one thing that people probably recognize about Regier if you’re within the Capitol is that he’s part of a little bit of a family dynasty.His father was just term-limited out of the Montana Senate. His sister, Amy, serves in the Montana House. Regier was House Speaker in 2023. I looked back at several sessions to see when was the last time a house speaker transferred to the Senate, ran for election, and won, and made it to the Senate, and was immediately appointed Senate president. I couldn’t find one. Shaylee Ragar: Let’s turn to Democratic leadership. In the upper chamber, Senator Pat Flowers of Gallatin County was re-elected as Senate Minority Leader and Representative Katie Sullivan from Missoula is the new House Minority Leader. How should we expect them to lead Democrats? Tom Lutey: I think Republicans shortly after Jon Tester’s loss in the U.S. Senate race, were quick to note that Pat Flowers is probably now the most powerful Democrat elected in Montana. Pat’s a mainstay in leadership in the Senate. Of course, he was a minority leader last time as well. Katie Sullivan, new to her position in the state house, I think probably touched on it well in caucus when she said that they had new numbers, they picked up 10 new members in the House, and that they should be able to use that strength of having 42 lawmakers to their advantage; being able to work with moderate Republicans and really affect the outcomes on several key votes. Shortly after caucuses met, Democrats quickly focused on both the judiciary and the tax picture–some kind of property tax reform. I expect that that’s where you’re going to see them really try to flex their muscles. Shaylee Ragar: Yeah, that makes sense. I think what’s always interesting is we kind of see lawmakers begin to flex those muscles before the session starts in the rules debate. So the rules are not final for the session–that won’t happen until lawmakers convene in Helena, but they’ve begun hashing out the rules.We saw quite a bit of discussion over one rule to restrict who gets to use a set of privileged bathrooms for legislators. Republican Representative Jerry Schillinger of Circle proposed that rule to prohibit transgender lawmakers from using the bathroom that aligns with their gender identity, but that rule was narrowly rejected.Talk us through that vote, Tom, and what we can maybe take away from it. Tom Lutey: The nuance of the rejection was this: The arguments that were made for rejecting the rule weren’t based on transgender rights. For Republicans, they did not want to resurrect the issues concerning trans lawmakers that flared at the end of the 2023 legislature and attracted media attention and national attention. TV news anchor: Now to Montana and the growing outrage over the treatment of a transgender lawmaker. Public protests in the legislature were met with police in riot gear on Monday. Another Republican-led state legislature voted to kick out a Democrat who dissented. This is Montana State Representative Zooey Zephyr. TV news anchor: Congresswoman Zooey Zephyr accused GOP legislators of having ‘blood on their hands’ for supporting bills that would prohibit gender affirming care for minors.Tom Lutey: The argument was that just by kind of moving forward with amendments targeting really one lawmaker, Representative Zooey Zephyr of Missoula, that was going to attract attention to Zephyr and they didn’t want that. They didn’t want national media attention. They didn’t want trans lawmakers to have that national profile.Shaylee Ragar: That does seem like an important distinction–that maybe this wasn’t blanket rejection of anti-trans policies, but more about this specific situation. Let’s move on for now. Eric, I know you’ve been digging into Governor Greg Gianforte’s proposed budget. There’s a lot in there, a lot of numbers. Can you give us the highlights?Eric Dietrich: Yeah, to be precise, there’s $17.9 billion in there, which is more than $16,000 per Montana resident. A lot of that’s federal pass through money that’s not Montana-specific tax dollars. But still, a lot of money, a lot of things being done with that money. Shaylee Ragar: So where does Gianforte want to direct some of that money? Usually there’s different programs that show up as priorities or maybe tax cuts. What is he looking at? Eric Dietrich: So yeah, several things. One of the big ones is another round of income tax cuts focused on lowering the state’s top bracket tax rate. Another big thing is property tax efforts. There’s a lot of concern about how much residential homeowner property taxes have gone up the last few years and the governor has a plan for tackling that, which is part of his budget proposal. Also, some more big spending proposals out there. We have money for expanding the state prison, money for trying to increase K-12 teacher pay, and also a big chunk of change that would go up into essentially shoring up the state’s pension system–the argument being that that money would make that system more resilient if the stock market crashes. Shaylee Ragar: So, Gianforte’s a conservative, Republicans hold majorities in both chambers, should we expect legislators to fall in line with Gianforte’s proposed budget? Eric Dietrich: I think it’s safe to say that the Republican majority is big enough that they’ll find things to argue about.There are different ideologies and different perspectives on the state and the right way to be using public money in the Republican caucus. In some cases, that may give the Democrats negotiating leverage. If there’s a split in the Republican caucus and some of the Republicans go along with the governor and some of the Republicans don’t, in some cases, that’ll let the Democrats kind of choose the side and get their way.Property tax issues could come down in a more interesting, complex way. Medicaid expansion, which has a spending component to it as well, possibly. Shaylee Ragar: Tax policy does seem to be a bipartisan priority. Do you think the parties will be able to find some common ground? Eric Dietrich: I think that’s going to be an interesting thing to watch. Almost everybody seems to agree that homeowner property taxes are an issue and that something should be done about it. There are several ideas floating around both inside and out the Leg. Probably the most prominent is the governor’s proposal that he’s calling a ‘homestead exemption’ and that would essentially lower property taxes on permanent residences, their homes and rentals, by raising taxes on second homes and Airbnbs.The governor’s number that he’s been citing there, is he says that he could get homeowners a 15 percent reduction of their tax bill, which is pretty hefty. The challenge is that homeowner taxes on many homes throughout the state have risen by more than that the last couple years and are likely to rise by perhaps that much again in the coming years for many people.Shaylee Ragar: Okay. So lots of numbers, lots of ideas in there. The budget is definitely a session-long process. So we will be watching this as closely as we can and update on future episodes. We’ll end it here for now. The 69th Montana Legislature will convene on January 6th. Our next episode will air the following Monday, January 13th.  From there on out, you’ll be able to hear this podcast weekly on Mondays on Montana Public Radio, Yellowstone Public Radio, or wherever you get your podcasts.This has been The Session, a preview of the policy and politics inside the Montana Statehouse.  See you guys in January. Eric Dietrich: Thanks for having us, Shaylee. Tom Lutey: Talk soon. Listen to all episodes of The Session. The post The Session: We’re back. So are newly elected party leaders. appeared first on Montana Free Press.