The Wyoming Freedom Caucus is a caucus in the Wyoming Legislature. It is generally considered the most conservative bloc in the legislature. It was formed in September 2020 by Wyoming conservatives inspired by the national House Freedom Caucus. Since 2024, the caucus has a majority of seats in the Wyoming House of Representatives.
History
Formation and early development
The caucus was formed in September 2020 in Story, Wyoming, a rural census-designated community in Sheridan County at the base of the Bighorn Mountains, by approximately 18 to 20 Republican House members. Founders Dan Laursen and Tim Hallinan said it would increase the influence of the Legislature's most conservative members and challenge Republican leaders they considered insufficiently conservative. The organization emerged from a broader intraparty conflict in which hard-line activists and candidates regularly used the label "Republican in name only," or "RINO," for traditionalist Republican officeholders.
The organization was inspired by the House Freedom Caucus in Congress. Its early priorities included opposing abortion, reducing public spending, expanding firearm rights and pressuring Republican leaders to advance socially and fiscally conservative legislation. John Bear became chairman in 2022.
National affiliation and voting coordination
Under Bear, the caucus established a partnership with the State Freedom Caucus Network, which seeks to organize similarly aligned caucuses in state legislatures. The national network employs Jessie Rubino as its Wyoming state director and, through her, provides research and access to political resources in Washington. Bear said the arrangement supplied research and contacts that the caucus previously lacked.
Rubino researched legislation and sent caucus positions and recommendations by text and email, including while bills and amendments were being debated and voted upon on the House floor. Bear described the communications as concise research summaries and said members were not required to accept every recommendation. When asked what percentage of agreement was required to retain membership, Bear confirmed that an adherence threshold existed but declined to disclose it. He said he was pleased with how frequently members voted together.
Other legislators described the system more critically. Harshman contrasted it with the tradition that each member of Wyoming's citizen legislature should exercise independent judgment. Barry Crago said it was discouraging when a bloc of 26 legislators voted identically regardless of debate. Albert Sommers said political organization need not become "authoritarian." In 2023, the caucus repeatedly divided the House by votes near 36 to 26, particularly on budget amendments.
Internal communications disclosed in later litigation showed that Rubino participated in real-time floor strategy. During a contentious floor confrontation, she texted aligned legislators, "Keep pushing - people make great mistakes when they're this mad." The messages provided direct evidence that her role extended beyond preparing background research to advising legislators on tactics while proceedings were underway.
Rubino is married to Joe Rubino, who served as chief policy officer and general counsel to Wyoming Secretary of State Chuck Gray. Their work overlapped substantively on proof-of-citizenship and residency requirements, voter identification, election-administration rules, limits on party-affiliation changes and other legislation promoted by Gray and the caucus. Jessie Rubino analyzed and communicated caucus positions on election bills while Joe Rubino advised the state official responsible for administering elections. Public reporting identified the marriage and overlapping responsibilities but did not establish an unlawful conflict or show that either spouse participated in a particular governmental decision affecting the other's employer.
Expansion during the 2023–2024 Legislature
During the 2023–2024 term, the caucus increasingly operated as a coordinated bloc. It supported legislation limiting when voters could change party affiliation, prohibiting medication abortion, eliminating gun-free zones and ending the University of Wyoming's diversity office. Gordon vetoed the gun-free-zone and university-diversity measures.
During the 2024 budget session, the caucus used the two-thirds vote required to introduce non-budget legislation to prevent numerous committee-sponsored bills from receiving debate. Committee bills ordinarily result from months of public meetings, testimony and interim study. The defeated measures included legislation intended to preserve access to community mental-health and substance-use treatment for uninsured patients, establish criminal penalties for threatening election workers and increase nonresident fishing-license fees that support wildlife management. Critics said the caucus discarded work completed through the Legislature's interim process before the full chambers could consider its merits.
Rubino said the caucus obtained policy ideas from constituents, internal polling and members' Christian faith, which she said "drives everything" they do. The caucus also promoted "Judeo-Christian family values" as an organizational principle. Its opponents argued that public policy should remain accountable to the state and federal constitutions and to constituents of different religious beliefs, rather than to a single religious framework.
Before the 2025 session, Gordon questioned whether caucus legislators were voting for their constituents or following recommendations originating outside the chamber. He warned that they were creating a public record Wyoming residents could judge at the next election. The caucus's sweeping 2026 losses later prompted renewed attention to Gordon's warning.
2024 elections and House takeover
The caucus, Wyoming Freedom PAC and outside organizations supported candidates challenging traditionalist Republican incumbents in 2024. Make Liberty Win, a Virginia-based super PAC associated with the libertarian-right organization Young Americans for Liberty, spent approximately $370,000, largely supporting caucus-aligned candidates. Americans for Prosperity, part of the political network founded by Charles and David Koch, spent more than $343,000 across Wyoming Republican races. Its activity was not uniformly pro-caucus; it supported or opposed candidates according to its own free-market priorities and participated on both sides of the intraparty divide.
Caucus-supported candidates defeated House Speaker Pro Tempore Clark Stith and representatives David Zwonitzer, Dan Zwonitzer, Tom Walters and Ember Oakley. Another supported candidate defeated House Speaker Albert Sommers in a Republican primary for the Senate. Following the election, caucus members and reliable allies controlled at least 34 of the House's 62 seats. Chip Neiman became speaker, Jeremy Haroldson speaker pro tempore, Scott Heiner majority floor leader and Ocean Andrew majority whip. Rachel Rodriguez-Williams became caucus chair.
The caucus's expansion also involved support outside its formal endorsement list. During the House District 41 campaign, Rubino appeared in a personal testimonial for Gary Brown, identifying herself as a district resident rather than speaking formally for the organization. Brown was not on the caucus's organizational endorsement slate and was not publicly listed as a member. Rubino said he would represent the "true conservative values" of central Cheyenne. Brown subsequently voted regularly with caucus members and co-sponsored legislation with them.
House majority, 2025–2026
Five and Dime agenda
Before the 2025 session, caucus leaders announced a "Five and Dime" plan to move five bills through the House during its first 10 days. The agenda included a residential property-tax reduction, restrictions on government diversity programs, citizenship and residency documentation for voters, restrictions involving driver's licenses issued to undocumented immigrants and a prohibition on considering environmental, social and governance factors in state investments.
Several priorities addressed practices that were already prohibited or had not been shown to occur in Wyoming. State law already limited ordinary driver's licenses to applicants who could demonstrate lawful presence, while federal law barred noncitizens from voting in federal elections and Wyoming law required voters to be United States citizens. Supporters said additional statutes would prevent future changes and increase confidence, although they cited no polling or other measurement demonstrating a Wyoming-specific collapse in election confidence. Critics described the measures as national political priorities for which proponents had not demonstrated a state-specific problem. The property-tax proposal addressed a documented increase in residential assessments, but the final law was substantially narrower than the caucus's initial plan. The ESG prohibition was the only Five and Dime bill the Senate declined to consider.
The House advanced all five measures on the accelerated schedule. Four passed the Legislature, while the Senate declined to advance the investment proposal. Gordon allowed the election bill to become law without his signature but questioned the legality and "arbitrary" nature of its 30-day residency requirement. He warned that damaged identification, post-office-box addresses and other documentary uncertainties could cause clerks to reject qualified voters, and wrote that citizens must be able to vote "without undue difficulty."
The final property-tax measure differed substantially from proposals initially promoted by caucus members. Representative Landon Brown, a Republican critic of the bloc, called amendments added during the process "pure stupidity." Other Republican legislators said the caucus claimed credit for compromises developed in the Senate after its more sweeping proposals encountered constitutional, fiscal and practical objections.
Budget policy
Caucus members and allies controlling the Joint Appropriations Committee proposed major reductions to Gordon's biennial budget recommendation. Targets included the University of Wyoming's block grant, the departments of Health and Family Services, state-employee compensation, the Wyoming Business Council and Wyoming Public Media. The committee also considered eliminating or sharply reducing programs supporting rural services and economic development.
The caucus said the reductions would restrain government growth and return spending toward pre-pandemic levels. Gordon answered that Wyoming had neither structural debt nor uncontrolled spending and called the committee proposal a "demolition budget." Wyoming has no state individual or corporate income tax, maintains a constitutionally required balanced budget and relies heavily on mineral revenue. Gordon argued that importing a national "cut everything" message into that structure amounted to political theater rather than a response to debt. The proposed reductions included $40 million, about 11 percent, from the University of Wyoming's block grant; elimination of most Wyoming Business Council funding; an end to state support for Wyoming Public Media; and reductions affecting health, family services and employee compensation. Critics said the practical effects would include fewer university programs, weaker recruitment and retention of public employees, reduced rural economic-development capacity and pressure on services for children, older residents and people with disabilities.