- Wyoming PBS, Wyoming Public Media, and Cowboy State Daily present Vote 2026, a debate among candidates in the Race for Wyoming's seat in the US House of Representatives, live from the auditorium at Riverton High School.

Greetings, viewers, audience members and candidates.

I'm Steve Peck, public affairs producer for Wyoming PBS, and we welcome you to tonight's general election debate among candidates for Wyoming's lone seat in the United States House of Representatives.

That seat is held currently by Harriet Hageman, a Republican who did not seek reelection this year after two terms in office in order to run for the US Senate.

This is the first of two debates tonight on Wyoming PBS.

Candidates for Wyoming Superintendent of Public Instruction take the stage immediately following this debate.

All ballot certified candidates were invited to take part in tonight's debate.

Those who accepted are on our stage tonight.

The order of speaking was determined by a random drawing backstage a few minutes ago in which the candidates participated.

This debate is being aired and streamed live by both Wyoming PBS and Wyoming Public Media.

Our debate comprises four segments, including first, a preview question that was sent to the candidates in advance.

Second, several questions in sequence to the full slate of candidates with each candidate answering the same question.

Third, a short answer lightning round with each candidate responding to a brief prompt provided by the panelists.

We expect to have time for as many as 10 lightning round cues.

Finally, a closing statement for each candidate with 60 seconds allotted.

In a joint briefing before the debate, we express to the candidates that we expect and require civil conduct and decorum on our stage tonight.

I'm the moderator of tonight's debate and I'll be a questioning panelist as well.

Now it's time to also to thank Fremont County School District 25 and its superintendent Jodi Ibach for hosting us tonight.

Our remaining panel consists of two experienced Wyoming journalists, Clair McFarland of Cowboy State Daily and Jordan Uplinger of Wyoming Public Media.

Wyoming Public Media and Wyoming PBS are separate and unaffiliated organizations.

The timer for the debate is Ryan Schuckman of Wyoming PBS.

He's operating a traffic light-like device when 10 seconds remain in the candidate's allotted time, the light turns yellow.

With five seconds remain, the yellow light blinks and when time has expired, a signal will sound accompanied by a red light.

Now we meet the candidates participating in today's debate introduced from left to right as you see them on stage.

Lisa Kinney, Democratic Party nominee.

Jeffrey Haggit, Constitution Party nominee.

Shawn Johnson, Libertarian Party nominee.

The general election is November 3rd.

Early voting in Wyoming has begun and is ongoing.

Candidates, here's the preview question that you received ahead of the debate.

Forecasts say the primary funding mechanism for social security is being depleted faster than it is being replenished, raising the potential for social security to be unable to meet its expected obligations in as little as five years.

Concerns similar to this have been raised numerous times through the years, but many analysts say this time is different, meaning more ominous.

As a US representative, what would be your recommendations to safeguard social security?

Ms.

Kinney, we begin with you 60 seconds.

- I'd like to thank PBS and the other members who are sponsoring this tonight.

I appreciate it.

I want to thank everyone in the audience and also those people who are listening live.

But the one thing, I started worrying about it, where is the GOP nominee?

I was worrying about that earlier.

I still haven't seen him.

And here's the interesting thing.

He had $1.5 million in his debate to go ahead and meet everyone in the state.

I don't have 1.5 million, so I have one chance to talk to the people in the state and it happens to be this debate.

I want to introduce myself and introduce parts or as much of me as I can get in.

So the answer to that question is this.

I will never cut Social Security at all under any circumstances.

Right now what's happened, if you've ever gotten FICA, every time you work, you get a little notice that you get FICA taken out at 6.2% that you get taken out for Social Security and 1.2% for Medicare.

Now, what happens then to that money?

If you earn more than $184,000, you know what they do?

They stop Social Security.

So the very richest people then are not paying their fair share.

So my recommendation to solve this issue is to remove that cap so that everyone's paying the same.

And I think this will solve the problem with Social Security and we're not going to have to cut down to 20%.

Bye-bye.

- Thank you.

Mr.

Haggit, your allotted time is 90 seconds.

And Ms.

Kinney, you did receive the full 90.

Mr.

Haggit, you did.

- Yeah.

Thank you.

- Okay, sure.

Social Security Act was signed into Bean in 1935 and it was meant for retired workers that when they became 65, they were eligible and that's now 67.

And there's three ways for people to get Social Security that never paid into it, and that's been added in.

But the Social Security trustees estimate that reducing benefits to restore solvency requires a 16.4% immediately cut, which works out to about $150 billion.

I would be in favor of eliminating the confirmed fraud, which is 88 million estimated, I'm sure it's higher than that, and three to nine billion in improper payments for a variety of non-criminal errors.

Then move on to the smaller things that they've added into the matrix over the years that could be looked at.

But I also would not be cutting social security to our seniors because it's part of the retirement now and it's counted on and a lot of them are expecting that and live on it.

And we'd have a serious problem if we cut into that.

And so I would not do that and I would work to make sure that it's funded.

Where there's a will, there's a way.

Thank you.

- Thank you, sir.

Mr.

Johnson, 90 seconds.

- Thank you.

First of all, thank you all for being here.

Thanks Wyoming PBS for putting on this debate and thanks to those who showed up to the debate tonight.

To answer the question, my generation and my children's generation are at risk of not receiving social security, although we pay into it.

We need to preserve payments obviously to the beneficiaries who currently receive social security, but there needs to be reforms.

And one option I want to explore is authored by former Utah State Auditor John Dugle, where he proposes that we bring social security to the state level into individual accounts similar to college savings accounts and that puts control more into the hands of the individual.

It puts control over your social security closer to the individual and it takes it off of the federal balance sheet and it prevents the federal government from dipping their hands into it.

And so that is an option that I want to explore, but obviously while we're looking at reforms and looking at different ideas, we need to ensure that those who are benefiting currently continue to receive their benefits.

- Thank you, sir.

Our next question, the first of the second round of questioning in which all three of you will answer the same question in sequence comes from Clair McFarland.

Mr.

Haggit, we'll start with you.

- How will you address the federal deficit?

- Federal deficit is one of the top three spending expenditures with social security being involved in that and also the interest on the national debt is also in the top three.

The federal deficit is just a simple byproduct of the uni party spending more than you bring in.

So refuse to do that in your home, you know how that would work out.

But to reduce the federal deficit, you've got to, first of all, stop spending so much.

That's where you got to start.

So that's the obvious question.

The answer would be to, and how are you going to do that?

That's the tough one and it involves not spending money, not giving our money away, not being involved in these needless wars.

They keep asking more and more money.

Defense department needs more money, so we need to just live within our budget and stop spending so much.

- Thank you, sir.

Mr.

Johnson.

- Thank you.

We are $40 trillion in debt, 40 trillion, and largely due to unnecessary wars, largely in the Middle East, overspending, living outside the federal government's means, and foreign intervention in the form of whether that be foreign aid or regime changes behind the scenes that don't involve war.

So one of the things that I would like to do initially is one, stop the war in Iran because that is driving up the deficit by itself.

We have a trillion dollar budget to the Pentagon.

We're running out of munitions.

We are seeing record high inflations here back at home.

We have food prices increasing, gas prices increasing all over this one decision, all over this one decision to go to war with Iran, which was highly improper.

And so we need to address the deficit by living within the federal government's means, cutting spending where appropriate, and bringing the federal government back within its constitutional boundaries.

- Thank you, sir.

Ms.

Kinney, 60 seconds.

- 60 seconds?

Yes.

Okay.

Here's what I would do.

I would first of all cut or hire back the inspector generals.

In January of 2025, all 17 inspector generals were fired.

And what this means is the people who go out and look for fraud and waste in our government were fired.

So we have to get that back.

We have to cut the war, that's exactly correct.

The big beautiful bill added 1.3.

No, they say it saves you 1.3, but it actually is costing us $3.66 trillion in that one bill.

I'd go back into that bill and cut it.

We need to do that.

And also I haven't seen the GOP nominee yet, and I want to tell you, I am always here.

I'm going to be here as often as I can for the people of Wyoming, and I'll tell you more about me later.

- Thank you.

Our next question is from Jordan Uplinger of Wyoming Public Media.

The response time is 60 seconds.

Mr.

Johnson, you'll be first to respond.

- Regardless of your feelings about America's involvement with the Iran War, what do you believe is the best path forward to rebuilding or establishing new trade lines to ensure Americans and American companies have access to the partners, goods and services they need to thrive?

- Thank you.

Obviously, one of the big hurdles to trade right now are tariffs and the trade wars that have been started with namely our allies, Canada and Europe.

So we need to end the illegal tariffs that have been imposed by this administration, and we need to open up dialogue with our allies again.

We need to open up free trade again, because that is where American business has in the past and would continue to prosper is through free trade agreements with our allies.

- Thank you, sir.

Ms.

Kinney, 60 seconds.

- I still haven't seen our nominee here, and I just want to say I will show up whenever I can.

I've been endorsed by the president or by the former governor of the state of Wyoming.

I also have three Republican nominees, when I served in the state senate who have nominate or who have endorsed me.

And I just, again, want to talk to the people out there in the state.

Absolutely, we have to have tariffs changed.

They were put on Liberation Day, right?

And once Liberation Day happened, then what happened was all of the costs everywhere went up.

And what we have to do is reevaluate what's going on with the tariffs, how we can cut them, how we can make a better choice, set of choices for US, and our prices should go down.

New trades, get new trade deals.

It should all work.

Thank you.

- Mr.

Haggit, 60 seconds.

Repeat the question, please.

- Regardless of your feelings about America's involvement with the Iran war, what do you believe is the best path forward to rebuilding or establishing new trade lines for Americans and American companies to thrive?

- I'll start with the Iran War because that's just so important to this, unfortunately.

But our founding fathers said to not create alliances, military alliances, only with trade, trade deals, treaties with other countries and not to get in entanglement of with other countries any other way and not be beholden to them.

So trade is paramount to any country.

You're always trading.

It's always been that way.

So when the colonists, when we were getting started, they traded, that was a huge part of their income on the East Coast.

They were trading with Europe and all these other countries, and they were tariffs, and that's how they funded the government.

And so tariffs though, unfortunately now they're contributing to inflation and I don't know that the president has the right to do it how he, how he's doing it.

So trade is important and, and we need to do what we can to facilitate that future instead of cutting it back.

- Thank you, sir.

The next question is from me.

The response time is 60 seconds.

Ms.

Kinney, you'll be the first to respond.

You've addressed this to an extent already.

I want to ask it of all the candidates.

Chuck Gray, the Republican nominee for this position is not here tonight.

What message do you think that sends to Wyoming voters?

- Thank you.

Here's the problem.

Historically, if you win the GOP nomination, you believe you've already won.

I think he thinks he has already won.

The, the problem is that's not the case.

You have three, three good people and especially me, I believe, who are going to challenge him.

And here's another thing.

He said that he wants to save or to get rid of AI data centers.

The president, he just endorsed him, said, "I want AI data centers to continue."

He said, this is Chuck says, "I want to not sell public lands."

The president says, "I want to sell public lands."

So what is he going to do?

Who is he going to be working for?

Is he going to be working for Washington or is he going to be working for the Wyoming people?

And I think he's going to be caught.

He also got or gave away all of our information to the feds, the Voter Information Act, and also he was one of the three founders of the Freedom Caucus.

So there are a lot of things that are going wrong that people are questioning.

- Thank you, Mr.

Haggit.

60 seconds.

- Chuck Gray is his own man.

I mean, he's going to do what he wants to do.

I don't know if he's being told to not show up here or if it's just a personal decision.

I think the reason they gave was to to take the ticket to the people.

I, I think that's what we're doing here, but to each their own.

And so I would, don't know why he chose not to be here, but that's, he's not the first that's decided not to grace this stage with their presence.

I've been up here before when, when the leading candidate decided they weren't going to be here, and I was, was asked about that, and you probably remember that.

And that's just been the answer is they probably don't feel, like Lisa said, he probably doesn't feel like he needs to be here, but I can't talk for him.

I don't know.

But that's that's on him.

And so that's just how it is.

- Thank you, Mr.

Johnson.

60 seconds.

- Thank you.

Chuck Gray's not here because he knows it'll do more harm than good for him.

I am the only viable option to Chuck Gray.

As a libertarian candidate, we have more overlap with Republican values than any other candidate on this stage, and Chuck Gray knows that.

He won 25% of the vote in the primary, and he thinks that that's a mandate of some kind, that he doesn't need to show up and explain his views to the Wyoming people.

It's not a mandate.

We are a red state, but Wyoming understands that they should vote for the person and not the party.

Just because he won the Republican nomination doesn't mean he's automatically won this race.

- Thank you.

The next question is from Clair McFarland.

Mr.

Haggit, you'll be the first to respond, 60 seconds.

- What is your policy stance toward license plate reader cameras and other forms of high-tech surveillance?

- I think that's a violation of our Fourth Amendment rights, personally.

It's been... You go on social media now and you can see all kinds of stories where the police have got it wrong and they pilled somebody over totally innocent and, but, you know, they say, "Well, why do we need all these data centers?"

So, well, they've just got to have a place to upload a lot of this surveillance that they want to put on people.

They want to track everything.

And so I, I'm against fuck these cameras being posted everywhere.

They're, they're... Well, the argument for it is that, well, it's in public, so there's no Fourth Amendment expectation, but I disagree and it's causing some issues with people being pulled over.

And so on a, on a theoretical reason, I would say it's a violation of your constitutional rights.

- Thank you, Mr.

Johnson.

Thank you.

- As a libertarian and as a criminal defense attorney, I'm highly opposed to mass surveillance.

We've already seen examples where mass surveillance has gotten it wrong or it's been abused by the government.

And so while there is no expectation of privacy in public, Mr.

Haggit is right that, that what the information gathered by these things are used to eventually violate someone's Fourth Amendment right.

And so I am opposed to flock cameras.

I'm opposed to mass surveillance.

I understand that our law enforcement needs tools to do their job, but there are other ways other than putting the public under surveillance.

- Thank you, sir.

Ms.

Kinney, 60 seconds.

- This is a surveillance state.

Yes, they can find kids who are lost.

Yes, they can find vehicles that are stolen, but they're not just doing that.

They're putting them everywhere.

I just heard from somebody and it's just a guess that if you look at the front part of Walmart, they're putting up a statement saying that they can also use these flock cameras and go ahead and take your information if you go in.

I don't know.

It's just something the people in Northern Wyoming are worried about, but you need public notice.

You need short-term data retention.

You need limits on who can receive it.

Who are you going to share it with if you're doing it locally?

You need audits, you need penalties for abuse.

Nobody's doing that.

What Congress should do is set a clear safeguard and a law enforcement purpose.

Limit the time.

It was supposed to be 30 days.

It started out 30 days.

Now it's perhaps 77 days.

We have to do that.

We have to control the amount of time they have and penalize use.

- Thank you.

The next question is from Jordan Uplinger.

Mr.

Johnson, we'll begin with you.

The response time is 60 seconds.

- CEOs of AI companies are warning the US government about AI's potential ability to become a threat to humanity.

How serious do you take these threats and what guardrails can Congress set up to protect society at large?

- It's a great question, and I've heard this in the news and I default to the experts on this.

We have actual AI workers that are coming out into the public and saying that things in the AI world are progressing to the point where it's becoming a danger to humanity.

And so I do think there needs to be guardrails and even conversations with other nations on how we reign in AI and how we can control its growth for the future.

I think AI can be a great tool.

I use it in my line of work, but the rate that it's going currently is alarming, especially when you have the AI builders themselves coming out and telling you to your face that the danger is coming.

So I do support looking at different guardrails and control approaches to at least slow the progression and growth of AI.

- Thank you, sir.

Ms.

Kinney, 60 seconds on AI.

- It's interesting.

People keep saying it's a race in developing AI between China and the United States.

It's a race for what?

What are we racing toward?

Are we racing to see if which company or which country can destroy the other ones first?

No, it's out of control.

I heard the person who actually developed AI recently saying this.

He said, "What we need to do is not say whether or not, or we should not make them smarter and smarter.

We should make them kinder."

What we have to do is get a global treaty with all countries like we did with the atomic energy.

All countries get in there who are using it and stop, slow down and agree that we'll get to the point using experts where we're going to wait until we know what kind of damage it can cause.

Because once it continues on, once it gets out of its little areas and puts notes to itself on how it can defeat or destroy other things, we're in trouble.

We need a global treaty among all nations.

- Thank you.

The next question is from me.

Ms.

Kinney will be the first to respond for 60 seconds.

The... I'm sorry, Mr.

Haggit, you speak first.

My apologies, sir.

I though I was going to get - Out and have to answer a question.

Oh man.

No - Such luck.

- Anyway, no, AI has got out and out of the box.

In fact, they're using AI to create themselves.

In fact, they do it on their own.

They try to put them in a box, but they get out and they've infiltrated other companies on their own.

And I don't know if it's they're setting up a false flag for AI to hack into our stuff like our energy grid, but it's a very... I mean, yeah, it can be a great tool, but it's very, very dangerous and it needs to be... Yeah.

And when the CEOs come right out and tell you that they are alarmed and they are scared and they think it could cause millions of people to die and how that, how they didn't explain that any, but when they're coming out and saying this and you have to, you have to listen to them.

So I'm really concerned about it and I think it needs to be controlled whatever it takes because it's bad news.

- Thank you, sir.

Now the next question comes to me.

Ms.

Kinney will be the first to respond for 60 seconds.

The incumbent is not seeking reelection to this seat, so Wyoming will have a new US representative regardless starting next year.

That member of Congress will be the sole representative of the least populated state in the nation, a freshman and possibly in the minority party as well.

What specific steps will you take to be an impactful, productive member of the US House?

- Okay, thank you.

I'll tell you what.

So we have a Democratic Party, Republican Party, and in Washington, they've stopped talking to each other.

They're not communicating.

I'm a moderate person.

I learned how to be bipartisan when I was in the Wyoming State Senate, when Rex Arne was the chairman of the committee.

And the question is, how can I, as an individual, go in and make a difference?

And here's the reason, or here's what I can do.

If you look at 435 people and the different votes on each one, what you need, it's 216 to 2619.

What you need is somebody who can go in there and work with both parties, Republican and Democrat, get them working together.

I'm part of a national congressional candidate group.

I'm for state number 41.

We are going to be working together on a whole series of bills, and I already have made those things.

I think if you get in there, and when you talk only about Libertarian, he's the best one, he says, but there's no libertarian party.

He stands for the libertarians, not for anyone else.

- Thank you.

Mr.

Haggit.

- Could you repeat the question, please?

- If you're elected, you'll be a freshman from the smallest state in the union, possibly be in the minority party.

What can you do to be a productive, effective member of Congress in that situation?

- That's a real interesting question.

You hear all kinds of stories about people that get in there and they're all... Massey did a really interesting speech on the House floor a while back, and he was talking about people that get in there fresh.

They just got elected, they're all fired up and they get in there and they get patted on the head and you either play with the big boys, play their game, and maybe you'll get a seat on a committee or they give you a hall pass, and those were his terms.

And so I thought that's really how it is in there.

And you're one voice.

You get in there and you try to do what you can and you try to create relationships.

We've been in multi-level marketing, not right now, for years, and they teach you people skills and how to get along and how to develop relationships.

And so that's a big part of going in there is you got to develop those relationships and get along, but not be a part of the big boy club because that's where I draw the line, but that's how I do my best to serve the people of Wyoming.

- Thank you, sir.

Mr.

Johnson.

- Thank you.

If I'm elected, it will send shock waves throughout not only the United States, but the world.

It'll put Washington on notice because a libertarian has never been elected to a federal office, and that by itself will give Wyoming's lone house seat unprecedented influence.

And what do I mean by that?

I'm not beholden to the Democratic Party leadership like Lisa Kinney will be.

I'm not beholden to the Republican Party leadership like Chuck Gray will be.

I will be beholden to the people of Wyoming, not just Libertarians, Wyoming.

It'll put me in a unique position where we typically have a razor thin offset between Democrats and Republicans in Congress, where Wyoming's seat, the seat that I would occupy, would be the tie-breaking vote in a lot of very close votes.

And so it would force the other two parties to come to me and ask me, "How are you going to vote?"

And that gives me the opportunity to say, "What can you give me to help the people of Wyoming?"

- Thank you, sir.

The next question is from Clair McFarland of Cowboy State Daily.

Mr.

Johnson, we'll begin with you.

The response time, 60 seconds.

- Okay.

Power utilities, the Wyoming Department of Transportation and the business community have all said that federal laws governing the Wind River Indian Reservation block infrastructure, stifle development.

Would you fix this and how?

- When talking about the Wind River Reservation, I mean, they are a sovereign group of people.

And so I believe that it would be my... Obviously they're also Wyoming citizens, they're Wyoming residents and they're voters.

And so I would have an open dialogue with the leadership of the Wind River Reservation on how best to deal with that and any other issue that they have.

I don't pretend to be an expert on, you know, what the governing body of the Wind River Reservation does or the priorities that they may or may not have.

And so it would be my job as the representative to meet with the representatives of the Wind River tribe and come up with solutions that help them.

- Thank you, sir.

Ms.

Kinney?

Can you - Repeat the question?

- Yes.

So power utilities, the Wyoming Department of Transportation, the business community have all said that federal laws governing the Wind River Indian Reservation block infrastructure, stifle development, would you fix this and how?

- I'm just writing it down.

I think what we always need to do is make sure that whenever there's a problem, whether it's water, whether it's employment, if it has to do with the reservation, we have to get together with them.

We have to say, "We had this treaty with you and we're going to honor it."

If there's a problem, I know that the people who are there would try to work with everyone here, the non-tribal members to fix it.

I think that's not an easy question, but something that needs to be done over a period of time.

And so I think that that would, in the long run, be good as long as we continue to talk to the people on the Wind River Reservation.

Sorry, my voice is going sometimes.

But I think it's something that we need to do with the tribes and to never go back on our treaties and try to always offer them a hand if there's a problem or they can offer us a hand if they're doing the problem.

- Thank you.

Mr.

Haggit.

- Yeah, I'm not an expert either on the laws and treaties.

I know there's numerous ones there on the books and they're constantly being looked at.

But if there's something that's not being done that's supposed to be being done as far as bridges and roads and stuff on the reservation, then I think you need to get all parties together, sit them in a room and find out what the problem is and look at the law and what can be done, what can't be done, and come up with a solution that everybody can walk out of that room with and be okay with.

- Thank you, sir.

The next question is from Jordan Uplinger.

I believe I may have been out of order in the previous question.

Mr.

Haggit, we'll start with you on this one, then we'll be back on cycle.

60 second response.

- What can Congress do for states like Wyoming that are too small to have competitive health insurance marketplaces?

- Well, in Wyoming there's, as everybody knows, it lives in a rural area, there's, there's food deserts and then there's medical care deserts and there's hospitals closing.

There is a, it's been in the books that it's allows the rural, smaller hospitals to get the medicines and stuff and then at a reduced rate and then, and then disperse them at the regular rate.

And then they use those funds to offset their, their expenses because if you look at per, per, the person that's in, that's getting the care, rural hospitals pay out more overhead per person than a bigger hospital.

So they need special care and special needs to be taken care of.

And the, unfortunately, the bigger hospitals have figured out how to get their hands in the cookie jar.

And so instead of being just for those rural hospitals, now some of that's being siphoned off to some of these bigger hospitals and that needs to be addressed.

- Thank you, sir.

Mr.

Johnson.

- Healthcare in the United States is, is a mess and it has been for quite a while.

I think in the immediate, we need to lift regulation on insurance companies to be able to sell across state lines, to create more competition amongst insurance companies to lower premiums.

We also need to make sure that funding for Wyoming's rural hospitals is adequate because as Mr.

Haggit spoke about, which is correct, a lot of our rural hospitals are in trouble and we need to make sure that they're properly funded.

I don't believe the solution is to bring in more government regulation.

I don't believe the solution is to throw more government subsidies into the healthcare system.

I think the healthcare system needs a reform as a whole, but in the immediate we can lift regulation to create competition amongst insurance companies to lower premiums.

- Thank you, sir.

Ms.

Kinney.

- Here's the problem.

If everyone in the state of Wyoming signed up for health insurance right now, it's 500,000 people.

It's a small insurance pool.

So what we have to do is increase the size of the insurance pool, and that means joining with other surrounding states or joining in the United States so that we don't have such a tiny situation where if one person gets sick in that 500,000, it's costing us all money.

In the big beautiful bill, what happened, there were subsidies to the Affordable Care Act.

And again, our representatives killed those subsidies which were going to you to make your healthcare go down.

They killed them, so your healthcare went up.

I would reauthorize the ACA and say what we need to do, work Republicans and Democrats together to come up with a plan in three years that will cover everyone.

Nobody likes ACA, fine.

You can't get rid of it.

Let's do something that will help us all.

The transformation pool from the Big Beautiful Bill provides insurance for five years.

And health insurance is not a five-year plan, it's a 20-year plan or more.

- Thank you.

The next question is from me and we'll get back in sequence with Ms.

Kinney starting 60 second responses.

Candidates, much of a US representative's work comes through committee meetings, committee hearings and the accompanying research and analysis.

Are there qualifications that you have that make you particularly suited for any particular committees that you'd like to serve on?

Ms.

Kinney, you're first.

60 seconds.

- Thank you.

When I was in the Wyoming State Senate, I served there for 10 years.

I was on the judiciary committee and we did hundreds of bills.

That's what we did.

We looked at everything.

And I think because I'm an attorney, I was in the Wyoming State Legislature, I'm a librarian, I'm really good at research.

I'm really good at looking at bills, creating bills that, well, creating bills, also editing bills.

And so I think a judiciary committee might be a good way to go because that's my skill.

That's what I do really well.

I work well with words and I'd love to do something like that.

And I know it's probably not the most exciting thing in the world, but that's what I do well.

- Thank you.

Mr.

Haggit.

- I wouldn't be in charge of obviously of what committee I might get on.

Like I said before, I'm not going to play games and I have two lenses.

One, it's got to be constitutional and the other one's got to benefit the people of the great state of Wyoming.

And being on a committee, you usually ought to play with the big boys.

But if I get on a committee, it would be one that would involve the outdoors, like outdoor council.

- Mr.

Johnson.

- Thank you.

I'm also an attorney and the judicial, or excuse me, the judiciary committee would be one that I would seek.

And I also have a background in business, and so I think the appropriations committee would be another one that I would look at, but I would use the skills that I have currently to attempt to get onto these committee assignments.

And committees are important.

They're part of the legislative process.

That's how bills make it to the house floor.

And so it's important that we seek committee assignments that align with our skill sets.

- Candidates, thank you.

The next question from Clair McFarland, 60 second response.

Mr.

Haggit, you'll begin.

- Are there any federal agencies you would eliminate or downsize which and why?

- That's a really good one.

There's many.

There's many.

A lot of the three letter agencies are not constitutional.

They are served by people that were unelected and they beholden to who knows who... I would go after... There's a plethora of three letter agencies and I couldn't even begin to say who they are, but they need to be downsized.

And how that happens is would have to be worked out in the heat of the battle.

- Thank you, sir.

Mr.

Johnson.

- Thank you.

I guess two that come off the top of my head currently, not to eliminate, but to reduce, and those are ICE and the defense.

And here's what I mean.

The defense department is at a trillion dollars.

So we need to end the war in Iran and reduce spending at the defense department by ending the war in Iran.

ICE is received unprecedented funding and has essentially been used as a standing federal army that has gone into American cities and rounded up people and have committed atrocious constitutional violations without any accountability.

And so those are the two that I would look at first at reduction and it would also help close the gap between our spending and our income on the federal level.

- Thank you, sir.

Ms.

Kinney, 60 seconds.

- Sure.

The Defense Department is something I would do, try to cut down on, and I'll tell you why.

They just put in $1.5 trillion for this year's defense spending.

And you know what happens?

They take that money out of all of our social programs and that's because they don't do it like we did in the Wyoming State Senate where if you want to put money into a bill, you say where it's coming from.

Now they say $1.5 trillion is going into defense spending.

I have five pages of items they're cutting down to fund that with.

So I have an idea.

Here's my idea.

I think what we should do in Wyoming is create a drone factory to start creating drones because they are cheap.

We just spent all of our defense budget, the $1.4 million per whatever missile hitting little drones.

And it's terribly inexpensive, so we have to come up to date, create cheaper ways of fighting and do it in the state of Wyoming, create those in Wyoming.

Our sky is free.

I've talked to NOAA and they say great.

- Candidates, thank you.

This concludes the general question round.

We'll move now to about eight minutes of a lightning round format.

Each panelist will give a short prompt of one, two or a few words.

Each candidate will answer the same prompt.

You have 15 seconds to respond.

I encourage you to use that time.

It may be a little more than you realize.

The first will come from Clair McFarland.

Mr.

Haggit, you'll be the first respondent.

- Harriet Hageman.

- She's moved on and she's going to try to be in the Senate and I wish her well.

She's done a pretty good job and that's, I would, if I am elected, I would, she's very good at going out and informing people and so I would try to follow up with that.

Thank - You.

Mr.

Johnson.

- I'm not running against Harriet Hageman.

Good luck to her and her campaign.

If she and I both are elected, then obviously we would need to come together to represent the best interests of Wyoming.

- Thank you.

Ms.

Kinney.

- I taught Harriet Hageman law when she was going through law school.

I've known her for years, but she is dead wrong about taking away our public land.

She's put in bill after bill after bill after bill, and we need to stop what she's doing because that is not what the people of Wyoming want.

- Thank you.

The next prompt comes from Jordan Uplinger.

Mr.

Johnson, you'll be first to respond.

- ICE and immigration.

- I already touched on this earlier.

I think ICE is overly overfunded.

I think they're being used improperly.

We do need to ensure that our borders are secure because I believe that borders define a nation, but there's a right way of doing it and a wrong way of doing it.

And ICE is the wrong way of doing it.

- Thank you, sir.

The next... Are you up, Jordan?

The next question comes from me.

Thank you.

Ms.

Kinney, you'll be the first to respond.

I don't answer that one.

Yes, you do.

Please do.

Thank you.

- All right.

The problem with ICE, when it was first created, it worked because they had badges, they had masks or not masks.

They didn't have a quota of taking the number of people in, which they have now.

And when they're taking hundreds of people in because they're black or whether they're brown and they're being cruel and they're not using due process, it has to be reformed.

Thank you.

- ICE is... They're like, a lot of people look at them as the brown shirts of Nazi Germany and they've moved in, but a lot of the stuff that they run into problems with is because the local sanctuary outfits don't deal with them, so they got to come in with force.

But immigration's broken and needs reformed.

- Candidates, thank you.

The next prompt is from me.

Ms.

Kinney, you'll be the first to respond with 15 seconds.

In a few words, what's your leadership style?

- I'm a moderate Wyoming person.

I was born in Wyoming.

We're all the same.

We're, we like to work to solve problems for the people of Wyoming, and the people of Wyoming are my number one goal, to help them to make things better, to cut down on the cost of living, to get rid of the war.

- Mr.

Haggit.

- Leadership style.

I've been on numerous boards.

I've served on United Way.

I used to be the chairman of the Constitution Party of Wyoming.

Now I'm the vice chairman.

So you got to deal with all the aspects of that.

So I have a lot of history and, and experience with that.

Thank - You.

Mr.

Johnson.

- Thank you.

My leadership style is I lead from the front and I'm a coalition builder.

A leader cannot be a leader without a coalition.

- Thank you.

Next up for the prompt is Clair McFarland.

Mr.

Haggit, you'll be first.

Donald Trump.

- Interesting character.

He's, he's not the same person that he used to be.

I don't know what happened to the Trump that got elected the first time.

This guy's tyrannical.

He's off the wall.

I don't know.

He's, he just really confuses me where he goes.

- Thank you, sir.

Mr.

Johnson.

- Too much power largely given to him by the legislative branch.

The executive branch has way too much power and authority and it's time for the legislative branch to take back control of what their intent or what their purpose is, and that is to represent the voice of the people.

- Ms.

Kinney.

- Okay.

He made a lot of promises and he's broken them all.

We're seeing new wars that are legal wars because they did not, he did not ask Congress if he should do that.

He said the cost of food and all expenses are going down.

That's not the situation.

He's putting money into his pocket and we're still poor.

- Thank you.

Next prompt is from Jordan.

Mr.

Johnson, you'll be first.

- The roadless rule.

- I'm sorry?

- The roadless rule.

- I still couldn't hear you.

- The roadless rule.

- The roadless rule.

- Public lands.

- Public lands.

Public lands need to remain in public hands.

I support public lands being managed in Wyoming, the federal lands being, continue to be managed by the federal government, and I continue to support public access to those lands.

- Thank you, sir.

Ms.

Kinney.

- Okay.

If you're talking about the roadless rule, one of the things that you usually don't know is that it contains water, stops water, holds water for 26 million people.

And if you get rid of the roadless rule, all those people will have less, less great or less time being able to drink fresh water.

- Thank you.

We have time for a couple of more.

The next one comes from me.

Ms.

Kinney, Mr.

Haggit, after you.

- That was instituted by President Clinton and I was listening to a podcast a little bit ago and talking to this guy that's very knowledgeable about this and it needs work.

It needs tweaked like on other things.

Don't throw the baby out with the bath water.

It allows, still allows some roads to be built for fire prevention and stuff like that, but we need to keep the lands public and keep them where we, the people can can use them, that likes to get it in the back country.

- Thank you, sir.

Ms.

Kinney, you'll begin.

Nuclear energy.

- You know, the interesting thing about nuclear energy is we have, we need transition in Wyoming from oil and gas, and Naughton Plant is training all of their people to learn how to, to transition into nuclear.

For us to take care of our grand - great grandkids, we need to look at geothermal transitioning from all of our different kinds of energy over the years.

- Thank you.

Mr.

Haggit.

- Nuclear?

Nuclear energy.

Energy.

Nuclear energy.

I know the Chinese have built these pebblebed technology nuclear plants in local areas, and so they don't have, we don't have a, they don't have a right, like a great big power plant that services like three states, you know, and so they keep them small.

So nuclear energy is, is okay.

It just needs to be managed correctly.

- Thank you, sir.

Mr.

Johnson.

- I support all forms of energy.

I support diversifying energy as, as best we can because we've already seen what a one war can do to, to the rest of the world when they shut down oil out of the Strait of Hormuz.

So I support all forms of energy and diversifying our energy dependence.

- Candidates, thanks for participating in the lightning round.

We've moved on now to the closing segment of our debate, which is closing statements from each of you.

We agreed backstage.

These would be 60 seconds.

We'll continue in the order that we would have had the regular questioning continue, meaning Mr.

Haggit, you'll be first following Mr.

Johnson, followed by Ms.

Kinney.

Mr.

Haggit, closing statement, please.

- Okay.

Thanks again to the host and the moderators, fellow candidates, and you, the audience.

US President Gerald Ford was famously quoted as saying, "A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have."

Let think about that.

I want to be that voice in Washington fighting to return the country we love to the constitutional form set forth in September 17th, 1787.

I want to be that vote for a budget, that act that reduces the fraud and the misappropriation of your tax dollars.

I want to be that vote which restores our nation's sovereignty and removes any entanglements with foreign countries, especially military entanglements and alliances, as our founders warned us about.

And remember, we cannot spend our way out of inflation or tax our way into prosperity.

I will always choose principle over politics.

That's my promise to you.

Thank you.

- Thank you, sir.

Mr.

Johnson.

- Thank you.

I spent my life in public service, 21 years in the Army as a combat medic, a combat veteran from the Iraq War, 13 years in law enforcement, eight years on the Casper City Council, and now as an attorney.

I've lived life in the lower and middle classes.

I understand what it's like to live paycheck to paycheck.

I understand what it's like to decide whether I should pay the electric bill or buy groceries.

Today, Wyoming faces three main issues, high cost of living, the economy and shambles, and high healthcare costs.

If elected, I'll put the people of Wyoming first, vote against spending increases and unnecessary foreign wars, and take care of Wyoming and the United States before any other foreign country.

I'm running because I believe public service is about responsibility, not power.

I believe Wyoming deserves a representative who will come home and listen to the people and talk to the people and answer to them and not Washington.

So I ask for your vote in November and vote Shawn Johnson for Congress.

Thank you.

- Thank you, sir.

Lisa Kinney.

- Thank you.

My name is Lisa Kinney and I'm running for US House.

There are lots of reasons why you should vote for me.

And I'll tell you, about a week after the primary, I got a letter from the libertarian saying that both parties had failed and I was part of the problem.

He's never met me.

He'd never met me.

So you can't be serving the public or serving the working with both parties if you think they've both failed.

So I was a little bit disappointed in that.

So what I want to tell you is this.

In the primary, you saw what happened, that one person got 25% of the vote, and the same thing is going to happen again.

When you get your ballots, you have four options.

One of them is that guy.

The other three are us.

If you vote randomly for all of us, then the guy who won before is going to win again because he'll get the most.

You need to vote for me.

A woman said she had voted for me.

She hadn't voted for a Democrat in 56 years.

And she said, "I was energetic.

I was bipartisan.

I was Wyoming and she voted for me.

I need your vote."

Thank you.

- Candidates, thank you.

Lisa Kinney, Jeffrey Haggit, Shawn Johnson.

We appreciate your attendance and participation tonight.

Panelists, thank you for your participation and we appreciate the attention of our audience as well.

If you've not already voted, early voting is ongoing and remember that the primary election day is Tuesday, November 3rd.

Our state superintendent of public instruction debate begins in five minutes.

Thanks for watching.

This is Wyoming PBS.