By any measure, the Wyoming Legislature just completed a transformative session. In the House, the hard-line Freedom Caucus took control of a statehouse chamber for the first time in the U.S. In the Senate, leadership stunned observers when they decided the upper chamber would not pass a supplemental budget — another first for Wyoming.
During the 37-day session, lawmakers adopted a string of measures that could dramatically alter public life in Wyoming. The state is now set to embark on a universal private- home- or religious-school voucher program while doing away with almost all gun-free zones. Legislators passed a major property tax cut with significant implications not just for taxpayers, but for local government funding and services. And they showed an increased willingness to litigate national issues within the state’s borders, approving legislation to crack down on illegal immigration and transgender rights.
WyoFile asked its six staff reporters who covered the session to each share a key takeaway from the session. Here’s what they had to say.
School choice is having a moment
School choice was a popular buzzword in the 68th Legislature, where lawmakers introduced and debated several bills touted as enhancing the rights of Wyoming families to choose where and how their children are educated.
Those measures included House Bill 46, “Homeschool freedom act,” which frees homeschool parents from what many described as an unnecessary and onerous requirement to submit curriculum to their school district. That bill passed with little controversy.
The sailing wasn’t as smooth for House Bill 199, “Steamboat Legacy Scholarship Act,” which creates a universal school voucher program in the state. The program offers families $7,000 per child annually for K-12 non-public-school costs like tuition or tutoring. The scholarship also will offer money for pre-K costs, but only to families earning at or below 250% of the federal poverty level (about $80,000 annually for a family of four).
The bill survived dozens of amendment attempts and several challenges to pass through both legislative chambers, and lawmakers reported being deluged with constituent feedback for and against it. Even lawmakers arguing against the bill often noted that they are “all for school choice.”
Its passage is notable as it follows two years in which similar efforts had been shot down by those with constitutional concerns. Gov. Mark Gordon cited those very concerns when he partially vetoed a similar bill last year.
Opinions appear to have shifted. Gordon lauded this version as a “remarkable achievement for Wyoming,” though it’s expected to face a court challenge by opponents who maintain it violates the state constitution.
— Katie Klingsporn
Gordon’s erasable, red pen
Headed into session, it remained to be seen how willing Gordon would be to use his veto powers following an election season wherein many of the lawmakers he backed lost their races and the Wyoming Freedom Caucus took control of the House.
What became clear from week one, however, was the inclination of lawmakers to push back against vetoes.
As the Joint Appropriations Committee worked the supplemental budget bill on the first Friday of session, lawmakers voted to “override” many of Gordon’s line-item vetoes from 10 months before by adding language struck from last year’s budget bill back into this year’s supplement.
The move was highly unusual.
The Senate’s decision to tank the budget sank the added language with it, but the reversal by appropriators was a hint of what was to come.
At publishing time, Gordon had vetoed seven bills and exercised his line-item veto powers on an eighth. The Legislature attempted to override six of those rejections. Five of those attempts stuck.
Ten Sleep Republican Sen. Ed Cooper said overriding a veto by the governor is “probably one of the most serious things we do in this body,” as the Senate debated reversing Gordon’s decision to reject a bill requiring a transvaginal ultrasound and a 48-hour waiting period before taking abortion medications.
“Normally, I don’t do that,” Cooper said. “In fact, I don’t know that I’ve ever done that.”
But this time was different, said Cooper, who voted with 21 other lawmakers to override the governor’s decision.
— Maggie Mullen
Blurring the lines on federal immigration enforcement
The Legislature continued testing the limits of how much a state can involve itself in immigration enforcement — historically the realm of the federal government.
Wyoming lawmakers passed a bill opposing sanctuary cities and counties, though none exist in Wyoming. And the Legislature adopted a measure that will invalidate driver’s licenses issued to undocumented immigrants by as many as 20 states and the District of Columbia.
Questions abound about how that law will be enforced and how it might impact Wyoming’s standing with the states whose lawful licenses it will now refuse to honor.
But amid a political climate where illegal immigration remains a driving animus for Republican voters both nationwide as well as locally, conservative lawmakers made clear they want Wyoming to join President Donald Trump’s drive to deport large swaths of people currently residing in the country.
That’s what Sen. Cheri Steinmetz told WyoFile after the senate killed a controversial bill she brought to spark a sweeping statewide immigration crackdown. “President [Donald] Trump and other states are taking bold action to crack down on illegal immigration,” Steinmetz said in a statement. “Wyoming should follow suit.”
The Legislature’s fervor on the issue matches national trends, according to an expert in immigration policy. Both red- and blue-governed states are starting to lean deeper into immigration law, passing bills to make their states less or more welcoming to undocumented migrants and immigrant communities generally.
“States are starting to push the boundary to see how much authority local law enforcement can have,” Colleen Putzel-Kavanaugh, an analyst with the Migration Policy Institute, told WyoFile early on in the session.
— Andrew Graham
Senate defeats federal land grab
Wyoming senators narrowly defeated a resolution demanding control of all federal land in Wyoming except Yellowstone National Park.
Although Senate Joint Resolution 2, “Resolution demanding equal footing,” was only an expression of Wyoming’s desires, it drew widespread attention and criticism because of similar recent efforts in the West. Consideration of the resolution came in the wake of Utah’s appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court seeking a similar transfer of property in that state.
Sen. Bob Ide, a Casper Republican and commercial real estate developer, claimed that the U.S. Constitution requires the federal government to turn over the public land, which belongs to all Americans. Senators had a constitutional duty to vote for the resolution, he has said.
Opponents of the idea have characterized his view as a misreading of the Constitution. Sen. Mike Gierau, D-Jackson, said that land is of paramount importance to his district. “We hold these lands dear,” he told the Senate. “We hold these lands sacred.”
Sen. Cale Case, R-Lander, another critic of the resolution, said the measure was “probably the most important issue” to his constituents. Americans owning and using public lands is “one of the most fundamental pieces of our Constitution,” he said.
— Angus M.Thuermer Jr.
Controversial wildlife bills beat back in bulk
During the 2025 general session, some Wyoming lawmakers’ desires to affect wildlife management locked horns with others’ unwillingness to tell biologists and wardens how to do their jobs.
A number of controversial or divisive bills succeeded, including a measure reclassifying otters, another upping penalties for wildlife torture and a change in the law that allows the Wyoming Game and Fish Department to regulate guided fishing.
But on balance, the most hotbutton proposals did not survive.
La Barge Republican Rep. Mike Schmid, a freshman, came out hot-to-trot in proposing House Bill 286, “Mountain lion hunting season-changes,” which sought to completely overhaul how mountain lions are managed across Wyoming. It ran into overwhelming opposition and went nowhere.
Schmid’s effort to end the practice of running over wildlife with snowmobiles was likewise struck down twice during the legislative session.
There were also failed efforts to tell Game and Fish — and the federal government — how they ought to manage grizzly bears. One proposal called for hunting grizzlies even if they remained protected by the Endangered Species Act, and another would have banned state wildlife managers from spending any money on the bruins, with a few exceptions. Both were shot down.
The outcome was the same for a proposal that would have allowed Wyoming landowners to sell special hunting tags they’re granted. Hotly contested, the bill was pulled back by its sponsor, Kemmerer Republican Sen. Laura Pearson.
— Mike Koshmrl
Lawmakers favor fossil fuels
Fossil fuels continued to win favor among Wyoming lawmakers, while measures regarding renewables and energy efficiency were mostly punitive, advocates say.
Lawmakers handed surface coal producers a $10 million annual tax break — the second such tax cut since 2022 — and seeded a $10 million fund for those who provide commercial carbon dioxide used to produce more oil. Two other measures aimed at repealing carbon dioxide reduction mandates and outlawing such efforts were similarly intended to boost fossil fuels in an increasingly carbon-restrictive marketplace. One of those bill titles put it bluntly: Make Carbon Dioxide Great Again. Other fossil fuel proponents, however, suggested those measures might actually work against fossil fuel industries, and the bills failed.
Meantime, rooftop solar proponents fended off a perennial attempt to lower credits to homes and businesses that invest in small-scale systems to save money on their monthly electric bills. Rooftop solar proponents pushed their own measure to increase the size of personal solar systems that qualify for so-called net metering — an effort supported by family agricultural operations — only to see it fail at the last minute.
Renewable proponents also helped sink a moratorium on commercial wind and solar projects, as well as a “poison pill” bill that would have required wind energy producers to bury decommissioned wind turbine blades onsite.
Though two efforts to allow the storage of radioactive spent nuclear fuel failed, proponents suggested there’s renewed support for what has long been a divisive issue in the state.
— Dustin Bleizeffer
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