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Wyoming Plagiarism of Al Gore's Title

David Iverson - July 17, 2023

Last week, Representative Barry Crago, a ”Republican” from Buffalo, penned a statewide op-ed blaming the numerous failures of the 2023 Legislative Session on the work of the 26 members of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus. 

It’s interesting that Rep. Crago would mooch the title of his op-ed, “An Inconvenient Truth:…” from a thoroughly discredited Al Gore movie about global warming.  The claims made in Crago’s piece are just as preposterous as those in the film.  Rep. Crago spends several paragraphs asserting that it was the Freedom Caucus that prevented any form of tax relief from being passed.  

In the Wyoming House of Representatives there are 26 conservatives. There are 31 liberal "republicans," with whom Crago votes in lock-step.  I say that they are liberal because their voting record proves it out. Barry Crago and his Wyoming Caucus votes with the Democrats an astounding 80% of the time. Not even Liz Cheney has a record like that.  

And yet, the Wyoming Caucus insists they are the true Republicans and are the only ones working for the good of Wyoming Citizens.These are the folks that voted for millions upon millions of dollars of new spending and who claim that property tax caps only benefit the rich.  

I would be more than happy to provide the audio soundbite of Casper “Republican” Steve Harshman saying that. If Crago and the Wyoming Caucus truly believe they are working in our best interests, they must think Wyoming should lean more to the Democrat party. Because, that’s how they vote. 

At his recent town hall, Crago implored the crowd to pour over Wyoleg.gov to find the truth of his voting record. Fortunately, I already have. Of the 620 recorded votes in the 2023 session, 534 times Crago dutifully voted with Mr. “Tax the Rich” Harshman.  

One of those votes was against capping your property taxes. And how many times did Rep Crago vote to increase spending? Almost every single time.  Search “Crago” on the site he pleaded with you to look at, you’ll find out for yourself.

At Crago’s town hall he quoted Mark Twain in saying, “There are lies, damn lies and then there’s statistics.”  Of course, he was referring to Evidence Based Wyoming, WyoVote and WyoRino—the three prominent legislative rankings websites.  The only thing that Evidence Based Wyoming does is keeps track of how often a legislator votes with the Republicans or the Democrats. If the data from that site is nothing but lies, then so is what Crago says about his voting record.

The last time I checked, 26 is less than 31, and is not a majority in the House. It is mathematically impossible for the Freedom Caucus to have stopped a single thing that Crago and his pals wanted to pass.  Crago’s Wyoming Caucus has the majority in the House. Why were they not able to pass any meaningful property tax relief? The Freedom Caucus could not have stopped them. There is only one logical conclusion: they didn’t want to.  

Barry Crago can blame the Freedom Caucus for anything he wants but like Al Gore’s movie, saying it doesn’t make it true.

In Johnson County, we haven’t trusted Cheyenne since 1892. Representative Barry Crago’s votes prove we still don’t have any reason to.