♪♪ Wyoming PBS, Wyoming Public Media and Cowboy State Daily presents vote 2026.

The U.S.. Senate Republican primary debate live from the little theater on the campus of Central Wyoming College.

♪♪♪ Greetings, viewers, audience members and candidates.

I'm Steve Peck.

Public affairs producer for Wyoming PBS.

Welcome to today's Republican primary.

Election debate.

Among candidates for U.S.. Senate.

That seat currently is held by Cynthia Lummis, a Republican who is retiring.

The primary election is Tuesday, August 18th.

You heard our debate partners during the opening credits of the debate, and we add our thanks now to Central Wyoming College and President Dr.

Brad Tyndall for hosting us on campus tonight.

All ballot eligible candidates from both the Republican and Democratic parties were invited to take part in this debate for Republicans accepted that invitation at our on stage.

Now, this debate is being aired and streamed live on Wyoming PBS and Wyoming Public Media.

Tonight's debate comprises five segments.

First, a preview question was sent more than 24 hours ago to all four participants.

I will ask that question shortly to open the debate, and each candidate can respond for as long as 90 second the candidates will respond from left to right in the order that you see them on stage.

That order was determined before the debate.

In a random drawing backstage in which the candidates participated.

Next, our panelists will ask three questions in sequence to the full slate of candidates.

Each candidate, in turn, will answer the same question again, with 90s allowed for the response.

The candidate who responded second to the initial preview question will respond first to the opening all panel question, and each subsequent response will move down the line.

In turn.

Third, we devote about eight minutes to a short answer lightning round, with each candidate responding to a brief prompt with 15 seconds allotted per response.

We expect to have time for about ten lightning round cues, but we'll have more if we need them.

Fourth, our panelists will ask one round of individual questions.

That is a different question for each candidate.

The initial answers are limited to 60s, after which each remaining candidate on stage will be permitted.

20s for rebuttal or response or reaction.

Then the initial respondent will have a final 15 seconds for a follow up if desired.

As always, we'll proceed down the line so that a different candidate goes first with each new question, and I invite my panelists and the candidates to help keep me keep that order in line.

I might just need it.

Finally, each candidate has 45 seconds for a closing statement.

The closing statements will proceed in reverse order from the initial preview questions that open the debate.

In a joint briefing before the debate, we expressed to the candidates that we expect and require civil conduct and decorum during the debate.

We expect the candidates to address the questions asked of them.

And while occasional references to other candidates are not necessarily prohibited, prolonged challenges or pointed attacks at other candidates are not permitted and will be interrupted.

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

Our remaining panel consists of two experienced Wyoming journalists, Clair McFarland of Cowboy State Daily and Melodie Edwards of Wyoming Public Media, and this note Wyoming Public Media and Wyoming PBS have similar names.

We are friendly partners in this debate tonight, but otherwise are separate and unaffiliated entities with different staff, different licensing, different facilities, locations and management.

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

He'll operate a visual timing device, which most of you can see we resembling a traffic light.

Timing begins the moment the candidate starts speaking.

When 10 seconds of the allotted time remains, the yellow light will appear, flashing when the allotted time has expired, the red light appears and an alert will sound, and I probably will advise the candidate to stop reasonable allowances to complete a thought or a sentence are fine, but I ask candidates not to abuse that flexibility.

Thank you in advance.

Now we meet the candidates for our U.S.

Senate debate participating tonight.

Introduced from left to right Jimmy Skovgard.

Sam.

Mead.

John.

Holtz and U.S.. Representative Harriet Hageman.

A fourth candidate, Jill Edwards was ballot eligible.

She was invited, but she did not respond to repeated invitations to participate.

This is the first of three debates tonight.

Following this debate, Republican candidates for governor take the stage, followed at 9 p.m.

By Democratic candidates for U.S.. Senate.

Now we begin.

Each candidate was sent the following preview question yesterday.

Candidates.

The constitutionally constructed separation of powers and U.S.

Government has tilted in different directions from time to time through the generations.

Today, some say the executive branch, meaning the president has been accorded too much power compared to Congress, partly because the U.S.

Senate itself has become too deferential to the executive.

Is this critique accurate in your view, or is the balance of power between President and Senate appropriate and satisfactory?

Mr.

Skovgard, your first 90s.

Thank you for the invitation here tonight, and thank you, CWC, for hosting and and.

Wyoming PBS.

Yes, yes, the balance is deeply skewed.

Our Constitution gives Congress the power to write laws, control spending, and decide whether this nation goes to war.

Executive orders were never intended to become a substitute for legislation.

Congress has surrendered too much of its responsibility through broad delegations of power open ended emergency authority and war authorizations that continue for decades.

Senators should not simply defer to the president.

Our oath is to the Constitution.

Congress must claim its authority by writing clear laws controlling the purse, limiting emergency powers, conducting serious oversight and requiring a direct vote before this country enters a war.

We were never meant to wake up and discover that we were trapped in a conflict that people never approved, and Congress cannot easily end.

I also support congressional term limits.

The people's work can be done by the people.

Public office should be a period of service not linked to a lifetime of power.

We must restore lawmaking authority to the branch closest to us.

That's how we restore the balance of power.

Thank you sir.

Mr.

Mead 90s.

I think, of course, that's an accurate critique.

I lay much of the blame at the feet of Congress, and when there's a vacuum of power, because Congress has been ineffective, the executive naturally comes in to fill that.

But my campaign is about solving problems, not describing to you problems you're already familiar with.

And so I think things that we can do to solve that immediately are term limits.

The long terms that we have for our Congress people encourage loyalty to the party instead of loyalty to constituents.

And I think that's a problem.

I think we need to legislate away omnibus legislation because it makes it really hard to hold our representatives accountable.

And it takes a long time to write huge, huge bills.

And who here has ever read a huge, let's say, the one big, beautiful bill, you know, it's it's a monster.

We need to legislate feedback into the laws we make.

I was a software engineer and any modern system you build, you build in things that allow our legislation to evolve with our country.

So we're not relitigating the same things over and over.

And finally, I really think we need to change the way we finance campaigns.

Just, for instance, our Senate race, 10% of the money is come from Wyoming.

And that's alarming.

I'm proud to say 85% of my campaign has money has come from Wyoming, but people from this state should be able to choose.

Thank you sir.

Mr.

Holtz 90s.

Thank you all for being here.

I would like to say I confronted this problem when I was a judge many years ago.

After just a few years on the bench, the Wyoming Legislature passed a law that required judges.

When someone pled guilty or was found guilty of driving under the influence to pick up driver's licenses and issue new ones.

And I refuse to do it.

It somewhat great personal risk, career risk, et cetera.

But the Supreme Court upheld me 5 to 0.

We need three branches of government.

They need to be separate and equal.

It's very important to follow our Constitution and to have the courage to do it.

And I demonstrated that shortly after being appointed within a year or two, I believe it was 1983.

I was appointed in 1981.

So in Congress, we have to have the courage to do that and convince others to do the right thing.

It's one thing to go to the Senate with a set of, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that, but you've got to get other senators to agree with you.

You may have to pry.

Lobbyists off the lap of some of your comrades to get their attention.

But you need to do what it takes to get something done that will follow the Constitution.

We have three branches of government, and they should be separate and equal.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir, Miss Hageman.

Yes, well thank you.

We are a republic.

We are a representative form of government.

And obviously we need to rebalance the relationship between the legislative and executive branch which is what I've been working on for 30 years prior to coming to Congress as a private attorney.

Both the judges, both the courts, as well as the legislative branch have abdicated their responsibility of asserting their lawmaking authority Just as an example, in 2024, there were right at about 200 bills that were passed into law, but over 3000 regulations issued by the Biden administration, it's actually a tax of about $2.1 trillion a year, is what the regulatory burden is in this country.

And as I've indicated, I spent over 30 years as a private attorney pushing back against that, but also because of the knowledge that I have doing that kind of work.

I was appointed by the Republican Study Committee to lead the article one Task force, the very purpose of which is to make sure that we are rebalancing that power and making sure that it is the legislative branch, not the administrative agencies, that are controlling what happens in this country.

Just in the last couple of weeks, we have seen the kind of abuses of of power when we have unelected bureaucrats making major, incredibly significant decisions about our health.

For example, Anthony Fauci had far too much power.

We know how that turned out.

And you can say that about many, many different agency heads.

I have worked to reduce the power of agencies and to make sure that the legislative branch does carry out its responsibility.

That's what I've been doing in Congress.

Candidates.

Thank you.

Now we begin our all panel questions.

There'll be three of these.

The first one asked by Clair McFarland.

Thank you.

Where, if anywhere, would you cut the U.S.. Budget specifically?

It'd be Mr.

Mead Mead your first 90s.

So the way I like to think about problems is let's attack the low hanging fruit first.

And that means going where the money is.

If you look at our spending, one of the biggest line items is health care in terms of Medicare and Medicaid and any improvement we can make to our health care system, I think is going to pay huge dividends because it is a drag on growth.

People don't want to be entrepreneurs.

And, you know, there's a human factor as well.

It is not fun to not be able to pay for your own health.

So one of the things I think I'd like to do as a software engineer, building communication protocols is build a communication protocol that's standardized by the federal government between the insurer and the providers.

We shouldn't have to have a different system for every single insurer, and we can cut the administrative costs and start to build regional national markets.

That will really help Wyoming.

A lot of times we're served by monopoly or duopoly of insurers.

And that is not ever an environment that's really going to serve the patients.

So that's, that's the first step I think we have to do is make sure we attack that administrative cost.

Then.

And that's such a big number, the health care costs.

Then we start working down from there and improving some of our efficiencies.

But it's a it's a huge problem.

Honestly, we've let it go for far too long, and I don't want to leave our kids with that.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Mr.

Holtz 90s.

Yes, and I have and I'm being a bit facetious.

Wonderful news for everyone about the national debt.

It's not going to hit 40 trillion until slightly August.

After August 18th, it's going to be a few days after that before it hits 40 trillion.

That is serious.

We need to look at everywhere to make cuts.

Nothing should be exempt.

Even things we really need.

We look at ways to do things more efficiently, cheaper, but we need to do something or we are going to experience Weimar Republic inflation, where you have to pay for a meal in advance because the price could change during a meal.

We could experience hyperinflation, and we need to have the courage to confront it and not just talk about it, but actually do something.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Miss Hageman.

Yes.

The one big beautiful bill has already been mentioned up here this evening.

We actually cut $1.5 trillion in spending with the one big, beautiful bill.

I have consistently voted for appropriations bills that cut spending.

For example, one that we recently had actually cut spending related to the United Nations.

One of the things that I have consistently advocated for is taking power out of Washington, D.C.

How do we do that?

We need to reduce the size and scope of the federal government.

And this kind of relates to the very first questions that you asked, which is, what is the balance and relationship between the executive branch and the legislative branch?

There are over 400 agencies, federal agencies in Washington, D.C.

Much of the work that many of those agencies do needs to be done at the state level.

We have federalized far too much in this country, and we need to empower our states, our local governments, our legislators, our governors to actually be the ones that make the decisions that affect us, the government that is closest to the people is more effective.

It's more accountable, it's more responsive.

And by cutting the size and scope of the federal government, we're going to be cutting across the board.

There are many agencies.

There are many things that can be done at the state level.

And in fact, there's a lot of duplication between what we do with state agencies and what we do with federal agencies, the EPA and the Department of Environmental Quality, Department of AG, Department of AG, Department of Education, the Board of Education.

We have a lot of redundancy, and I believe bringing power back to the states and reducing the federal government will allow us to cut spending pretty dramatically.

Thank you, Mr.

Skovgard.

90 sec How can we trust our government?

How can we trust a representative who comes in and tells us that we just cut $1.5 trillion from our deficit, and yet we're going to see a deficit by the end of this year, $41 trillion, 1.3 trillion more than where it's at right now.

How do we trust that?

And the idea that we can borrow money and then turn around and say, oh, I just saved you a 1.5 trillion?

That's that's ridiculous.

This has got to stop.

This is going to affect our children.

This affects our posterity, our posterity.

That's all the names that come after us.

And yet we, we, we stick our heads in the sand and we say, oh, we don't have any say in that.

Yes we do, yes we do.

We're citizens of this United States.

We're citizens of this great state of Wyoming.

And we do have a say.

We have that say on August 18th.

Let's let's face it, folks, we need to take our ownership of this situation ourselves because it's certainly not being done by the folks that we've hired to represent us.

And literally, we do hire them every four, six, and two years.

The folks that we have hired are failing us, and they don't seem to care why this is affecting our children, our grandchildren.

Every, like I said before, every name that follows us, that's who it's affecting right now.

And can we not do anything about it?

Yes, we most certainly can.

We can work under the 10th amendment of the Constitution and return some of the powers that we've shifted to the federal government back to the states where they belong.

Thank you, sir.

Our next question is from Melodie Edwards.

Mr.

Holtz, you'll begin.

To follow up on the the previous question, what do you see as a concerning example of federal overreach, and how do you propose to rein it back in?

I see examples of federal overreach everywhere.

For example, the one big, beautiful bill.

I'm going to try to be polite, has some shortcomings.

I think the longer we have it, the more evidence it's going to be.

It's going to affect a number.

It's going to have what I call the law of unintended consequences.

We are going to be making it more difficult for people to stay on Medicare.

Some people are able to draw Medicare and Medicaid at the same time.

It's going to reduce Medicaid rolls.

But what happens when somebody loses their health care?

They go to an emergency room at the hospital and rural hospitals bear that burden more significantly than most other hospitals.

When somebody goes without insurance, they go to the emergency room.

It's like triple the cost.

And rural hospitals may not or will not be able to sustain that We may be losing more quickly and more hospitals in Wyoming than we have projected.

That has some unintended consequences.

But you look at other things.

You look at Social Security, which is basically running into an iceberg.

Well, when I say running into the iceberg, it's kind of like being on the Titanic and looking down and all you see is white.

You're on the iceberg.

It is going to run out of run short of money and approximately 75 months.

So the current senator, the next senator will have to solve that problem with others.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Representative Hageman federal overreach.

I wish we had several days to visit about this particular one.

The federal Department of Education, I think, is a classic example.

Their budget is about $80 billion, but only about 10% of that actually goes through K through 12 education, with the remainder of it just being paying to pay for the bureaucracy in Washington, D.C.

But I'll give you a real world example of federal overreach right here in Wyoming with a gentleman up near Warland who moved an irrigation ditch on his property The EPA came in as a test case and determined that that irrigation ditch was a navigable water of the United States and sought to penalize him $65 million for affecting 2.1 acres of land on his own property.

This was an effort by the EPA to use the Clean Water Act to control irrigation, to control water quantity, using a water quality statute to control water quantity, which is clearly delegate, which is clearly within the jurisdiction of the state of Wyoming administering water rights.

That's just one example of the of the various lawsuits that I've handled over the years.

And you see it in almost every single agency that level of federal overreach.

So I have a real world examples.

And that's why in Congress, I have been working so hard to modernize many of these statutes so that we do not have that kind of overreach and make sure that the federal government stays in its lane, and the states stay within their lane, and then also protecting our civil liberties, federal overreach.

I don't think that you can describe anything more than what we saw with Anthony Fauci over those several years.

That was the most extreme form of federal overreach that I think any of us ever experienced.

We don't ever want that to happen again.

Thank you, Mr.

Skovgard.

So let's talk about federal overreach.

How about the 23rd plank of the Republican Party right here in Wyoming?

We will not allow the federal government to ever impinge upon local elections in Wyoming.

And yet our our senators, our representatives all push for the Save America Act.

Why?

That is obvious.

Federal overreach.

What happens when a Democrat governor or Democrat president takes power?

Do we want that Department of Justice to send notes to our county clerks on how we're toto conduct our elections in Wyoming?

No, we do not.

That is federal overreach.

And that's what's going on right now.

Why do we need to look at what's gone on in the past?

We need to be looking at what's going on in the future.

We can talk about Dr.

Fauci.

We can talk about Joe Biden.

But that doesn't solve anything going forward.

It doesn't keep us from reaching into our children's future.

It doesn't solve the national debt or the deficit spending that we see.

It doesn't stop odd wars that just kind of start up overnight.

You wake up one day and you say, oh, we're in a war.

How did that happen?

Is that federal overreach?

I'm not sure.

I thought the power to declare war resides with Congress, resides with the the House and the Senate.

What happened?

What happened to our our system of government?

We you and I have let this go.

We are the ones responsible for this.

And we need to accept our responsibility as citizens.

Thank you, Mr.

Mead.

Well, I think there's several examples that I'd look to the Buffalo RMP or the Rock Springs RMP, which were done.

Without much consultation with the state and with our commissioners.

And I believe in small government.

I believe in local control.

We here in Wyoming especially, we have unique challenges and the people here are really best suited to solve those problems.

But another one that's near and dear to me is you know, the support for, of, of federal mandate to dispose of 2 to 3 million acres of land throughout the west and, that was a, a mandated sale of land.

It had the Secretary of the interior had broad discretion to nominate parcels and the people of Wyoming had no say in what was going to be nominated.

And there's no recourse once that land is gone.

so I think that's a really good example of federal overreach.

We don't want to see as someone that believes I'm a conservative, I believe in small government.

I'm not sure how that's compatible with the ideals of conservatism.

I'm happy that there's been more pushback to that sort of thing.

Thank you.

Thank you.

The third and final question in this all panel session comes from me and Miss Hageman, you'll be first to respond.

Candidates.

Congress hasn't passed an actual annual federal budget since the 1990s.

Since then, relying on a series of stopgap continuing resolutions to stave off government shutdowns or gigantic so-called omnibus bills that are so long as to be incomprehensible.

A 2022 omnibus bill ran to more than 4000 pages.

These bills contain not just basic budgeting, but billions of pork barrel spending for earmarked spending, much of which isn't detected until after the bill has been signed into law.

Nobody thinks this is good, but Congress keeps doing it anyway, year after year.

What's the problem and what can be done?

Miss Hageman, you're first 90s.

Mr.

Peck, I'm actually going to correct the record on that.

Please, if necessary.

because we did pass the budget this year.

The 2022 omnibus bill was the very last Pelosi budget.

Since then, and since the Republicans have controlled the House, we have not done any more omnibus bills for the first two years.

We did, in fact, do CRS or continuing resolutions.

But this year, this past year and through January, and then later this summer with one seat, with one particular reconciliation package, we actually passed 11 budget appropriation bills.

And then as I just indicated, we then did the reconciliation package.

So under the Republican leadership, we have actually worked very hard to to go back to regular order and pass the individual 12 appropriations bills that we are required to do.

So, for example, the Department of Education, the various other the defense bills, the budget coming out of the Natural Resource Committee.

So in fact, we have done that.

That's exactly what we did was we've gone back to that with our leadership.

And I advocate for that.

I have advocated for it since I have been there.

I have made it very clear to the leadership that I would not support those kinds of omnibus spending bills.

The last, as I indicated, was in 2022, because we do need to be doing our individual appropriations bills in the House of Representatives.

We have consistently done that before.

We also controlled the Senate.

We had to work with the Democrat controlled Senate.

And so there were some CRS.

But since we have controlled the whole of government, we've done our 12 appropriations bills.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Skovgard.

So we're talking about the budget.

Who approves the budget?

That is Congress.

That is us.

The the branch that's closest to us needs to be visiting with us about what it's spending our money on.

Who ends up holding the bag?

Is it Congress?

I don't think so.

I think it's us.

The people end up holding that bag, and that bag is getting heavier and fuller and and out of control to a point where who knows where it's going to stop?

Why can't we just say no?

Simple.

Oh, you want to spend $1 billion here?

No.

Oh, you want to spend $1 billion there?

No.

Why don't we balance the budget first?

First?

Just try it once.

Just balance the budget one time, and then everything else is just.

No.

Oh, you want to go in and start a war somewhere?

You better come to the people first.

And the people had better have a method that they can respond.

And we do have the technology right now, folks, I'm telling you, we have the technology to reach out and get your feedback before we pass any budget.

And I expect, I expect Wyoming to say, no, no, we don't need we don't need that.

No, Michigan doesn't need that.

No, California doesn't need that.

We need to look at what we need bare bones to run our government and start cutting it back.

Return those functions to the state that belong to the state that should have never left the states.

Mr.

Mead 90s.

Well, as I mentioned in the opening question, I do believe omnibus bills pose some problems for Congress.

something thats really important to me is that we make government more efficient.

We make government more effective, and omnibus bills, I think, are a large part of why it's not effective.

And so I guess to explain more of the problems with it it makes it really hard to hold our representatives accountable because if you have a monster bill, you can always point to something that's good in it.

Someone else can always point to something that's bad in it.

And it, you know, it becomes hard to judge whether or not those things are good for your constituents.

They take a really long time to write and we, we should value our representatives time because that's time taken away from time They could otherwise be spending making good legislation, making our lives better.

And then you know, it just allows a lot of horse trading, which, you know, I guess probably comes with its goods and its bads, but it, it slows the process down.

And so I think I would like to legislate into existence some germaneness rules and make sure that the legislation we create is discrete and it covers single issues.

Because I was a software engineer, that's how we developed software.

You make small changes quickly, and pretty soon really big things happen.

And it's an effective government.

I want to see it.

Thank you.

Mr.

Holtz.

90s.

We are in serious trouble.

Congress couldn't do this when we were at peace.

We are now at war.

Look at Social Security, which I spoke to briefly, but three things.

The cost of living allowance has not kept up with inflation.

It's lost approximately $0.30, 30% of its value since 2000.

The thresholds have not been adjusted for inflation when they were originally enacted, virtually no one paid tax on Social Security.

Now it's about 50% paid tax on Social Security.

Soon it will be virtually everyone taxed at almost the rate of ordinary income.

Then they will have to be a cut in 75 months of about 22 to 25%.

You put that all together.

Parents aren't going to be able to afford to stay in their house Kids aren't going to afford to buy a house.

Kids and parents together are going to have to struggle to keep the house theyre in.

We have.

But look at this war with Iran.

I read an article that said This is World War Three and I thought that's a bit of an exaggeration, perhaps.

Perhaps not.

Think about it.

We are at war with a theology and Islamic theology that believes they have to start a war and be losing for their Mahdi or Savior to come and save them.

We are in a serious war situation.

Thank you.

Candidates, Thank you.

That concludes the all panel questions.

We'll now devote about eight minutes to a quick response.

Lightning round.

You'll have 15 seconds to respond.

All four of you will respond to the prompt, and then we'll do another one.

The first one comes from Clair McFarland.

Immigration.

Mr.

Skovgard.

What a mistake.

Fighting against people that have no voice.

When we could be fighting against the employers that employ these folks and solve the problem.

If you have if you have a a problem legally, you go after the money, you don't go after the the Jose and Maria, you go after the money.

The employer.

And we're not doing that.

Mr.

Mead.

I think we can spend our money more effectively.

And while treating people with dignity and respect, I'm really proud to live in a country that people want to immigrate to and be a part of.

Mr.

Holtz.

We have a real problem.

When I was in elementary school in Del Rio, you could fish the Rio Grande safely.

When I was a lieutenant stationed in Laredo, I remember someone strapping on a pistol.

I said do we need that And he says, it's not a bad idea.

Now they're hanging people from bridges.

We have a serious, serious problem.

Lewes Hageman.

A country without borders isn't a country at all.

It was absolutely critical that we close the border.

President Trump has done that, and we've passed some very good legislation to make sure that we are reforming our immigration policies so that we do not have this kind of an influx in the future.

The criminal and economic impact of of the Biden four years is going to be devastating.

Our next prompt is from Melodie Edwards, and Mr.

Mead, you'll be first.

a nationwide abortion ban.

I've personal experience with an ectopic pregnancy.

And, you know, I know the pain of that more than anyone else, that unless you've been through it, I don't want to put doctors in a position where they're deciding between legality And saving a mother's life.

Mr.

Holtz.

It should be illegal both nationally and with every state.

Thank you.

Miss Hageman.

I am pro-life and it should be illegal.

Mr.

Skovgard.

Well, I'm pro-life.

I believe that there are.

There are more than just one life at stake here.

There are four.

There's the mother, the child, the father and the doctor.

All of those need to be consulted.

And we've already decided that this is a state wide issue, not a federal issue.

Thank you.

The next prompt is for me, Mr.

Holtz.

You'll go first.

Age limits for members of Congress.

I think they should be [LAUGHTER] over [APPLAUSE] 18.

[LAUGHTER] [APPLAUSE] Thank you.

Miss Hageman.

Constitution specifically identifies the qualifications, and the court has already held that you cannot legislatively impose additional restrictions on the ability to run for office.

Mr.

Skovgard it would take a constitutional amendment, and there's one out there.

Convention of states is looking at term limits.

I think that term limits is probably the way to go rather than age limits, although we do need to take a look at the the ability of folks to think after a certain age, you know, we really do.

Mr.

Mead.

Yeah, I think term limits are the the right answer here.

You know, we may end up living longer and we'll have to change the law again.

Thank you.

Next prompt is from Clair McFarland.

I'm being told that we're out of time for the lightning round.

I thank you for your participation and congratulate you for using your allotted time for the other questions.

We move now to our individual campaign or individual candidate questions.

Each of us will ask a different candidate a question.

You'll have 60s to respond, after which each candidate in turn has 20s for a rebuttal, a reaction or response.

Then the first candidate to answer will have a final 15 seconds if desired.

I believe Mr.

Holtz goes.

Miss Hageman goes first with this one, and the question comes from Clair McFarland.

, Wyoming and other plaintiffs recently challenged the Trump administration, administration, arguing that the National Firearms Act is not lawful because it it purged several of its tax components.

Should and the judge ruled that it is not lawful, but it was a narrow ruling applying only to some plaintiffs should Congress take up revising or repealing the National Firearms Act?

And how?

Who was that a question to?

Was that to me?

You know, I'm very Pro-second amendment.

Second amendment is absolutely on the same level as every otherconstitutional right that we have.

And I have always been consistent in that way.

In terms of the judge's decision, I think it's very interesting the issue that has been put before us.

But what I will tell you is I have signed on to numerous pieces of legislation to make sure that we are protecting our Second Amendmentrights.

And to the extent that any court is attempting to limit those, I think that we absolutely should be involved in that and make sure that everybody can exercise their Second Amendment rights.

Thank you.

Mr.

Skovgard, 20 sec.

response.

I would say, at what point did we give up the negative powers that we enumerated in the Bill of rights?

At what point did we give those rights to the federal government to determine whether or not we enjoy the right to keep and bear arms?

We have never done that.

And therefore, that's one of those 10th amendment issues that needs to come back to the states.

Mr.

Mead.

20 sec.

Yeah, I think the NFA could use some adjustments.

There's too much ambiguity.

The agencies decide what's legal and what's not.

And that changes a lot, which leaves gun owners in the lurch.

If you buy something, then it becomes illegal.

That's not really the environment I think we should be creating, and we can probably fix that through legislation.

Mr.

Holtz.

When I was in my 20s, I was at Hughes Aircraft.

I did things no one else was ever able to do, including then I was the head of the committee to redesign the fire control system for the Army's main battle tank, the laser rangefinder, ballistic computer thermal imaging system.

I strongly support the Second Amendment, and it needs to be clarified, but it needs to be basically enforced because otherwise it will simply disarm the innocent.

Millis Hageman 15 seconds if you like.

Sure, I have worked hard against the ATF as it has sought to criminalize and impose ex post facto laws against a variety of different types of things, such as bump stocks.

And so I will continue to be a strong defender of the Second Amendment and push back against any effort to try to limit our right in that regard.

Thank you.

Next question from Melodie Edwards and Mr.

Skovgard, your first sorry about that.

Indigenous people are murdered and go missing at disproportionately high rates in Wyoming and across the nation.

What measures would you do use to support to address this crisis?

That's a good question.

And it affects us right here in Riverton very, almost directly.

Indigenous peoples suffer from a endemic drug use.

And why is that?

Why are we we not looking into the root causes of this?

We can't prevent it because it's a choice.

And we say, well, it's maybe it's not a choice.

Well, we can do something.

We can build a regional facility right here in Riverton or Lander that treats this, this type of, of abuse, this type of drug addiction, and bring those folks in on, at, on their own free will.

They need to enter into this type of treatment and finish this type of treatment.

And we need to begin healing those communities, working with those communities.

We can't just direct this.

We have to sit down and work with those communities.

And as your next senator, that is something that is on my agenda to do to make sure that we are talking with those folks and helping them heal.

Mr.

Mead 20 second response.

Yeah, I find it deeply disappointing that we haven't found a better solution for what we've been doing yet.

We need to be able to work with tribes, give them the resources they need to, to prosecute felons and, and start working on the enforcement side of these things.

And yeah, we just need to give it the time it needs and I'll work on that.

Mr.

Holtz 20 sec.

Years ago, when I was a judge with Judge Betty Kail, we cleaned up Chief Washakie's grave.

That had a real profound influence on me.

We need to do things to care for everyone.

And one more thing about abortion clinics.

Half the people that go in don't come out alive.

Miss Hageman 20s.

Yes.

In my first term in Congress, I was the chairman of the Indian and Insular Affairs Subcommittee, and I worked extensively on issues associated with providing additional security to our tribes across the country.

Just one example of what I did was to try to make sure that we could recruit additional officers, was making sure that benefits would be on parity with federal officers, so that we would be able to hire and keep people for a longer period of time to provide security on our reservations.

This is an issue that needs to be addressed.

Mr.

Skovgard, 15 seconds, if you'd like.

The key, the key to this situation is communication.

We need to visit with the folks that we're talking about.

We cannot legislate for them.

They have to be part of the conversation, and we need to reach out and ensure that their voices are heard in these type of conversations.

Always.

Thank you sir.

The next question comes from me, Mr.

Mead.

You'll be the first to respond.

What can the Senate do to help prevent looming cutbacks in Social Security?

I mean, it's actually pretty straightforward.

We we cut the cap to Social Security, which is, I think, $184,500 right now.

And that gives us quite a bit of breathing room.

Just as some history, Social Security used to cover, I think about 94% of income.

Now it's down to 82.

So we're capturing less income into Social Security.

That's, that's one of the reasons I think we need to legislate feedback mechanism so that, you know, we don't have to turn around and change a constant and bring everyone into a room and argue about what to change that to.

Every year we pin it to something reasonable and go from there.

But I would add that we're going to have to make a lot of changes going forward, because many of our systems are built on a presumption that we'd have a lot of young people feeding into small amount of old people.

And that's going to require more systemic change and a lot of thoughtfulness to avoid these sort of things in the future.

Mr.

Holtz 20s.

Yes, the first step is removing the cap.

The cap is 100,000 484,500.

Doing that by significant room to fix the problem.

But the longer you wait, the harder it is to fix.

It.

Could have been fixed easily a few years ago, perhaps more than a few years ago, but could be fixed.

The longer we wait, the harder it's going to be to fix it.

Thank you.

Miss Hageman.

20s.

We need to adopt policies.

to unleash our economy and grow jobs and get more people in the workforce.

We have been pursuing those very kind of policies, including in the one big, beautiful bill and other actions that I have taken in the House of Representatives and will continue to do so in theSenate.

It's a matter of unleashing our economy.

Mr.

Skovgard.

So here we go.

We've got an opportunity that is facing us in six years.

We we face a 25% cut to our Social Security benefits.

The majority of us in this room.

So let's take a look at that and say, what are we going to do about that?

Are we going to just sit back and and ignore this problem, enjoy our theater popcorn as we sit in the halls of Congress on your dime?

Or are we going to actually do something?

Are we going to actually fix this problem?

Are we going to address it, or are we just going to wait?

Thank you sir.

Mr.

Mead, 15 more seconds if you like.

Sure.

It's a it's a pretty easy problem to fix, at least short term.

I think us having not fixed it yet is a sign of where our priorities are.

And yeah, it's disappointing.

Thank you.

Next question is from Clair McFarland.

Mr.

Holtz, you'll be first.

At least one federal agency has installed license plate reader cameras in Wyoming with little or no transparency or public input.

Is this a problem?

And if so, how would you fix it?

Well, one of the cities or towns is Glenrock, where I used to be.

The judge I. I am not in favor of the.

I understand they.

So the reason it helps solve crimes.

But it's.

Big brother on steroids, taking pictures of everyone.

I'm opposed to it.

I do not think it's wise.

I think it could lead to more unintended consequences and.

Cheyenne Glenrock.

There are a number of cities that use this, but I think it is not a good idea and it should not be allowed.

And we should take steps to prevent it.

Thank you.

Miss Hageman.

I think that we're seeing that this is being abused across the country, and I have grave concerns about this type of technology being used.

How is the information being stored for how long?

What is it going to be used for?

What is the other kind of data that that is being gathered at the same time?

I think we'd have to have a very serious and important discussion about the appropriateness of this type of technology and equipment.

Thank you.

Mr.

Skovgard.

Again, the Bill of rights protect us.

They enumerate powers that the federal government does not have, and yet the federal government continues to reach out and seize these powers.

Nobody asked you.

Nobody asked me.

That needs to change.

Mr.

Mead.

Yeah, I think it's a terrible idea.

I hate the construction of the surveillance state that we've been- That's the road we've been going down.

And the security that we may have presumed to have before.

Artificial intelligence, just through the sheer volume of data, that's no longer going to be the case.

And, you know, we shouldn't be storing this much data.

And it's ubiquitous.

It's not American.

Mr.

Holtz final 15 seconds, if you'd like.

Well, we could move the Colorado where it's more accepted.

That's a joke.

Now.

I'm opposed to it.

We shouldn't have it, and we need to stop it in the bud.

We need to stop it right now.

Thank you.

The next question is from Melodie Edwards.

Miss Hageman, you'll be first.

Wyomingites are concerned about the rising cost of health care and the significant increases to insurance costs when the marketplace subsidies were eliminated in 2025.

What steps do you plan to take to create more affordable and accessible health care in Wyoming and reduce insurance costs so that more wyomingites can have affordable health insurance?

So one of the things that we did in the one big, beautiful bill is we invested $50 billion in rural health care.

The rural health care Transformation Fund, Wyoming is the biggest recipient per capita of any state in the nation.

And this year alone, we received $205 million.

But going back to some of the things that several people up here on the stage have talked about today in terms of local control, is what John and Cynthia and I and many others in Congress worked on when when drafting this legislation, was to make sure that it was addressed at a state level.

Wyoming is not Nebraska, which is not Florida, which is not New York City.

Every state is different in terms of how they need to be able to deliver rural health care to their citizens.

And again, we're in a unique circumstance because we're one of the most rural states in the entire nation.

So we made sure that it was very much to be directed by the state and the local people to be to decide how that money is to be spent, to develop the plan of action and decide how that money is to be spent.

It was just in July that Wyoming's plan went into effect, and you're going to start seeing more money distributed to our rural communities.

There is a mechanism by which you can contact the state and seek additional or seek funds for health care.

As a result of that law.

Thank you.

Mr.

Skovgard 20s.

Why is this so hard for us to solve?

Health insurance is broken within the state of Wyoming.

Obviously, if we're going to solve a problem, we need to address the money.

It is always about the money.

Let's concentrate the money at the state of Wyoming and distribute it back to our health care providers, our hospitals, our ambulances.

Take the middleman out.

This is a state issue, and we need to address it at the state level.

Mr.

Mead.

The rural health Care Transformation Act is a great start, but we need structural changes.

We need things that are going to be durable and last a lifetime.

And so I think I've already talked that up.

The other thing that besides the insurer communication protocol I talked about is we need to talk about the vertical integration between insurers, providers and PBMs.

Mr.

Holtz.

I think it's going to create more problems than it's going to solve.

You will see that if not in the short term, certainly in the intermediate and long term.

Thank you.

Representative Hageman 15 more seconds, if you'd like.

So this law does make structural changes, but those structural changes are going to be dictated here in Wyoming to meet the needs of our citizens.

It's 205 million this year.

But in the subsequent four years, there will be additional funds that come to the state of Wyoming to implement the plan of action that they have, that the state of Wyoming, our legislature and our governor has created.

So I'm looking forward to seeing the program work, and I think it will work well in Wyoming.

Candidates.

Thank you.

We've reached the end of our question and answer portion of the debate.

We move now to closing statements.

Each of you will have 60s.

We'll go in the reverse order from our opening round.

Representative Hageman, you're first.

Wonderful.

It is truly been the honor of my lifetime to represent the state of Wyoming and the people of Wyoming in the United States.

House of Representatives.

Everything that my team and I have focused on has been very Wyoming centric, making sure that the bills that we are introducing and the committee work that I have done really focuses on the needs of the people of Wyoming and our communities and our businesses.

For example, we have solved over 6000 cases on behalf of citizens and businesses here in the state of Wyoming.

We have brought back almost $17 million to people for money that was being wrongfully withheld by a variety of federal agencies.

We have also brought $40 million back to the state of Wyoming for a variety of community projects in Rock Springs.

And tomorrow I'm going to be in Casper for the for the airport, for the the air traffic control tower that we are investing in.

So I have worked tirelessly and diligently to making sure that I am representing Wyoming well.

And if I am fortunate enough to earn your vote from the U.S.

Senate, I will do the same thing there.

Thank you very much for this evening.

Thank you, Mr.

Holtz.

We are in a time of war.

We need a veteran in the U.S.

Senate.

We do not have a veteran in the House or the Senate, and we haven't for many years.

We are in a theological war with Iran and we need someone who has military experience during war time to help solve these problems and make decisions and convince other senators on how to vote.

God bless you all.

And don't be afraid to ask the Lord for guidance.

Thank you.

Thank you sir.

Sam Mead 60s.

Well, I'm Sam Mead.

I've had a kind of an interesting trail here.

I've been a rancher along the way.

A rocket technician, a mayor, software engineer, and I even made whiskey for a little bit.

But what I'm most proud of is being a father and husband.

Earlier this year, I it came down to this, you know, I had a choice.

Do I despair for the future or do I fight for the future?

And honor and duty demanded the latter.

And so if you think we should protect public lands, and if you dream of an effective government, and if you hope for a better future.

I'd love your support and your vote.

Thank you very much.

Thank you sir.

Jimmy Skovgard 60s.

Thank everyone for for coming out tonight and visiting with us and allowing us to, to maybe get a little out of control and, and talk to you, but I'm.

Jimmy.

Skovgard and I'm from the people I am.

Wyoming.

And it's time that Wyoming looks to the people for the answers.

That's where they are.

The answers reside out there amongst you.

You all wyomingites you need to exercise your right to vote.

This primary is where Wyoming chooses its next senator, its next representative for the House, its next governor, and on down the line.

And it's your responsibility.

I've met folks around the state that have told me my vote doesn't count.

My voice doesn't matter.

That is what got us into this situation.

It's time for us to rise up and take our responsibility as citizens of this state and citizens of this country.

So, folks, join with me.

Rise up and let's put this country back on track.

Wyoming can lead again.

Candidates.

Thank you.

If you haven't voted in early voting already in Wyoming, remember the primary election is August 18th.

This debate can be seen again anytime online at Wyomingpbs.org and on YouTube.

Our next debate.

Republican candidates for governor starts in five minutes.

Thanks for being with us.

You're watching Wyoming PBS.

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