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For years now, MTFP deputy editor Eric Dietrich and I have wanted to publish a comprehensive story about how Gov. Greg Gianforte’s family charity is donating its money. After all, as much as Gianforte, a multi-millionaire former tech entrepreneur who built a billion-dollar company in Bozeman, is among the state’s foremost political figures, he and his Gianforte Family Foundation are also major philanthropic forces in Montana.
As it turns out, that idea was hard to turn into reality. Donations made by the Gianforte foundation are reported in publicly available IRS form 990 tax filings. But working with that information required many hours of manual data entry and many more hours of researching individual groups and combing through the data to identify notable trends. And, as is always the case in a newsroom, there were other stories to cover. Somewhere between the 2022 elections and the 2023 legislative session, the project fell by the wayside.
Luckily for us and our readers, MTFP was able to hire a full-time data reporter, Jacob Olness, early this summer, giving us a team member who could pick the project back up. The result is the story and digital database we published this week.
We’re thrilled to have this project across the finish line, and not just because it’s something we can check off our long-term to-do list. We think it’s important information for the public to have, particularly as Gianforte seeks re-election this fall. Public information, including nonprofit giving records related to a prominent elected official, should be easily accessible — not just buried in arcane tax forms. Our hope is that Montanans far outside our office can use the searchable table at the end of the story to conveniently identify groups that have received donations from the governor and piece together information about the Gianforte family’s wide-ranging priorities.
Now, if this is a topic that sparks your curiosity, we have some questions for you: What surprises you about the information in this data? What didn’t you know before? Are there parts of Gianforte’s philanthropic giving that seem like they deserve more reporting? Don’t hesitate to let us know by emailing [email protected].
READ MORE: How Montana’s governor gave away $57 million of his family’s wealth.
—Mara Silvers, Reporter
By the Numbers 🔢
The amount of money raised by Montanans Securing Reproductive Rights, the group backing the state’s constitutional abortion rights initiative, between June 26 and August 25 of this year.
The fundraising haul largely comes from out-of-state political action groups, including the Sixteen Thirty Fund, the Global Impact Social Welfare Fund, The Fairness Project and Advocacy Action Fund, Inc. Other major donors include wealthy individuals: Gwendolyn Sontheim, heiress of the Cargill food corporation fortune and resident of Sante Fe, California; Gaye Piggott, part of a family of Seattle, Washington-based philanthropists; and Kate Capshaw, a Los Angeles, California, actress married to filmmaker Steven Spielberg.
—Mara Silvers, Reporter
Following the Law ⚖️
A federal court this week dealt Montana Secretary of State Christi Jacobsen the latest in a string of judicial setbacks as she and her attorneys attempt to defend Republican-backed election administration laws from court challenges.
A trio of judges from the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Wednesday upheld a court-mandated freeze on House Bill 892, which was passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature last year to establish criminal penalties for Montana voters who remain registered in two separate locations or who fail to provide past registration information on voter registration applications. The injunction was initially ordered by U.S. District Court Judge Brian Morris in Great Falls at the request of the Montana Public Interest Research Group (MontPIRG) and the Montana Federation of Public Employees. The plaintiffs argued HB 892’s vague language would deter potential registrants fearful of accidentally incurring up to 18 months in jail or $5,000 in fines.
In seeking to overturn that injunction, Jacobsen’s legal team argued the so-called “double voting” that HB 892 sought to crack down on poses a real threat to the integrity of Montana’s elections. Federal judges, however, haven’t been persuaded that’s the case. The circuit court’s memo affirmed this week what Morris concluded in April: that voting twice in one election was already a crime before HB 892 imposed new penalties.
In an email to Montana Free Press Thursday, spokesperson Richie Melby said Jacobsen’s office believed that the appellate court’s decision, while “not surprising,” was wrong.
In a separate elections case, Jacobsen appealed a Montana Supreme Court decision that invalidated another batch of election administration laws to the U.S. Supreme Court last month. Now Jacobsen and MontPIRG, which was one of several plaintiffs in that lawsuit, await word on whether the U.S. Supreme Court will take up that federal appeal. Her petition, filed last week, seeks to reestablish two election laws signed in 2021 that eliminated Election Day voter registration and prohibited paid ballot collection
—Alex Sakariassen, Reporter
The Viz 📈
The administration of Gov. Greg Gianforte, specifically the state Department of Labor and Industry, published its annual Labor Day report on the status of Montana’s economy this week. As has long been tradition under both Democratic and Republican governors, the report emphasizes the bright spots in the state’s economic performance — among them strong wage growth since Gianforte took office at the beginning of 2021.
According to the report, which compiles a variety of statistics from state and federal economic agencies, Montanans’ personal income has grown at 7.5% a year since 2020, the fourth fastest rate in the nation. As of 2023, the average Montana income was up to nearly $64,000 a year, a figure that’s middle-of-the-pack nationally.
Of course, the notable inflation of recent years — for housing in particular — means Montanans also face higher prices for the things they’d like to buy regardless of whether they’ve seen commensurate wage increases. According to the national consumer inflation index published by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, it took an estimated $1.17 in December 2023 to match the purchasing power of a Jan. 1, 2021, dollar.
Additionally, the statewide average income growth figure doesn’t necessarily reflect what individual Montanans in different industries, income brackets and parts of the state have seen happen with their personal finances over the past four years. The above chart, for example, compares inflation-adjusted wage growth for workers across different segments of the economy, showing that wage growth has kept pace with inflation or outstripped it entirely in some fields while lagging in others.
Wages for Montana’s professional service workers — architects, veterinarians and lawyers, among others — have in aggregate seen their wages rise 3.1% faster than inflation, the labor department says. On the other end of the spectrum, however, is education, where wages for teachers and other education workers declined by 2.7% relative to the cost of living.
Asked what he’s doing to ensure Montana’s public sector wages keep up with the cost of living at a press conference Wednesday, Gianforte pointed to the 2021 TEACH Act, which authorized incentives intended to boost starting teacher pay. He also noted that the state pay plan negotiated with public employee unions and passed by the Legislature last year provided state and Montana University System employees with across-the-board raises of 4% or $1.50 an hour this year and last.
—Eric Dietrich, Deputy Editor
Landscape Watch 🏔️
According to a newly published roadmap from the Bureau of Land Management, about 572,000 acres of land in Montana have some baseline potential for utility-scale solar development, more than double the acreage that the agency had identified in the draft Environmental Impact Statement it released in January.
The revised Western Solar Plan released late last week identifies 31 million acres of BLM-administered land that could be suitable for solar projects of five megawatts or greater across an 11-state region of the West. It prioritizes areas that are previously disturbed or close to existing or planned transmission lines and that would minimize conflicts related to cultural and historical resources and sensitive wildlife (e.g., threatened endangered species, sage grouse habitat, big game winter range and migration corridors).
The expanded Montana acreage reflects changes the agency made to the plan based on the more than 64,000 comments that it fielded on the draft EIS. In addition to lowering the distance and voltage thresholds required to meet the agency’s proximity-to-transmission criteria, the agency incorporated previously disturbed lands that aren’t located near transmission lines in the revised plan.
BLM Director Tracy Stone-Manning said in an Aug. 29 press release that the proposal supports long-term energy security and will put the country’s largest federal land manager to work to support the Biden administration’s clean energy goals.
“It will drive responsible solar development to locations with fewer potential conflicts while helping the nation transition to a clean energy economy, furthering the BLM’s mission to sustain the health, diversity and productivity of public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations,” Stone-Manning said.
Parcels incorporated in the Montana portion of the plan are largely concentrated in the north-central region of the state and the area east of Miles City, which is along the corridor of a planned 525-kilovolt transmission line that will connect the eastern and western power grids.
The solar-suitable acreage in Montana is relatively modest compared to that of other western states. For example, the agency has identified more than 3.8 million acres of BLM land in Wyoming as potentially appropriate for solar development.
According to the agency’s final EIS, which serves as a precursor to the project-level environmental analyses that will be required before any on-the-ground work occurs, about 5,400 acres of BLM land in Montana could be developed or solar by 2045 under the “reasonably foreseeable development scenario.” That’s the least of any of the 11 states analyzed in the plan.
As of June 30, the agency has permitted 52 solar projects on its land in the western U.S., together capable of generating nearly 9,600 megawatts of power. Half of those projects are located in California, which was incorporated in the decade-old Western Solar Plan that’s being replaced with the new guidance.
The agency is expected to issue a record of decision finalizing the plan in December.
—Amanda Eggert, Reporter
Fire Watch 🔥
The Remington fire in southeast Montana, the state’s largest wildfire of the season so far, is nearing total containment, allowing firefighters to direct their efforts toward several large timber fires speckling western Montana’s rough backcountry.
Ravalli County hosts several large blazes. The Sharrott Creek fire covers almost 3,000 acres three miles west of Stevensville. The blaze, considered 23% contained as of Thursday, more than doubled in size over the last week and remains the most-staffed fire in the state. On the other side of the Bitterroot Valley, the Railroad and Daly fires are burning near each other along the border between Ravalli County and Granite County, covering a combined 2,500 acres. The Johnson fire also continues to burn more than 4,000 acres in southern Ravalli County near the Beaverhead County border.
Additionally, the Grouse fire now covers 5,000 acres in Beaverhead County, roughly 10 miles south of Wise River. The fire was first reported on July 25 and grew rapidly over the course of the following week.
According to the National Weather Service offices in Missoula and Billings, the weekend forecast does not include fast winds or fire-prone humidity levels. Even with high temperatures, fire risk remains mild. Montanans can expect hazy skies over the next few days, though, as smoke continues to enter Montana from Idaho and Canada.
—Zeke Lloyd, Fire Reporting Intern
Highlights ☀️
In other news this week —
Republican U.S. Senate candidate Tim Sheehy drew national media attention this week for campaign trail comments he made about alcohol use by Crow tribal members, remarks captured in audio recordings first published by the Flathead Nation newspaper Char-Koosta News. As Tom Lutey reports for MTFP, Democratic members of the state Legislature’s American Indian Caucus sent Sheehy a letter saying his remarks “perpetuate the damaging and racist stereotype of ‘the drunken Indian.’”
As of Aug. 30 the race between Sheehy and incumbent Democrat Jon Tester has drawn $44 million and counting from political committees nominally operating independently from the two candidates’ campaigns, Lutey also reports. Here’s a rundown of the major spenders and what we know about their agendas.
Southeast Montana mule deer populations are in decline. As Amanda Eggert reports from Ekalaka, that raises questions about how Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks is managing the number of hunting tags it issues.
A Montana Department of Transportation proposal to add a roundabout on U.S. Highway 93 in the Bitterroot Valley just north of Victor is producing notable public opposition. As Nathan Brody reports, one commenter went as far as to call the proposal a “woke” plot to inject “liberal ideology into the heart of Ravalli County.”
On Our Radar 
Amanda — While reporting from Ekalaka last week, I took a pleasant little detour into Medicine Rocks State Park, a small but striking park where weathering has created a Swiss-cheese pattern in tall pillars of sandstone surrounded by pine trees. It’s worth a trip if you find yourself in the southeastern corner of the state.
Alex — Having visited pictograph sites throughout Ontario’s Quetico Provincial Park during the backcountry canoe trips of my youth, Flathead Lake’s Painted Rocks has long been on my Montana bucket list. After reading about those vivid red markings in the Flathead Beacon this week, I’m tempted to borrow a kayak ASAP.
JoVonne — In 1997, a cargo ship carrying over four million Lego pieces nearly capsized as it made its way from the Netherlands to the U.S., an event dubbed by toy collectors and the media as the Great Lego Spill. A New York Times story published this week looked back at the spill and highlighted a niche community of European beachcombers who collect the washed-up Lego pieces from the incident.
Matt — Back in September 1992, KRTV ran a delightful, hour-long special report on the demolition of The Anaconda Smelter stack in Great Falls. Thankfully for posterity, it’s archived here on YouTube.
Katie — Half the internet might say it’s already fall, but with plenty of 80-degree days ahead, September feels like summer to me. Catherine Mack’s “Every Time I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies” is the perfect mystery thriller for the weather, with its Italian summer setting and fourth-wall-breaking narration.
Mara — I experienced some unexpected technology troubles recently and was sorely in need of reliable WiFi. For those who don’t know, public libraries are here to help! I checked out a pocket-sized WiFi hotspot for a week from the Whitefish Community Library to easily work from a friend’s house. Your local library might let you do the same.
Eric — Kalamazoo, Michigan, used to be the sort of place you could move to for cheap housing if you were priced out of the market in, say, Seattle or San Francisco. As the New York Times reported earlier this month, that’s no longer the case. There are definitely some parallels in this story to how Montana’s housing dynamics are playing out between, say, Bozeman and Great Falls.
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