Episode Details

It's time to take a look at what's happening around Wyoming for Tuesday, September 30th. I'm Mac Watson, bringing you headlines from the Cowboy State Daily newsroom… Brought to you by Wyoming Interventional and Vascular Associates. WIVA offers the best solution for treating tired, aching and swollen legs, at Wyoming's only IAC-accredited vein facility. With virtually no downtime and minimal risks, if you're ready for relief, see what WIVA can do for you. Schedule a consultation at Casper Medical Imaging dot net, forward slash WIVA.

– The Department of the Interior announced Monday that it's opening more than 13 million acres of federal land for coal leases and investing $625 million dollars to modernize coal plants and jump-start U.S. mining. Cowboy State Daily's Renee Jean reports this is great news for the coal industry, and for Wyoming specifically.

"The Trump administration, from day one, has been talking about coal and doing things to empower coal. The one big, beautiful Bill Act had, you know, things in it related to coal. I just think this is a continuation of the administration's efforts to boost coal…This is a concerted and coordinated effort across departments. Department of Interior is expanding the acres for coal leases. The EPA has announced that it's rolling back regulations that might hamper coal. You know, this money from the Department of Energy. So this is a concerted effort across departments working together to try and kick start the coal industry and keep it going. I think the other thing that's probably pretty significant in all of this, you know, artificial intelligence is going to need a lot of energy. People are basically looking for every molecule of energy that they can find from whatever energy source they can get it from."

Since the Cowboy State produces 40 percent of all the coal in the United States, Wyoming Energy Authority Director Rob Creager hosted several out-of-state legislators last week from states that accept Wyoming coal for tours of mines and power plants to see how Wyoming handles its coal industry.

Read the story HERE.

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The county clerk accused of botching portions of the 2024 general election in northeast Wyoming and filing a false post-election audit did not show up Monday for a legislative subcommittee meeting for which she was subpoenaed. Cowboy State Daily's Clair McFarland reports that Secretary of State Chuck Grey repeatedly stated this was more than just a simple error.

"It was a seven and a half hour meeting with no lunch break, and a lot happened. Secretary of State Chuck Gray talked at length about how the real issue, and his view, is that she filed a post election audit with his office that you know, he said is either fraudulent or she didn't do one at all, and and that was the real issue to him, is this system that's supposed to be a check on the veracity of the election results, and somehow she missed, ignored, lied about, or otherwise didn't catch 21 errors…Chuck Gray complained about Governor Mark Gordon, whose declination letter where he declined to pursue a removal of Office Action said that, you know that that declination letter did not cite the post election audit. And Chuck Gray was like, this is the issue. Why did the governor not cite it? And Governor Gordon, in response, His office said, Well, that's because the statute only allows us to act upon a locals concern. And Chuck gray is not a Weston county voter, so we had to confine our analysis to the locals filed complaint."

Weston County Clerk Becky Hadlock could face up to $100 in fines and up to six months in jail for not complying with the subpoena, and if a prosecutor takes up a case against her for failing to appear for the