EVANSTON — Wyoming Secretary of State Chuck Gray held a town hall meeting at Evanston’s Strand Theatre on Wednesday, Jan. 11. Following a showing of the film “Rigged: The Zuckerberg Funded Plot to Defeat Donald Trump,” the Pledge of Allegiance, a prayer and introduction by Pastor Jonathan Lange, Gray took the stage to address about 40 people in attendance.

Gray began in the state legislature in 2017, representing east Casper. After former Secretary of State Ed Buchanan said he would not seek re-election, “I immediately went into prayer mode to decide if I would run,” Gray said.

In Casper, his family was in the radio business when Gray started a conservative talk show to “[take] on the ‘troika,’ as I call it: the Democrats, the insiders, often called ‘RINOs’ (Republicans in name only), and the mainstream media,” he said. “Those three entities try to come together to stop the will and majority — the silent majority — which is the conservative majority in our state, and our nation.”

Gray then referred to the Casper Star Tribune as the “Red Star Tribune” — which he claims falsely accused him of taking straw donations — and denounced WyoFile.

“This is what they do, the ‘troika’ ... anything they can to try to stop conservatives from winning elected office,” he claimed.

“I worked on a lot of different things as a member of the legislature,” he said, mentioning the passing of an ultrasound bill in 2017, “saw a wave of pro-life legislation, which culminated in the pro-life trigger bill in 2022.”

He further asserted that he was instrumental in banning funding for abortion at the University of Wyoming in 2019.

Gray addressed cross-over voting.

“This practice has really crippled our election system,” he said. “Democrats can cross to the Republican party on the day of the primary, then cross back.”

Gray stated that he had been strategically working on passing the bill for years before it became “law of the land ... in effect for the 2024 primary.”

Gray then segued into some states’ attempts, including to remove Trump from the ballot, calling them “outrageous” and “election interference to the worst degree.”

Retired attorney Tim Newcomb had sued Gray last November in Albany County District Court in an attempt to keep former Pres. Donald Trump off the ballot in Wyoming. Gray celebrated a judge’s decision to toss the suit.

“We’re getting involved nationally to stopping [this],” purporting to be the only secretary of state in the nation to send a letter of warning to New Hampshire, which he claims then “backed off.”

Regarding the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection, he stated, “We all know that Pres. Trump was using his First-Amendment rights to question the election. Period.”

“I want to assure you we’ve been the strongest in the nation in pushing back on these radical left attempts to remove Trump from the ballot,” he added.

“Another thing we’re taking on is residency,” Gray said, switching gears. He said he discussed voter IDs and residency statutes with county clerks, posing hypothetical scenarios, such as “if someone crossed over into the state of Wyoming, lived in a hotel ... and qualified via the other requirements to register to vote in Wyoming, signed the oath that they’re a bona fide resident ... if someone was here for 15 minutes, could their vote be legally challenged? The answer they gave me was ‘no.’”

He then said there are allegations of people being “bused in to different communities.”

He’s since proposed a bill requiring a 30-day durational residency period, stating, “We gotta get something on the books,” while conceding that he doesn’t think it’s strong enough. “We were able to bring that to committee ... but that is a key election integrity issue.” 

Currently, proof of identity is the only requirement for voter registration.

“We’re trying to 1) require a proof of residency document on the front end to register to vote and 2) clarify that non-resident designations on identifications are not eligible for voting; non-resident designations are what illegal aliens receive,” he said.

Gray took an opportunity to recognize Chris Hopkin for his efforts to promote a 50% off property tax ballot initiative.

“The right of the people to bring laws is in our Constitution,” Gray said. “It’s a very important right, and the Wyoming Secretary of State’s Office administers that constitutional provision, which is also laid out in Wyoming state law.”

Property tax reform is something that Gray says he’s been working hard on.

“We saw properties [on Casper mountain] that increased 1,000% in a year,” he said. He said he proposed a bill that would cap property tax increases at 3% a year, but it failed on the floor. He claimed that the “insider groups that controls [sic] politics in Cheyenne ... contradict themselves, after filing their own voter ID bills.”

He named Rep. Barry Crago (HD-40) as having filed a bill for a 5% cap on residential structures, saying, “So it’s amazing the sort of twisted nature of the insider group.”

Gray says that Wyoming is “No. 2 in the nation on corporate registrations,” behind Delaware. “We’re up 30% just last year,” he said, before attacking the media again.

“I’m sorry, but the media is not going to point this stuff out,” he said, “so I’m going to do it.”

He said a current hot-button topic is environmental, social and governance (ESGs), essentially a framework designed to inform stakeholders how sustainability affects financial investments.

Gray said he is adamantly anti-ESG, declaring it an “attack on our way of life.”

“They’re trying to deny capital,” he said, “all industries that are key to Wyoming — coal, oil, gas, soda ash, trona.”

He said he faults increased property taxes, Rocky Mountain Power and the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) currently-pending Resource Management Plan (RMP) as the reason his proposed anti-ESG bill failed, deeming it “woke investing.” 

Further expounding on the BLM’s RMP, as “an attempt to lock up southwest Wyoming,” he likened a recent public hearing in Rock Springs regarding the matter to a “circular firing squad,” explaining that “people [were] standing in front of maps showing us what they want. You know what they want. They want to shut down all mining, all trona, all coal. No grazing. No recreation. It’s all about trying to prevent us from reaching our full potential.”

Attendee Joe Webb asked, “What can we do as patriots to help save this country?”

Gray responded, “We need to be honest where we’re at. Take the BLM thing,” before accusing the BLM of promoting positive RMP feedback, alleging the commentary is coming from out of state, and possibly even outside of the country.

“From China,” Webb suggested.

Again, Gray complained about the media.

“The media is just so dishonest,” Gray reiterated, drawing attention to the Kemmerer Gazette’s recent use of “scare quotes” when referring to the term “election integrity.”

He once again cited his continued frustrations with news publications, particularly WyoFile.

Gray stated that Sweetwater County Sheriff John Grossnickle has expressed to him that he wouldn’t allow the BLM’s plan to go through.

“I believe the sheriff would be one of the last lines of defense,” Gray said. 

Webb said, “Why do we want to keep this government open? This is do-or-die for us.”

“Critical mass transcends the media,” Gray replied, citing a governmental uprising in “Chile ... no, Argentina. No, it’s Chile. … One thing I hope to accomplish is to push through conservative policies that have never been done before. Keep moving the ball forward,” Gray said.

Uinta County Commissioner Brent Hatch voiced his concerns about the BLM’s RMP.

“If this doesn’t get shut down, they’ll keep pushing it,” Hatch said.

He said he believes the land would be available for purchase by foreign countries and “our IDs will be used.”

Gray used the opportunity to suggest that “what the feds are doing now — we’re all under attack.”

An attendee maintained that NACs (natural asset companies) could cost thousands of jobs and incite “range wars.”

“It’s a full-frontal assault on our way of life,” Gray stated, citing an “ESG agenda.”

David Bennett of Evanston said, “... As we sit here ... it boils my blood. I come from a time when America was strong … I wonder if they have any clue what’s it gonna take to stand up, say, ‘To hell with all this crap.’ There’s going to be a civil war. What are they gonna push us to? We’ve got a crisis on our hands. We try to be patriots and law-abiding citizens...”

Gray turned back to his ‘troika’ theory.

“I still think we can turn this around,” he said. “It takes really good patriots; it takes election integrity; but this ‘troika’ element, the media, the insiders and the Democrats, they have a lot of power; they have a lot of money ... [but] we have God on our side. I think the truth will win out.”

Gray also endorsed Trump’s reelection campaign during the meeting. 

*Correction* An earlier version of this story indicated that Gray considered running for office after former Sec. of State Ed Buchanan resigned. However, Gray said that process began a few months earlier, when Buchanan announced he would not seek re-election. An earlier version of this story also said Gray said “The right of the people to break laws is in our Constitution." However, Gray told the Herald he said, "The right of the people to bring laws is in our Constitution" and the story has been updated to reflect that.