The Wyoming Constitution Party is hoping a gubernatorial run by conservative activist Rebecca Bextel can elevate it beyond its current minor party status and give Wyoming a third major political party.
Cowboy State Daily reported Friday that Wyoming Constitution Party Chair Joshua Shimkus said Bextel’s campaign is part of a wider effort to win enough votes in the gubernatorial race to qualify the party as a major political party under state law. “We are transitioning from a protest party to a legitimate party,” Shimkus told the outlet. He added that the party is fielding candidates for other positions related to that same push.
Shimkus argued that Wyoming’s political makeup creates space for a second conservative party, particularly given its Republican-dominant electorate and the penchant of many Democratic and independent voters to participate in Republican primaries to impact more competitive races. According to the article, Bextel has also positioned her bid as an “insurance policy” for conservatives if a more moderate Republican wins the GOP nomination.
Wyoming law defines major parties as political organizations whose candidates for U.S. House, governor, or secretary of state receive more than 10 percent of the vote. Parties that fall short of that but receive at least 2 percent in one of those races are instead treated as minor parties.
The party briefly held major party status following the 2014 election cycle, when Jennifer Young received 18,918 votes in her bid for secretary of state, amounting to 11.81 percent of the total. That same year, Wyoming Libertarians also crossed into major party status. Since 2016, however, candidates outside the Republican and Democratic parties for the three qualifying spots have generally remained in the low-to-moderate single digits.
Read the full article in the Cowboy State Daily.
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