Congrats – you made it to Friday! Here are the topics that caught my eye for today’s column: 

• Montana Republican Party
• Trump and Liberia
• Health Insurance Cost Per State
• Birthright Citizenship Update
• One More Thing

MONTANA REPUBLICAN PARTY:

The implosion within the Montana Republican Party is in full swing, with former Republican legislator and current chair of the Teton County Republican Central Committee, Ross Fitzgerald, sending his opinion piece to several publications across the state. 

You can read Fitzgerald’s opinion HERE.

Fitzgerald attended the Montana GOP Convention last month and had this to say:

I was appalled to watch the Freedom Caucus, an extremist faction within the GOP, orchestrate the purge of nine sitting Republican state senators by stripping them of all voting privileges. Celebrated as a “cleansing” by Representative Nelly Nicol, the Freedom Caucus took a page right out of the authoritarian playbook, disenfranchising the 190,000 Montanans represented by those senators in the process.

I think the Freedom Caucus is just another word for MAGA. Only the extremists can exist in the Montana Republican Party these days, and the moderates will be ridiculed and attempts will be made to cast them aside. 

I am proud to say that I never voted for Trump. I sleep fine at night. 

A little later, Fitzgerald states: 

In a representative republic, elected officials must prioritize their conscience and the needs of their constituents over party demands. A true Republican Party values individual liberty, not rigid loyalty.

There does not appear to be any room for moderates in the Montana Republican Party these days. I’ll be voting for Republican and Democratic moderates as well as independents. I hope you will join me. Together, we can rid the political parties of extremists. 

TRUMP AND LIBERIA:

President Donald Trump embarrassed the USA and himself during a meeting with Liberian President Joseph Boakai this week. 

Here is how the Associated Press (AP) reported the event:

“Such good English,” Trump said to Boakai during an event at the White House, with visible surprise. “Such beautiful English.”

Although English has been the official language of Liberia since the country’s founding in the 1800s, Trump asked Boakai where he had learned to speak the language “so beautifully,” and continued as Boakai murmured a response. “Where were you educated? Where? In Liberia?”

There have been reports that Trump does not read briefings about upcoming meetings. I think those reports are true! 

HEALTH INSURANCE COST PER STATE:

From my friends at WalletHub:

With individual health insurance premiums rising significantly in recent years, the personal-finance website WalletHub released its report on the States Where People Spend the Most & Least on Health Insurance to shed light on where Americans are struggling the most to stay covered.

To identify where Americans are shelling out the most and least for health insurance, WalletHub analyzed average premiums in each of the 50 states, then compared them to the median household income.

For those keeping score at home, Montana is ranked #13 (Cost of Insurance as % of Median Monthly Household Income), which is not that good. 

Read the complete report HERE. 

BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP UPDATE:

Reuters reported that a federal judge on Thursday again barred President Donald Trump’s administration from denying citizenship to some babies born in the U.S., making use of an exception to overcome the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling that restricted the ability of judges to block that and other policies nationwide.

CNN reported: 

“The ruling from US District Judge Joseph Laplante is significant because the Supreme Court last month curbed the power of lower court judges to issue nationwide injunctions, while keeping intact the ability of plaintiffs to seek a widespread block of the order through class action lawsuits, which is what happened Thursday in New Hampshire.

So little by little, the birthright citizenship issue will make its way to the U.S. Supreme Court this fall. 

In case you are a MAGA and have forgotten what the Fourteenth Amendment says,  “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.” 

Seems pretty cut and dried to me…

ONE MORE THING:  

My wife called to tell me she saw a fox on the way to work. I asked her how she knew it was on its way to work.

She hung up on me.

## HAVE A WONDERFUL WEEKEND ##