by Helen Sabin, Corvallis
Remember the line from the movie, “A Few Good Men?” “You can’t handle the truth?”
That line comes to mind when reading Kathy Love’s 2025 legislative recap in the Bitterroot Star (Dec. 10, 2025), where she highlighted what she called her “significant” work.
Noticeably absent: HB 309. Why?
HB 309 was as important as the others, but questions arose when she chose to leave out one bill that dealt with the lawsuit involving the central committee of which Love was a member.
Her bill, HB309, was supposed to look like what seemed to be a “minor” change of ONE word in Montana law replacing “date of election” with “date of election certification” for when local county central committee members assume office.
But in election law, ONE WORD concerning timing isn’t trivia, it’s power.
Montana statutes rule who gets elected to precinct committees, when they take office, how county central committees organize, and how delegates are chosen for state conventions. Change the timing, and you change who gets to participate in state conventions. There’s the reality.
In 2024–March of 2025, Ravalli County’s Republican Central Committee was in a legal dispute over election procedures and timing that ended when a judge ordered compliance with existing law and directed elections to proceed.
At the same time, state GOP party officer elections were approaching -June 2025. The Point? Voting participation in those elections depended entirely on who is recognized as a valid committee member or delegate BEFORE the state elections occur. Timing determines authority. Timing determines power.
HB 309 mattered because it touched a live wire: who was going to be the elected head of the GOP?
That outcome has been in the works since 2013with long term planning to take over the state party to put power in the hands of a man who was elected in June 2025 and who said this: “…Candidates for election will be vetted, and if we determine that they are good for the party, we will endorse them.” (https://montanafreepress.org/2025/07/03/wittichs-world/)
Kathy Love has been endorsed BIG TIME, by the GOP and the Montana Senate PAC as well as the AFP as she is good for the party. But what about her constituents against whom she voted twenty-two times in 2025? Do they matter?
Think about the fact that the GOP never endorsed a candidate in the primary elections until now and it is Love they support not Bedey?
Voters reading Love’s recap don’t see a complete record – only the parts that don’t require explanation about a Ravalli central committee trying to ignore state law and disenfranchise voters.
And voters shouldn’t have to play detective to understand what their elected officials did or why.
If a bill was insignificant, say so. If it was controversial, explain it. If it failed, own it. That’s what accountability looks like.
But leaving it out entirely? That leaves a gap and that is where trust starts to erode.
Because when a political party decides to choose candidates, not the voters, Bitterrooters know what to do…elect Bedey and let HIM fight for us against the corruption in the GOP.