by Matthew Sullivan, Florence
Wayne Rusk is the wrong choice for Ravalli County and Montana. This greatly saddens me to write because I was both a vocal supporter and financial supporter of Mr. Rusk in his successful run for HD88. However, if you believe like I do your representatives should represent constituents’ values and needs, you will find yourself not supporting Wayne Rusk for his bid to unseat Theresa Manzella. Here is why:
When you first get to know Wayne, he says all the right things in an ‘aw, shucks’ kind of way. For example, he says he is a conservative’s conservative. He says he is for property rights. He says he is for lower property taxes. He says he is a public land outdoorsman. However, his voting record, and I encourage readers to research this, is far closer to a liberal Democrat – there were only 7 other Republicans that voted more often in lock step with Democrats. And most disheartening, when you really get to know what motivates Wayne, he is like so many other politicians, it is his ego, as I will demonstrate below.
Property taxes are hurting all of us, making it harder to survive. When I asked Wayne why he voted “no” on the special session which 100% of Democrats voted “no” on and would have focused giving back overpayment of taxes to taxpayers, he focused on the fact that Mrs. Manzella supported the special session and because he was running against her he could not support the session. Mr. Rusk wrote to me and other legislators in December 30th of 2023 via email, “My concern then, is that the faction within our party that proposed this (the so called freedom caucus), and in particular their chairperson—against whom I am running for just this and other reasons—is once again chargeable with attempting to move faster than the people are willing to follow, which is of course an exceedingly poor position from which to legislate.” Further, when Mr. Rusk ran for HD88 in 2022, Mrs. Manzella sent a letter to constituents that she did not support Wayne. As he references above, the reason he is running for State Senate is to get back at Mrs. Manzella. Mr. Rusk has no concern for his constituents’ well-being, financial security and burdensome property taxes – he just wants to get even with Mrs. Manzella.
Mr. Rusk’s voting record on property rights issues is abysmal. For example, when Mrs. Zooey Zephyr proposed a bill (HB 785) that would grant tenants 60 days to terminate if the landlord changes lease terms but only provided the landlord with an unequitable 30 days notice if the tenant wanted to terminate, Mr. Rusk voted in lockstep with 100% Democrats in the House in support of deteriorating property rights. He did the same on property rights bills HB 282, HB 283, etc. voting in lockstep with 100% of the Democrats. Mrs. Manzella voted the opposite of Mr. Rusk in all of the cases.
If you are like me and are frustrated by the Montana Supreme Court voting down important legislation like voter ID laws, you should not vote for Mr. Rusk. Mr. Rusk does not believe, as he has stated at a Missoula Pachyderm meeting last year, that the candidates for Supreme Court should have to identify political party affiliation. While in a perfect world they shouldn’t, we don’t live in that world. Judges legislate from the bench based on their political ideology and not law. Former UM Professor and Constitutional Fellow at the Independence Institute recently completed a study on the Montana Supreme Court and found that from 2012 to 2023 the court has engaged in a ‘judicial obstruction’ campaign, taking power away from elected representatives that tried to pass reasonable legislation pertaining to election, environmental, constitutional amendments. Informing a busy voting public of which party affiliation a judge identifies with is the right thing to do. What world is Mr. Rusk living in?
Finally, Mr. Rusk takes pictures of himself hunting and fishing but make no mistake, he does not support the average person’s hunting and fishing rights. Again, his voting record says it all. Mr. Rusk voted No not once but TWICE with 100% of Democrats on HB 372 which would have added protection to our constitution on the right to hunt and fish. Voters that hunt or fish only need to look at what is happening in Colorado, New Mexico, California, Washington and Oregon to know our hunting heritage is under attack. 62 other Republican house members voted in support of this bill. Not Mr. Rusk, he knows better than all of them and you. In contrast, Mrs. Manzella voted in favor of this bill. Mr. Rusk does not care to educate himself on this issue. If you are concerned about your kids having the same hunting and fishing opportunities you did, you must not vote for Mr Rusk.
Mr. Rusk does not represent my values and I imagine the vast majority of Ravalli county citizens. Vote NO for Wayne Rusk and YES for Mrs. Manzella on June 4th.
helen says
Rusk is a constitutionalist, someone who loves this valley and isn’t addicted to power and control like others who are in the legislature. BRAD – you can already hunt and fish in this state already – so your letter doesn’t make sense. You seem to be a one issue candidate – we need someone in the legislature who has a broader outlook on issues.
Brad Davis says
Only one person to vote for here. Elect Brad Davis Senate District 44.He is the only candidate that lives in Senate District 44.
helen says
Double check about your statement as I think candidates for the state legislature only have to live in the county.
Brad Davis says
My statement is correct. I am the only candidate that lives in Senate District 44.
A Voter says
The comment thread candidate strikes again!
Brad Davis says
Who is “A Voter Says” ? It is a mystery to all of us.
Possibly your are John Tester or Joe Biden ?
Linda H says
Had those in the last legislative session not have been so concerned about other people’s life decisions, they would have known that the property tax increase was coming down the pike, and could have prevented it. It’s a little late now. That horse is already out of the barn.
Dan Tomlinson says
Mr. Sullivan’s letter begins to go astray from his first point. Are we really surprised to find that a candidate for political office wishes to defeat their opponent? Furthermore, it must be pointed out that Mr. Sullivan cannot read minds, and has no way of proving the wild assertion that Wayne does not care about his constituents.
Wild assertions of this type are all too common from Manzella and her cohorts. Furthermore, the Manzella forces are trying to high jack true conservatism. On these grounds, many of us would like to see Manzella go down. Points 3 and 4 in Sullivan;’s letter serve to illustrate this high jacking problem.
On point 3, Sullivan properly identifies the problem, that “judges legislate from the bench.” But the bill in question did not serve to fix that problem. True conservatism refuses to clutter the books with ineffectual laws. On point 4, we see another example of a downgrade of conservative principles. True conservatism has long recognized that the multiplication of enumerated rights does not actually help the cause of freedom. It actually tends to create the opposite effect, by creating the need for more government policing and by creating collisions between rights’ groups. The old USSR led the world in enumerating rights, even as the people remained in shackles..
Bringing all this together allows us to see through Sullivan’s argument on point #2. Given the radical and eratic nature of Manzella’s agenda, we can hardly expect her to lead the way to higher ground on an important issue like property taxes. Thus, it made sense to not provide her with another springboard from which to cook up bogus solutions. One need only turn to another letter in the current issue of the Star, on SB 434, to see an example of the type of nonsense that Manzella comes up with.
It is high time to send her home and replace her with a common sense conservative. Please vote for Wayne Rusk for Senate.
John Grant says
So maybe your quarrel with Wayne Rusk is that he took the time and rigorous analysis of bills you would support by virtue of the John Birch leanings of the authorship?
I am grateful there are elected officials who can and will not buy into my total self serving opinions on how the “world ought to be”.. You might try to embrace that yourself..