Wyoming

Eric Barlow won the open governor’s race with 68.1% of the vote. He defeated the Constitution Party candidate, Rebecca Bextel, who was second with 16.7%, and Democrat Kenneth Casner.¹ Republican Harriet Hageman won the U.S. Senate race by 30.3 points over Democrat James Byrd, and Secretary of State Chuck Gray won the state’s one U.S. House seat by 20.7.^{1, 2} Republicans won all four of the other statewide offices: Robert Short for secretary of state, Steve Harshman for superintendent of public instruction, and Curt Meier for treasurer and Kristi Racines for auditor, who had no general election opponent.¹ The secretary of state’s office lists the results as official.³

Trump carried Wyoming by 46.2 points in 2024, and Hageman’s margin was 15.9 points smaller. Byrd drew 94 votes for every 100 Kamala Harris won here; Hageman drew 63 for every 100 of Trump’s. The votes counted come to 97% of the 2022 total and 71% of the 2024 presidential vote. Gray’s House margin, R+20.7, was narrower still. Ryan Williamson, a political scientist at the University of Wyoming, told WyoFile the swing was historically large and that what it means is still up in the air.⁴

The two metro areas moved most. The Casper area went from R+48.6 to R+29.7, a move of 18.9 points, and the Cheyenne area from R+32.4 to R+14.3. The rest of the state, which casts 71% of the vote, moved least, 14.9 points, and stayed Republican at R+34.0.

Albany County, in the Laramie area, was the only county to change sides in the Senate race, going from R+3.2 to D+16.9 on 13,220 votes. Sweetwater County, in the Rock Springs area, moved farther, 21.7 points, and still voted Republican by 31.5. Laramie County, the largest, went from R+32.4 to R+14.3. No county moved toward the Republicans. The governor’s race looked different: Barlow won every county, each with at least 59 percent, at 93 percent of votes counted, Cowboy State Daily reported.⁵

Republicans keep the governor’s office and both chambers of the Legislature, with two-thirds majorities in each. Our count could not read most Wyoming legislative districts. A client alert from the law firm Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, written on November 4 pending official certification, has the Senate unchanged at 29 Republicans and two Democrats and the House at 55 Republicans and seven Democrats. A veto is overridden by two-thirds of the members elected to each house.^{1, 6} The one Democratic gain was House District 11, an open seat a Republican had held, where Britney Tennant beat Republican Dan McIntosh and Libertarian Ryan Shollenberger by 54 votes.^{1, 7} Another change inside the majority came before November. In the August 18 primary the Wyoming Freedom Caucus lost 13 House incumbents and its House majority, and WyoFile estimated it would have about 10 reliable House votes and five in the Senate in January.⁸

Barlow named Erin Taylor his chief of staff and Walter Eggers as his nominee for attorney general, who needs Senate confirmation. “Wyoming deserves a government that listens, spends responsibly and delivers dependable service,” he said, WyoFile reported on November 10.⁹ The Legislature convenes on January 13, 2027, with 28 House members in their first term, and the Brownstein alert says Sen. Tara Nethercott, the majority floor leader, will likely become Senate president.¹

The Legislature draws the maps. The constitution has it reapportion its own seats at the first budget session after each federal census and draw congressional districts when Congress makes a new apportionment, and the state has one House seat.⁶ Elections pass to Robert Short, the Republican who won the open secretary of state’s office that Gray is leaving for Congress.^{1, 2}

A citizen initiative in Wyoming is enacted only if the votes for it exceed half of all those voting in the general election, so a ballot left blank on the question counts against it.^{6, 10, 11} Proposition One, the first initiative on the Wyoming ballot in 30 years, would have exempted half of a primary residence’s assessed value from property tax. It failed, 80,047 votes for and 105,209 against in the secretary of state’s official summary.^{1, 10, 11}

Voters kept both Wyoming Supreme Court justices who stood for retention. The secretary of state’s official summary has Bridget Hill at 122,319 yes to 38,535 no and Robert C. Jarosh at 119,945 yes to 38,904 no; justices serve eight-year terms.^{6, 12}

Republicans won again in all seven of the offices in our count that they held, the closest of them the House seat, by 20.7 points. Their Senate candidate carried 21 of the 23 counties. Democrats won no statewide office, and Republicans kept their supermajority, the Brownstein alert says.¹ WyoFile reported that Republicans swept Wyoming but that voters there swung left compared with 2024.⁴

Neither of Wyoming’s U.S. Senate seats will be on the ballot in 2028. Barlow is set to be inaugurated on January 4, and the governor’s four-year term puts the office back on the ballot in 2030.^{1, 6, 9} The party system changes sooner. Because Bextel drew more than the 10% of the vote that state law requires, the Constitution Party is set to become Wyoming’s third major party, which means it will choose its candidates in the primary election instead of at a convention, WyoFile reported.¹³ The Legislature will next redraw its districts at the first budget session after the next federal census.⁶