HELENA — As Republicans on a state legislative select committee continue hearings into Montana’s judicial branch, they’ve adopted new rules – including one expanding the committee’s use of subpoenas. Leaders say they could also bring those policies to a new committee investigating an election issue in Butte.
On Tuesday morning, the Senate Select Committee on Judicial Oversight and Reform adopted two proposals from Senate President Sen. Jason Ellsworth, R-Hamilton, that he said would help them finish their work in a timely manner.
“We have a limited amount of time in the interim, session is fast approaching us in January, so we have to use our time wisely,” he said. “It's the citizen's money, we don't need to be spending more of their money being here, so we need to run efficiently. And what this will allow us to do is continue to run efficiently.”
The first motion says the select committee will issue subpoenas to elected officials and those who work under them whenever lawmakers are asking them to testify. Ellsworth said in some cases, they’ve gone back and forth with prospective witnesses about appearing before the committee, and that a subpoena would make it easier to ensure they attend the meetings.
The second motion calls for updating a document those testifying sign, to say that they will tell “the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth” – as in a courtroom. Ellsworth said he didn’t think there was a need for someone to swear witnesses in but he felt the committee wasn’t always getting full information from them, and he thought this language would “give people a pause” as they considered how to answer questions.
“I don't think anybody ever comes to our committee in any way, shape or form to give false testimony, and that's not what this is about,” he said. “This is about complete testimony.”
Ellsworth told MTN he didn’t believe these changes would create a more adversarial atmosphere with those testifying.
“We need complete answers from people, and I think this will help facilitate us to get there,” he said. “It's certainly not meant to be adversarial.”
Ellsworth said he expected a new select committee on elections to follow the example this committee set. He convened the committee over the weekend, after the Butte-Silver Bow Clerk and Recorder’s Office announced it would be recounting all ballots from the June primary, because of a discrepancy that indicated about 1,000 votes might have been counted twice. After the recount was completed Tuesday, the final vote count dropped from 12,077 to 10,934 – though there were only minimal impacts on primary results.
“I know, because a lot of people have talked to me about this, they're concerned about elections,” said Ellsworth. “And that's our job, is to make sure that integrity of elections is followed. And that's what we're going to do – but it's going to be fact-based.”
Ellsworth created the judiciary select committee after a series of court rulings that Republicans said had overstepped on the authority of other branches of government. Democrats have consistently refused to participate, saying it was a “political stunt” and part of a pattern of attacks on the judicial branch.
Democrats are taking part in the election committee. Senate Minority Leader Pat Flowers appointed Sens. Ryan Lynch and Edie McClafferty – both from Butte – to serve on it. He told MTN Tuesday it was a different situation than the judiciary committee because it was focused on a specific incident, and that Democrats shared an interest in making sure concerns about elections are addressed.
“We obviously are supportive of free and fair elections,” he said.
Flowers said he thought the policies Ellsworth had proposed would be unnecessary, and he questioned why those steps would be implemented for these committees when they aren’t used during the regular legislative session.
“I think it’s overkill,” he said.
Ellsworth said the judiciary committee had held about seven meetings since launching in April. This week, they discussed a piece of proposed legislation, that would create a public performance evaluation system for Montana judges.
