#MTGov Daily Rundown: Bullock's Lt. Gov Difficulties

Sunday marks the one-year anniversary of former Lt. Gov. John Walsh dropping out of the U.S. Senate race after it was discovered he plagiarized his master's thesis at the Army War College. After then having problems with his next Lt. Gov., Bullock is now on his 3rd Lt. Gov. in 4 years. Does the governor's office have management issues?

"Daines was pointed about what he said was Democratic Gov. Steve Bullock’s inability to attract and retain good people. Bullock is on his third lieutenant governor in four years. One of those second in commands was John Walsh, Bullock’s original running mate, who in 2014 the governor appointed to replace former Sen. Max Baucus in the U.S. Senate and eventually endorsed as the candidate to replace Baucus.

Daines challenged Walsh for the seat in the 2014 general election, but Walsh was exposed by the New York Times for plagiarizing the final research paper behind his master's degree at the Army War College. The War College rescinded Walsh’s degree.

Sunday will mark the two-year anniversary of Walsh’s decision to quit the Senate race. Democrats scrambled to replace Walsh as a candidate, selecting Amanda Curtis, a school teacher from Butte who had been a state legislator." -Billings Gazette, 8/4/2016


Walsh was followed at the post by Angela McLean, who by all accounts, seemed to be well liked. However, there was apparently a falling out between McLean and Bullock that led to her resigning and taking another post in state government.

Montana Gov. Steve Bullock has used his private email account to communicate about a wide variety of official business from proposed legislation to his increasingly strained relationship with the former lieutenant governor, according to hundreds of pages of emails released Friday." -Great Falls Tribune, 5/6/2016

"The newly released records shed more light on the strained relationship between McLean, Bullock and his staff. McLean complains to Bullock about her treatment by his budget director, Dan Villa, whom she said told her 'either you are on the team or you are not.'

In May, the lieutenant governor wrote a letter to Bullock saying Chief of Staff Tracy Stone-Manning had confirmed that he was considering a different running mate for his 2016 re-election campaign. 'I guess I am learning ambition is a funny thing and realizing the full consequences of standing up for what you believe it right,' McLean wrote." -Great Falls Tribune, 5/6/2016

The resignation of McLean and Bullock's issues with his choices for Lt. Gov. have caused leading commentators and newspapers to raise larger questions about how the governor's office is being mananged.

"“What’s more important is it looks odd the governor is going to have a third lieutenant governor in a four-year term. That then raises questions I don’t think the governor wants raised. It brings back the Walsh story, it goes to the fundamental question of, 'Is the governor competent?'” -MSU political science professor David Parker in the Billings Gazette, 12/1/2016

"There’s a gap there. There’s obviously a gap between her account of what took place and the fact that you felt her frustration was disruptive. I mean, there’s something else there.” -Montana Standard editor David McCumber, 12/16/2016