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CHEYENNE – The Wyoming Republican Party on Saturday selected a former Wyoming Speaker of the House, a local attorney and a Cody farmer as the three finalists for Secretary of State.

Torrington’s Ed Buchanan, Cheyenne’s Darin Smith and Cody’s Richard George are all vying to fill the spot left vacant by former Secretary of State Ed Murray.

Murray resigned earlier this month after two women publicly accused him of sexual misconduct.

Now, Gov. Matt Mead will select the replacement to serve the remaining 10 months of Murray’s term. That appointee will oversee the August primary elections and November general elections; supervise business and trademark registration; and would be first in line to replace the governor if he couldn’t complete his term.

Among the other candidates vying for the spot were former Secretary of State Max Maxfield, Wyoming Auditor Cynthia Cloud, former state Rep. Pete Illoway and Hot Springs County Clerk Nina Webber.

Each candidate presented a 3-minute speech to the Republican committee and answered eight questions about election policies, voting equipment, public lands and public investment.

The following is a brief summary of the major policy positions discussed by each finalist:

Ed Buchanan

The Laramie County prosecutor and former Wyoming Speaker of the House focused on the issue of voter fraud during his question-and-answer session.

“This is something we’ve seen a lot in the news lately, and I can tell you that it’s happened in a lot of states,” Buchanan said.

The topic of voter fraud has become more prevalent in recent years as largely Republican states such as Kansas and Wisconsin have passed strict Voter ID laws requiring people to carry a government-issued photo ID to polls.

But critics of those proposals say those laws target poor people as part of a growing effort to roll back progress on voting rights.

Buchanan said he doesn’t buy that argument because the state would make government-issued IDs available to help people vote.

 “To me, it’s not an inconvenience to show up to the polls, show an ID, get checked off, match your address … so that we can have confidence that the people who are voting are eligible to vote,” he said.

He also said he’d crack down on people who no longer live in Wyoming casting out of state ballots.

“If you lose the integrity of your elections, nothing else really matters,” he said.

In addition to voter fraud, Buchanan also advocated for using better technology to make customer service better for filling, educating the public about regulatory processes and finding more efficiencies to save the state time and money.

Richard George

The Cody farmer and Republican National Committeemen for Wyoming said he felt God was pushing him toward the vacant seat in the Secretary of State’s office.

“We need to have people in the Secretary of State’s office who care about elections and we’ve got to have conservatives filling these seats,” he said.

George talked frequently about the “good people” that currently worked in the Secretary of State’s office and how he would try to equip them with tools they need to do the job.

He said if the state were to adopt a vote-by-mail approach, the Secretary of State’s office would need to take a “heavy-handed approach” to make sure that people didn’t abuse it.

In response to a question about the Secretary of State’s role on the State Loan and Investment Board, which manages land funds and administer grant and loan programs to cities, towns and counties, George said he would be efficient with state money and prudent in awarding contracts.

He said he’d be ready to ask tough questions about grants awarded to communities.

“There’s nothing better to change Wyoming’s financial situation than a farmer with a sharp pencil,” he said.

Darin Smith

The Cheyenne attorney and former Christian Broadcasting Network executive said he would bring Wyoming into the future by trying to attract technology businesses.

“Because of weather and energy needs, Wyoming is an ideal place for data centers and crypto-currency miners,” he said. “There are literally thousands of companies that could and should have their data centers in Wyoming.”

He lauded the Wyoming Legislature for introducing bills that would enable cryptocurrency trading in the state. Wyoming is one of the few states in the country that doesn’t currently allow people to trade virtual tokens such as Bitcoin.

Those two bills were approved by committees last week and wait passage of the full House.

Like Buchanan, Smith said he worried about the integrity of elections.

He said imposing some kind of ID requirement would be “absolutely essential.”

When asked whether he would support a “vote-by-mail” proposal that has been adopted in other states, Smith said he was “100 percent, diametrically opposed.”

He said that allowing people to send mail-in ballots instead of voting in person would “breed corruption.”