Check the facts
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Editor,
We have a billboard outside of St. Ignatius. On one side, it says, “Zinke for Public Lands,” and on the other it says, “Zinke, Montana’s SEAL.”
We don’t have laws restricting misrepresentations and lies in political speech. Candidates may say what they like - but it is our job as citizens to check the facts.
Mr. Zinke’s career as a SEAL was stalled by indiscretions over billing the military for personal travel — termed “lapses of judgment” – in a 1999 Navy fitness report. He left the SEALs after this report and began looking for other work. He spent two years as Montana’s single Congressman before being installed as Secretary of Interior.
As Secretary, he presided over the largest sell-off of public lands and oceans in American history. He took some of our most beautiful, important habitats, as well as our most culturally significant lands, from the people - and handed them over to a few wealthy industries, for their profit - not ours. He recommended that the president shrink several national monuments, despite the fact that the 1906 Antiquities Act grants presidents only the authority to protect these sites - not to dismantle them.
In an administration plagued by scandal, after just two years, the president announced that Ryan Zinke would leave his post. He was under investigation on 15 counts, including a real estate deal involving a company that his department regulated, bending rules to allow his wife to use government vehicles, and allowing a security detail to travel with him on a vacation to Turkey.
Now Mr. Zinke is asking the people of Montana to vote for him for Representative of our new House District. Liberals and conservatives alike should be thinking about the importance of honesty and transparency in good government. Ryan Zinke is not a good candidate.
Gail Trenfield
St. Ignatius
