Fellows: Libertarian says he's the true fiscal conservative

HELENA — Mike Fellows said he’s running for the U.S. House for three reasons: to try to balance the federal budget, reduce the federal debt and protect Second Amendment gun rights.

The perennial Libertarian candidate from Missoula faces Democrat John Lewis and Republican Ryan Zinke in the Nov. 4 general election.

“If you want smaller government, lower taxes and more liberty, we’re the only candidate in the race,” Fellows said. “We’re the only fiscal conservative that’s out there. Lewis is the liberal. Zinke has already said he’s a moderate, and then you’ve got myself, who’s a fiscal conservative.”

Fellows, who said he’s around 55, is self-employed in video preparations and “odds and ends.”

He’s coming off his best showing in a statewide race in 2012, polling 43 percent in a losing race against longtime Supreme Court Clerk Ed Smith, a Democrat. No Republican ran.

To balance the federal budget, Fellows called for elimination of the U.S. departments of Education, Commerce and Energy.

He said the U.S. Education Department should just send its budget to the states, which would trigger innovation in education, halt its top-down, one-size-fits-all approach and eliminate the jobs of the federal agency’s current employees.

“It would be nice to scrap the tax code as well, but you and I know that is not going to happen,” the Libertarian said. “We need to reduce the rate of corporate and individual taxes.”

As for the $17.7 trillion federal debt, Fellows said, “We just have to control spending. That’s the only way we’re going to do it. We can’t spend more than we take in.”

Fellows said the country is slowly becoming more Libertarian, with candidates actually talking about reducing spending and getting the U.S. debt under control.

“People also see that this country is being destroyed by the two-party system,” he said. “It doesn’t matter who controls Washington because we still see government grow, we still see more government spending, more government debt and a loss of liberties and privacy by laws like the Patriot Act.” 

Federal judges already have found parts of the Patriot Act to be unconstitutional, including the provision that gives the federal government the right to collect phone records without a search warrant.

“Congress tried to defund it,” Fellows said. “We can’t defund it. It’s a feel-good type of action. We need to repeal it.”

He called for repealing unconstitutional gun control laws such as the Brady Law and some aspects of the 1968 Crime Control Act.

Fellows said he’s raised quite a bit of money, but not enough to meet the $5,000 threshold needed to have to file a campaign finance report with the Federal Election Commission.

“I guess you could say we’re not trying to buy the election,” he said.

Fellows said he has traveled to participate in a number of parades, done a number of interviews and spoken to various groups across during the campaign.

Besides being state chairman of the Montana Libertarian Party, Fellows said he’s one of the state coordinators for the Montana Fully Informed Jury Association. He is also on the board of Missoula Community Access Television and a trustee for American Legion Post 27.