Election season is underway; get your popcorn ready

Election season is already off to a very interesting start and we are not even to the primaries yet.

Two candidates in particular have garnered a great deal of negative attention for the tactics they are using to politically gaslight those who are telling the truth about their voting records. I am referring to Flathead County Commissioner Pam Holmquist, who is running for yet another six-year term, and Ronalee Skees, who is running for the District 11 House seat currently occupied by her termed-out husband, Derek Skees.

While their voting records over the past two years on the health board are nothing to crow about, the crux of the matter revolves around their votes on March 19, 2020, a crucial vote that would determine the way Flathead County would handle this alleged “pandemic.”

During the health board meeting on Jan. 18, Holmquist made several false statements about how the board allegedly supported the rights of Flathead citizens over the past two years. Dr. Annie Bukacek politely refuted this by explaining and holding up a copy of the meeting minutes from that meeting that clearly showed that she was the only abstaining vote regarding shutting down restaurant dining rooms and only allowing for carry-out and delivery services, effectively cutting off 80% or more of the income for these businesses. It is public record, so easy for anyone to see in black and white.

Then the theatrics began and have only increased in intensity since. In the political equivalent of “the devil made me do it,” Holmquist attempted to deflect blame onto then-governor Bullock while Skees went full gaslight by basically stating any attempts to show their voting record were inflammatory and divisive.

Holmquist and Skees then attended a Republican women’s function and cried the blues that they voted the way they did out of fear, admitting they believed the ridiculous assertions that we were going to need refrigerated morgue trucks, etc., in spite of the fact asserted several times that there were zero cases of Covid-19 in Flathead County, 12 alleged “cases” in all of Montana and zero deaths in Montana at that time. Because we need public officials who vote based on fear instead of facts and principle, right?

Derek Skees then decided to jump into the fray, starting with the Health Board meeting Feb. 17, where he labeled those who were pointing out the inconvenient truth about his wife’s voting record as woke, fringe, right-wing extremists. This is all public record and he has further entrenched himself since by doubling down on these statements and continuing to gaslight and use leftist tactics that he would normally decry. Apparently when it’s about politics, principles don’t matter.

The meeting video is public record and available on YouTube. I encourage everyone to watch it, but have your popcorn ready.

— Julie Martin, Kalispell