Former Wyoming Lawmakers Voice Shock, Anger Over 'CheckGate' Controversy

Jeff Wasserburger served in the Wyoming state legislature for 20 years.

And while it's only been a few years since he left the seat, statehouse norms appear to be spiraling, he said. 

So fast, in fact, it’s made him emotional.

When he learned a non-member of the House handed out donation checks on the chamber’s floor last week, he grew tearful.

“I can honestly tell you that when I read in the newspaper about this, I actually had tears in my eyes,” said Wasserburger, who represented Gillette and held top posts in both the Senate and House during his time in office.

Wasserburger said it was a “brazen act,” last Monday, when state Teton County Republican Party committeewoman Rebecca Bextel handed out checks to legislators on the House floor following adjournment of the session’s first day.

Wasserburger is not alone in his dismay.

Bextel has said publicly that she was distributing lawful campaign checks on behalf of a Teton County donor, and that she did so in person because she knew she’d be in Cheyenne.

It also happened two days before the reported recipients on the House side, among others, voted in favor of introducing a bill Bextel has championed.

The incident spurred an internal investigation in the House, a unanimous condemnation in the Senate, a draft of new Senate rules, and now an external investigation by Laramie County Sheriff's Department over allegations of possible bribery.

All for good reason, say former legislators in interviews with Cowboy State Daily, on what Capitol regulars are calling “CheckGate.”

“It’s unprecedented. I never saw anything like this. When it comes to ethics violations, never, I don’t recall anything of this magnitude,” said Ron Micheli, a Uinta County Republican who served in the legislature for 16 years, from the late 1970s through the early 1990s.

More Than Optics

One check recipient, Rep. Darin McCann, R-Rock Springs, publicly conceded, “The optics is bad, I agree absolutely. But I did nothing wrong — I did not accept any bribe or anything like that,” Cowboy State Daily reported from the House gallery Thursday.

Reducing the problem to optics, however, understates the trouble, according to Micheli.

“The public struggles with the Legislature on a good day. And anytime you have an appearance, these optics, it just confirms in people's minds the negative feelings they already have,” he said.

 “That negativity obviously affects the legislature and the work they need to do. This makes their work harder.”

The optics are glaring for other reasons also.

'None Of These People Are Candidates ...'

Bextel wrote in a Facebook post two days after the incident, “There’s nothing wrong with delivering lawful campaign checks from Teton County donors when I am in Cheyenne.”

Micheli said he doesn’t take those statements at face value.

“I think it's dodging the point if you're saying it's a campaign contribution, because there's no campaign. No one has filed for any office, because the time for filing isn’t until May,” he said. 

“That’s what makes this so troubling – none of these people are candidates, so what’s the money for?”

Anthony Ross, who served 22 years in the Legislature, in both the House and Senate, said that lawmakers’ ethics training always emphasized two critical areas.

“As vice president, and then as majority floor leader, we did all the training before the session and made it was very, very clear there's no allowance for trading votes – I'll vote for this way for you if you vote this way for me – and there’s no allowance for accepting some sort of benefit for a vote,” said Ross, a Republican who represented Laramie County. 

“Whether or not any of this constitutes malfeasance in office, the appearance is absolutely awful.”

Privilege Of The Floor, Who Gets It?

Micheli described lawmaking as a hallowed process. 

“The legislative process in my mind is sacred, and it's done in a sacred place,” said Micheli.

Other members echoed his reverence.

Of the Capitol’s sacred spaces, the floor is uniquely hallowed, they said. Accordingly, access to the floor is guarded by both statute and policy. 

State code gives the Speaker of the House and Senate President the authority to regulate “passageways on the second and third floors of the capitol building and passageways adjacent (chamber areas).”

And, policy and rules outline how and when non-members may appear on the floor. Those standards are found in House Rules, the Wyoming Manual of Legislative Procedures as well as policies from Management Council, among other documents.

As an example of floor access protocol, this year’s Management Council policy says guests, aides and interns are not allowed on the floor of either chamber while the bodies are in session – and they may only enter the floor if invited by a member while the bodies are at ease.

The lawmaker escorting the guest onto the floor is responsible for that guest’s conduct, the policy adds.

“I think that’s a critical question – who invited her,” said Wasserburger. “And if she was invited, she has a right to be there, however, that does not make handing out checks appropriate. 

Bextel handed out checks after adjournment. 

To former legislator Eli Bebout — a Riverton Republican who held top leadership posts in both chambers of the statehouse over the course of almost 30 years in state government — the timing of the act makes little difference.

“The privilege of the floor is very special,” said Bebout, “I'm hard pressed to remember lobbyists ever being on the floor, whether or not in session.”

Bextel is credentialed to attend the legislative session as a member of the media, though Bebout believes she was effectively functioning as a lobbyist.

Media are confined to the gallery and corridors for recording and documenting the events, under this year’s rules.

As an example of how the body has sought to guard against lobbying at the Capitol, House Rules say, “No ex-member of the House who is currently registered as a lobbyist with the secretary of state shall be granted privilege of the floor while the House is in session to address members of the House on any issue.”

Bebout said the act of handing out checks symbolized the growing influence of money in state politics, and raises questions about stewardship of the floor.

During the 2025 General Session, State Rep. John Bear, R-Gillette, who serves on the Management Council, penned an op-ed that began with an unequivocal statement on the topic.

“Under the rules of the Wyoming Legislature, lobbyists aren’t allowed on the House floor,” Bear wrote, by way of introduction for a tongue-in-cheek thesis that elected members had broken the rule by behaving like lobbyists.

Now a year later, lawmakers are voicing concern not over what Bear sardonically termed “lobbyist-legislator-hybrids,” but rather a non-member activist championing at least two bills the Legislature was considering that week as she reportedly delivered 10 checks, of $1,500 each, on behalf of a Teton County donor.

“That's not chump change,” said Ross.

Appropriate Response

Even as they lament the occasion, former legislators cheer the swift response by statehouse leadership. 

The House voted Thursday to convene a special committee to investigate whether the incident was an act of bribery or legislative misconduct.

On Friday, the Senate formally and unanimously condemned the Teton County GOP leader’s act, while the Senate Rules Committee began crafting a new chamber rule that could ban campaign contributions or their acceptance “by affirmative act” while in session.

“The fact that both bodies, in a near unanimous vote, said this is not what we would want or believe, really speaks well of the institution today, and I applaud both bodies for stepping up, because it’s not a partisan issue,” said Bebout.

Micheli also commended the response by leadership, but said the fundamental challenge can’t be fixed by new rules or laws.

Instead, he sees it as a call to address Wyoming’s political culture.

“The Senate can write new rules, that's fine, but ultimately it comes down to a basic belief in ethics and principles,” said Micheli, who during his service taught “legislative school” for incoming members, teaching decorum, workflow and ethics.   

“The Constitution is very clear about bribery or the appearance thereof. The important thing (for leadership) now is to talk about it, so they can enhance the belief in the sacredness of the legislative process,” he said.

Ross said the creation of a special investigative committee is a first-of-its-kind response.

“In my tenure, we’ve never had to create a special committee created to investigate ethics, and I’ll applaud Speaker (Chip) Neiman for creating that committee, because he may very well be one of the recipients of one of those checks,” Ross said. 

Neiman and Bear were intended recipients of the checks, the original donor Don Grasso told Cowboy State Daily on Saturday. Grasso also said his assistant had sent Bextel the checks believing Bextel would mail – rather than hand – them to potentially embattled, Freedom-Caucus aligned candidates.

Ethical Lapses From Earlier Eras Don’t Compare

While serving as Senate president, the biggest ethical error Tony Ross oversaw culminated with him ordering a lawmaker to deliver a public apology on the Senate floor. The lawmaker attempted to influence the outcome of a bill inappropriately, though Ross declined to disclose specifics.

Bebout recalled leadership rallying to protect Capitol integrity in other ways, though it was to put civilians, not legislators, in check.

During one session a constituent threatened a lawmaker in the Capitol lobby.

“This guy threatened him and just went over the top. We wouldn’t put up with that in any shape or form. The Sergeant (at) Arms removed him,” said Bebout.

He sees last week’s incident as the encroachment of a different kind of influence, no less detrimental to statehouse integrity.

“We always debated a lot of very intense issues,” he said, “but nobody ever threatened or (insinuated) that money was going one way or another because of an outcome.”

He also disagrees with the practice of taking personal photos on the floor, like the one Rep. Karlee Provenza, D-Laramie, shot of the incident Monday which both captured and galvanized the controversy.
“The checks are totally wrong,” Bebout said, “but to have people on the floor and taking pictures of representatives in that way, I don’t really think that’s appropriate either.”

Wasserburger said he witnessed only minor missteps in floor decorum during his two decades’ tenure, mostly accidental flubs in protocol, like speaking before being recognized or walking in front of a member during an address.

But those were rainstorms in comparison to the meteor that struck floor norms last week, he added.

“It's an embarrassing situation for all legislators,” said Wasserburger.

Former members said they have confidence that the statehouse institution will respond strongly and emerge a more conscientious body in the end.

For Ross, the stakes could not be greater. 

“You may be in the legislature for a few years, but the institution lives on,” he said. “All of those things that we now celebrate about Wyoming, you could tarnish all of it by making it look like the (Legislature) was for sale.”

Zakary Sonntag can be reached at zakary@cowboystatedaily.com.