Key coverage in the race for Attorney General
Race profile: Drugs, health care and budgets
Montana Lowdown: Austin Knudsen
Montana Lowdown: Raph Graybill
MTN News debate: Attorney General
Fundraising and campaign spending
Contributions by zip code: Kim Dudik (D)
Media coverage
On the issues
What separates you from your primary opponents as your party’s best candidate to serve as Montana's attorney general?
Experience is what separates my candidacy from all of my opponents on both sides of the aisle. My experience over 18 years as a practicing attorney in Montana provides the depth of experience statewide leaders need. I held offenders accountable and protected vulnerable populations for six years as a deputy Gallatin County attorney and an assistant attorney general under Attorney General Steve Bullock. As a private attorney and small business owner, I fought for the rights of citizens at all levels: from protecting working Montanans’ rights, to fighting for justice for crime victims, to ensuring children are safe. I served the people of Montana as a substitute judge and have been a legislator for the past eight years, examining and setting the state budget and leading essential reforms. I bring unique experience in health care and public health, having been a registered nurse specializing in neonatal intensive care, an advocate for domestic violence survivors, and director for a hospital.
Should the state incarcerate fewer people? If so, are there specific criminal justice reform measures you support?
I spearheaded reforms to help pregnant women receive chemical dependency treatment without being prosecuted for their addiction and led critical work to protect children from sexual abuse and stop human trafficking. I also started the only state-funded holistic criminal defense program in the nation, providing wraparound services to individuals so they can address the issues underlying their criminal behavior. As attorney general, I will continue reforming our criminal justice system and making Montana a safer and healthier place by increasing mental health and chemical dependency treatment. I will bolster the pre-trial diversion programs I helped start to get non-violent offenders out of the criminal justice system and connected to the services they need to live healthy, safe, and productive lives. I will also continue to protect children by holding abusers accountable and ensuring that the juvenile justice system has the resources it needs to rehabilitate young Montanans.
Do you believe abortion should be legal? If so, in which situations? If Montana passed an abortion ban, would you defend it from legal challenges?
I have vocally opposed all attempts to limit reproductive health care access as a danger to women’s lives and violation of the right to privacy, guaranteed by our state Constitution. As attorney general (first woman to hold the position if elected), I will fight against any efforts to take away these protections. I will not support an abortion ban because it is unconstitutional. As a neonatal intensive care nurse, I saw the impact public health policies had on the most vulnerable families. Montana needs stronger policies to protect women. As a state legislator and practicing attorney, I strengthened sex trafficking penalties and fought to eliminate the criminal statute of limitations for allowing prosecutions against those who sexually abuse children. Our failure to protect ndigenous women also requires particular attention. I worked closely with Rep. Rae Peppers last year to address the MMIP epidemic. I will remove bureaucratic barriers and dramatically improve these investigations.
Current Attorney General Tim Fox has initiated litigation against pharmaceutical companies that have distributed opioids in Montana. Do you support that action?
As a nurse, attorney, and legislator, I know firsthand the importance and potential dangers of prescription drugs. As a nurse, I saw the unfair choices patients had to make to pay for their medicine. As a legislator, I created Montana Prescription Drug Take-Back Day, encouraging Montanans to return unused and unneeded prescription pills. I also fought for reforms that would have brought transparency and limited increases in costs for prescription drugs. As attorney general I will fight for transparency and bring suit against insurance companies, big pharmaceutical companies, and pharmacy benefit managers who are trying to price us out of our prescriptions. I will join or continue the multistate lawsuits against those who have profited from opioids, and ensure Montana receives relief money. I will also take action to build the chemical dependency treatment we desperately need. My nursing and public health experience provide me a unique understanding of our addiction crisis.
As the attorney general, you would be one of five seats on the Montana Land Board, which manages state trust lands. What priorities would you advocate for in that role?
The biggest threat facing Montana’s public lands is the threat of losing their protected status and being opened up to harmful natural resource development, destructive recreation, or placing them for sale and taking them out of public hands. I have worked tirelessly for the past eight years as a legislator to defend public access to, and health of, our public lands. As a Land Board member I will ensure public lands stay in public hands. I will challenge out-of-state corporations and billionaires to prevent them from building fences that prevent locals from accessing their favorite public places. I will take action to end illegal dumping that is polluting our public lands and waterways. I would move Montana forward in the fight to stop climate change. I will hold the EPA accountable for cleaning up Superfund sites and add pending sites to the clean-up list, and fight federal rollbacks to environmental protections. Furthering environmental justice is the attorney general's job.
Stay tuned for more
We'll be updating this page with new information through Election Day in November 2020.
Have ideas about additional coverage that would be helpful as you consider your vote? Tell us at edietrich@montanafreepress.org.