Rep. Knudsen seeking reelection in HD 33

Montana House District 33 incumbent representative Casey Knudsen is seeking reelection in this November’s 2020 general election after serving since 2016.

In last week’s Phillips County News, Randy Holom, the CEO member at the Frances Mahon Deaconess Hospital in Glasgow, wrote in a paid political advertisement that he was frustrated with Rep. Knudsen’s stances on “health care legislation during his term in the Montana legislature’ He said he was compelled to voice his opinions of the HD 33 race for the Republican primary. Holom said that “Even on issues where there has been disagreements (legislator’s) positions were based on logic, reason, and sound science rather than on the political ideology of factions of their political party.

Sadly, that has not been the case since 2017 when Mr. Knudsen was elected,” Holom said.

Rep. Knudsen said that among many problems with the Medicaid expansion, the main problem was seeing how soundly the initiative (I-185, to increase the tobacco tax expanded eligibility of Medicaid coverage under the Affordable Care Act in Montana) was defeated in HD 33 when it came before the voters. Rep. Knudsen said that there were more than twice the number of votes against I-185 than in sport for.

I-185 in the 2018 election was defeated in Montana 264,087 to 236,990. In HD 33, the initiative was defeated 3,093 to 1,449 (Blaine 595 against 413 for; Hill 354 against 177 for; Phillips County 1,127 against, 348 for; and Valley 1017 against, 511 for.)

“That told me the people of HD 33 were wanting to reject more government control over their healthcare ,” Rep. Knudsen told the PCN. “Not only was the initiative defeated soundly in the state, but once the bill came through the legislature, there were too many problems with the bill for me to feel comfortable with supporting it.”

Another problem according to Rep. Knudsen, was that the work requirements included in the Medicaid Expansion bill were for mostly unenforceable. He said that there have been several federal district court lawsuits that have thrown-out Medicaid work requirements, citing lawsuits in Arkansas and Kentucky in 2019.

“I also didn’t want to saddle the state of Montana with the massive costs that we would have incurred should the federal government fail to pay for their share of the Medicaid program,” Rep. Knudsen said.

The primary election will be held on Tuesday, June 2 for the purpose of nominating federal, state, district and county candidates for the November 3, 2020 general election ballot and in Montana’s House District 33, incumbent Casey Knudsen is running for running reelection.