Plain Talk

We are 31 days away from election day and, here in North Dakota, the hottest race in the state probably isn't for the U.S. Senate, or the U.S. House, or even the governor's seat. It is, arguably, Measure 4 which, if passed, would eliminate taxes on property values and order the Legislature to compensate local governments for that loss of revenue at 2024 levels. It's such a hot issue that when Prai...

Todd Reisenauer says he'd like to get elected to the North Dakota House of Representatives so that he can take Fargo-area District 46 in a new direction. He said he'd like to focus on issues like housing, healthcare, childcare, and property taxes. What he doesn't want to do, he says, is emulate the approach taken by one of incumbents in that district, state Rep. Jim Kasper, who has been in the cen...

Steve Bakken is the former mayor of Bismarck, and the chair of the committee backing Measure 5, which seeks to legalize recreational marijuana in North Dakota. Pat Finken is a long-time advertising professional and political activist. He's a part of the coalition opposing Measure 5. These gentleman came together on Plain Talk to make their respective cases. The contrasts in their arguments, as you...

Is Attorney General Drew Wrigley's office wasting money on unnecessary litigation? Is North Dakota's Republican majority in the Legislature being something less than good stewards of our fiscal resources by passing controversial bills that invite litigation? House Minority Leader Zac Ista, who led his caucus in voting against approving attitional litigation funds for Wrigley's office at a recent m...

If you read the ballot language for Measure 3 and still didn't understand just what it is the proposed constitutional amendment does, I wouldn't blame you. I don't think that's anyone's fault. It's just a somewhat arcane topic, but that doesn't mean it's not important. State Rep. Corey Mock joined us on this episode of Plain Talk to discuss the proposal, which would make some changes around the Le...

Are the proponents of Measure 2 "elite and out of touch?" Are they "condescending" and "disrespectful" to the electorate? Or do they view North Dakota's initiated measure process -- particularly when it comes to amending the state constitution -- as flawed and needing reform? Measure 2 is a constitutional amendment placed on the ballot by the Legislature, which would prohibit people who aren't Nor...

In November, North Dakota voters will be asked to decide the fate of Measure 4. If approved, it would amend the state constitution to prohibit taxes on property values. It would also lock in an obligation for the state legislature to replace current property tax revenues to local government with other revenues, but only at 2024 levels, with no mechanism to change that level in the future. On this...

"The property tax is a good tax," Jared Walczak told Chad Oban and I on this episode of Plain Talk. "You may not love it, but you will not like the alternatives better." Walczak is the state projects director for the Tax Foundation, a right-of-center think tank that focuses on -- you guessed it -- tax policy. His organization recently published an article critical of Measure 4, a constitutional am...

North Dakota's gubernatorial race features to affable, well-liked candidates, who clearly like one another as well. Republican Kelly Armstrong was first elected to the North Dakota Senate in 2012, and served there until the 2018 election cycle, when he campaigned successfully for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. That's where he's currently finishing out a term, while also campaigning f...

We all know the old saying.  You don't talk about religion and politics in polite company. Only, does that advice make sense in a society like ours, where we practice self-governance? How can we govern ourselves if we can't talk to one another about politics? And, more pertinent to this episode of Plain Talk, how do we teach our kids how to participate in discourse over challenging issues like abo...

When U.S. House candidates Julie Fedorchak (a Republican) and Trygve Hammer (a Democrat) sat down for a debate on the Plain Talk podcast with me and my co-host Chad Oban, one of the first questions I asked them was why they wanted to be elected to Congress. Hammer, a Marine Corps veteran, said it's because less than 80 of the current 435 members of the House of Representatives have served in the m...

"This is the best job I could ever imagine," North Dakota U.S. Attorney Mac Schneider said on this episode of Plain Talk. Schneider was appointed to that position by President Joe Biden. Later this year, when America elects a new president, he may be out of a job, depending on how the country casts its ballots. A Republican president isn't likely to keep a Democratic appointee, but if Vice Preside...

When we organize candidate debates on the Plain Talk podcast, our intent is to foster a competition that's not bogged down by a lot of rules and restrictive formatting, nor plagued by shouting and candidates talking over one another. We don't really even want a competition. We want a conversation. A thoughtful discussion between two candidates on important issues of interest to the voters. I think...

"Every law enforcement officer I've spoken to has said this has been hard on our state and hard on law enforcement." That's what Burleigh County Sheriff Kelly Leben had to say on this episode of Plain Talk. He's referring to Measure 5 on North Dakota's November ballot which, if passed, would legalize the recreational use of marijuana. "I'm very big on personal freedom," Sheriff Leben told co-host...

"Let's take valuations away." That's what state Rep. Ben Koppelman proposed on this episode of Plain Talk. He's referring to a plan for property tax reform that he's proposed should Measure 4 -- a constitutional ban on taxing property values -- fail on the statewide ballot in November. Koppelman would like to see property taxed on size, not value. His plan would levy mills on the square footage of...

Even if North Dakota voters approve Measure 4, a constitutional amendment that would disallow taxes on real estate values, our state and its elected leaders will still need to figure out how to replace the roughly $2.4 billion in revenues those taxes generate very budget cycle. We're going to pay for it. The question is how. Neal Messer, a farmer, businessman, and commissioner in Stark County, joi...

The emergence of Vice President Kamala Harris as the top-of-the-ticket candidate for Democrats, nationally, has created an undeniable wave of enthusiasm among our liberal friends. North Dakota's Democrats are no different. "There's a new pep in our step," state Rep. Zac Ista told my co-host Chad Oban and I on this episode of Plain Talk. Ista is a Democrat from Grand Forks and the House Minority Le...

Rep. Kelly Armstrong, who is currently in the midst of a campaign to become North Dakota's next governor, has had a long career in public service. On this episode of Plain Talk, he told my co-host Chad Oban and I what his proudest moment has been from that career (so far, he's still a young man in political years). He said it was helping his hometown, Dickinson, build a new baseball complex. It wa...

In 2018, North Dakota voters approved a ballot measure creating the state Ethics Commission. The commission was implemented in 2019, and that first year, it received just 2 complaints. There were 3 in 2020, 9 in 2021, then a spike (right around election time) in 2022 to 14. There were 14 complaints again in 2023, and so far in 2024 (another election year) the number has spiked to 25 as of July 25....

Many Republicans are trying to argue that President Joe Biden opting to end his re-election campaign, and the subsequent consolidation of Democrats behind the candidacy of Vice President Kamala Harris, was a "coup." Was it? My co-host Chad Oban and I discussed it on this episode of Plain Talk, where we were also joined by Trista Keith, a now-former member of the Dickinson State University nursing...

When President Joe Biden announced an end to his re-election campaign, Adam Goldwyn, chairman of the North Dakota Democratic-NPL, participated in a call with his counterparts from around the country that resulted in a unanimous endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris to replace the incumbent at the top of the party's national ticket. "There was overwhelming support for her in that group," Gold...

Dickinson State University, one of the North Dakota University System's four-year institutions, has been thrown into chaos by a labor dispute with a group of nursing faculty. First the faculty, after rejecting a new contract aimed at tamping down what DSU President Stephen Easton too much spending on a program that produces too few students, chose to resign en masse. Then Easton himself tendered h...

Sandi Sanford, chair of the North Dakota Republican Party, joined this episode of Plain Talk from the GOP's national convention in Milwaukee, where, she said, "the security plan changed drastically" after the attempted assassination of the party's presidential candidate Donald Trump. Republicans have been focused on unity at this event -- two of Trump's top rivals during the primaries, Gov. Ron De...

Gov. Doug Burgum has gone through a "transformation." That's what reporter Stephen Rodrick said on this episode of Plain Talk. He spent a lot of time in North Dakota for a profile of Burgum published recently by Politico. He wrote that the governor has been "rebranding" on his way to a potential place on former President Donald Trump's national ticket. That means that Burgum has, along the arc of...

Senate Majority Leader David Houge, a Republican from Minot, says that if voters approve a ballot measure eliminating property taxes, state lawmakers will be left with a mess. He said that the legislature's appropriators will be tasked with making big spending cuts. He said that members of the taxation and finance committees will have to find new ways to bring in revenues. He also said that reserv...