Montana Republican State Central Committee takes position against Republican Gov. Gianforte
By Keila Szpaller DAILY MONTANAN
The Montana GOP filed to join two Republican legislators in a lawsuit alleging a property tax bill signed by Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte is unconstitutional.
In a filing Thursday in Gallatin County District Court, the Montana Republican State Central Committee argues Senate Bill 542 was the product of “secret deals” and tricks the authors of both the 1889 and 1972 state constitutions sought to combat.
SB 542 was a major property tax bill the 2025 Montana Legislature passed and Gianforte signed. Republicans and Democrats had pledged to tackle residential property taxes after steep increases for homeowners.
Legislators debated the best way to reduce property taxes for homeowners most of the session, and the lawsuit filed in January continued the debate in court.
In the case, Republican Sens. Greg Hertz of Polson and Tom McGillvray of Billings and former Kalispell legislator Keith Regier allege SB 542 unfairly raises taxes on multigenerational properties in Montana, such as small cabins. Regier served most recently in the Senate and earlier in the House.
But the plaintiffs also allege the bill is unconstitutional as a cobbled-together backroom deal that cut out the public.
The State of Montana, Department of Revenue and DOR Director Brendan Beatty are defendants in the case.
Gianforte, not a named defendant, has said the lawsuit could invalidate tax rates that helped 80% of Montana homeowners and gave taxpayers $95 million in rebates.
In the request to participate in the lawsuit, the Montana GOP said the three plaintiffs describe the alleged constitutional violations in their own motion for summary judgment.
But the Montana GOP said it wanted to show the protections in the Montana Constitution against secret, out-of-the-public-eye dealings it alleges lawmakers undertook to pass SB 542 were purposeful.
In other words, the GOP said the “original purpose rule” and “single subject rule” did not appear in the Montana Constitution by accident.
“They were inserted in 1889 by framers who had watched Montana’s Copper King-era legislative process devolve under secret deals, bill-vehicle swapping, omnibus packaging of controversial policy with popular spending, and vote-buying,” the brief said. “The 1972 convention delegates carried these provisions forward and strengthened them.”
The Montana Constitution says “a law shall be passed by bill which shall not be so altered or amended on its passage through the legislature as to change its original purpose.” It also says each bill generally “shall contain only one subject, clearly expressed in its title.”
The GOP brief said the “single purpose” rule was to prevent legislators and the public from being misled and to “guard against fraud,” which might occur if a bill includes information not in its title.
The GOP said the 1889 framers understood the way legislation could be manipulated by “the corrupt and the powerful” through “bill-stuffing, logrolling, and the packaging of controversial legislation with popular or innocuous measures.”
The filing said SB 542 was a product of just such unconstitutional legislative conduct. The GOP brief also argues none of the bill can be salvaged because its pieces go together.
“By combining a $90 million cash rebate with a sweeping permanent restructuring of property tax rates, Jones (Rep. Llew Jones, R-Conrad, Appropriations chairperson) created the precise appropriation-as-leverage dynamic that the separate-bill requirement was designed to prohibit,” the brief said.
Jones is not a named defendant in the lawsuit. He steered significant and controversial tax legislation to passage, including SB 542.
Thursday, Jones said he isn’t surprised the state GOP wants to join the lawsuit, although he said 80% of Montana homeowners saw their property taxes decrease, and 17.4% saw a smaller increase than they would have otherwise.
“They can’t win on the merits. They can’t win and say this bill isn’t treating Montanans well. So they’re looking for a process argument,” Jones said.
He agreed the different pieces of the legislation went hand in hand, and he said that was by design; the rebate was an incentive to get property owners to sign up, which allowed the Department of Revenue to know the status of a property (such as a rental) and how to treat it.
“I felt that was the cost of doing business,” Jones said of the rebate.
But he disputed any allegation the bill was put together in the dark. Rather, Jones said it was openly debated throughout the 2025 session.
“Every component of this bill, no matter what title, had been debated verbatim, over and over again,” Jones said.
The GOP said Jones was blunt during the session about how the rebate needed to be paired with the tax restructure, “without apparent motivation to deceive,” and that admission means SB 542 is void.
In its brief, the GOP asks the court to find SB 542 unconstitutional “and reaffirm what Montanan’s constitutional history has always required: that the structural safeguards against legislative manipulation are not aspirational goals but mandatory directives, enforceable regardless of which political party’s members have violated them.”
The Montana Republican State Central Committee is represented by Emily Jones and Justin Oliveira of the Jones Law Firm in Billings.
