MINOT — Unfortunately, political ads that contain exaggerated or misleading information are rote in American politics. It happens with such frequency that it's almost not even worth talking about.
But Citizens Alliance of North Dakota's conduct in some of our state's legislative primaries is egregious even by that low standard.
Citizens Alliance is an Ohio-based committee with deep ties to U.S. House candidate Rick Becker's campaign. The North Dakota iteration is an independent federal committee headed by state Rep. Brandon Prichard, and even its creation is sketchy. Prichard solicited donations for what was supposed to be a group promoting involvement among Young Republicans but then transferred those funds from that group to Citizens Alliance, which has a very different mission: attacking traditionally conservative Republican incumbents in the Legislature.
But those attacks aren't just misleading. They're blatantly false.
Take, for instance, a flyer, sent by Prichard's group to voters in District 34, which was shared with me by a Mandan-based reader. It alleges that state Rep. Todd Porter, R-Mandan, voted against bills from the 2023 legislative session prohibiting sex change surgeries (House Bill 1301 and House Bill 1254 from the 2023 session), banning drag shows (House Bill 1333 also from 2023), creating tougher sentences for crimes relating to fentanyl and heroin (House Bill 1183 from the 2019 session), and making it harder for the government to implement the sort of business shutdowns we saw during the COVID-19 pandemic (House Bill 1386 from 2021).
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The problem? Of the five bills mentioned, Porter voted for three of them.
You don't have to take my word for it. The votes for these bills are available for scrutiny on the Legislature's website.
House Bill 1254 received its final vote in the House on Febr. 12, 2023, at 1:33 pm. It passed 66-25, with Porter among the "yes" votes. The bill also passed the state Senate and was signed into law by Gov. Doug Burgum.
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House Bill 1333 received its final vote in the House on April 12, 2023, at 9:08 am. It passed 76-14, with Porter among the "yes" votes (Porter also voted yes for the first iteration of the bill that appeared before the House). The bill passed the Senate and was signed into law by Burgum.
House Bill 1183 was passed by the House 81-9 on February 14, 2019. It was also passed by the Senate and signed into law by Burgum.
Porter did vote against House Bill 1301 from the 2023 session, and House Bill 1386 from the 2021 session. Both bills ultimately failed.
This isn't the first time Prichard has spread demonstrably false information about legislative voting records. In January, Citizens Alliance slammed 24 House Republicans, and eight more in the Senate, for voting against a bill regulating pronoun use in North Dakota schools. Prichard called his colleagues "woke" and "spineless" for those vote, only it turns out that most of them had voted to pass identical legislation. What they were voting against was a duplicate bill.
Of the nine Senate lawmakers Prichard attacked for their vote, only two voted against the duplicate bill.
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Of the 24 House lawmakers Prichard named, just six voted against the duplicate bill.
This is not merely a difference of opinion. This is not a matter of perspective. These are falsehoods. Prichard is alleging that his colleagues voted in ways they did not.
Prichard has also caught flack from his fellow Republicans for mailers implying that his endorsed candidates are also supported by other incumbents in the district. The mailers were sent in District 34, which Porter represents, and in District 26. The incumbents in those districts denounced the use of their names and photos to promote Prichard's candidates.
Rep. Jeremy Olson, a Republican incumbent Prichard is targeting in District 26, called the mailers "absolutely underhanded and unethical."
Opinion by Rob Port
Rob Port is a news reporter, columnist, and podcast host for the Forum News Service with an extensive background in investigations and public records. He covers politics and government in North Dakota and the upper Midwest. Reach him at rport@forumcomm.com. Click here to subscribe to his Plain Talk podcast.
