Tim French

Park County Republicans again put their confidence in state Sen. Tim French (R-Powell) in Tuesday’s primary election, delivering the incumbent a comfortable win over former Cody City Councilman Landon Greer.

Barring the emergence of a last-minute challenger, French is now poised to cruise to a second term in November’s general election.

“I’m thrilled, excited to go back and hit the ground running,” French said Wednesday, offering a thank you to the voters.

“There’s nobody in the state better than the Park County people,” he said, adding, “I’ll work my rear end off for them.”

The longtime county commissioner, who joined the Legislature in 2021, received 3,190 votes (57.8%), topping Greer’s 2,311 votes (41.9%) in unofficial results.

French congratulated Greer on running “a great race.” 

Campaign finance reports say Greer actually raised more funds than French — receiving $29,460.60 to the incumbent’s $10,088.63 in the months leading up to the election. However, unlike other contested legislative races within the county, the Senate District 18 contest did not feature a raft of negative ads and messaging.

“[Greer] and I did not get down in the mud; we weren’t going to do that, and I applaud him for that,” French said. “And we just ran our races and told the people what we were about — and he had a good showing.”

In a Tuesday night Facebook post, Greer thanked his supporters and offered his own tip of the hat to French.

“Not the results we were looking for, but I am proud of the campaign we ran,” Greer wrote, congratulating French “on a hard fought win.”

In both Park County and across the state, Tuesday’s primary generally swung in favor of more conservative candidates, putting those lawmakers in position to get control of the House and Senate.

French has been among a conservative voting bloc in the Senate that held a razor-thin, 17-vote majority at times. On the campaign trail, he complained about “a lot of games being played down there [in Cheyenne] by our leadership” — including accusing the more moderate leaders of running out the clock on the 2024 Budget Session so the body wouldn’t have time to override vetoes from Gov. Mark Gordon. New leadership elections will be held following November’s general election and it appears likely that more conservative leaders could take over the upper and lower chambers.

French said one goal heading into the 2025 General Session will be to stop the infighting that characterized last winter’s Budget Session. 

“It’s going to be a whole different tone down there, and we’re going to do everything we can to produce good legislation for the people. So I think it will be good,” French said. “And we’ve got a couple years to prove ourselves ...”