Latest Montana News
Judge strikes down Montana law defining sex as only male or female for procedural reasons
MISSOULA, Mont. (AP) — A judge on Tuesday struck down a Montana law that defined “sex” in state law as only male or female, finding that it was unconstitutional. District Court Judge Shane Vannatta in Missoula ruled the law, passed last year, violated the state constitution...
2 inmates charged with attempted murder after attack on Montana jail guards
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — Two Montana inmates were charged with attempted murder Tuesday after allegedly using makeshift weapons to attack corrections officers in a county jail, sending one of the officers to the hospital with stab wounds to the head. The two inmates pleaded not...
88-year-old Montana man who was getaway driver in bank robberies sentenced to 2 years in prison
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — An 88-year-old Montana man has been sentenced to two years in a federal prison medical facility for being the getaway driver in two bank robberies in Billings last summer, the U.S. Attorney's Office in Montana said. The man was sentenced Thursday after...
New state program aims to put 500,000 acres of Montana prairie under conservation leases
Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks has received tentative approval to enroll 10 eastern Montana properties in a newly launched state program to conserve prairie habitat. The Montana Fish and Wildlife Commission on Thursday voted unanimously to authorize the Prairie Habitat...
Biden administration old-growth forest proposal doesn't ban logging, but still angers industry
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — The Biden administration is advancing its plan to restrict logging within old-growth forests that are increasingly threatened by climate change, with exceptions that include cutting trees to make forests less susceptible to wildfires, according to a U.S. government analysis...
Tale of a changing West
Doug Rand is a lucky man. The 84-year-old Gallatin Gateway resident is a former assistant professor at Montana State University and lives in a home he designed and built himself over more than 50 years. Rand’s home, a storybook creation with twisting metalwork,...
Canal pipe breaks, threatening a northern Montana irrigation project and drinking water
Two century-old steel pipes that help convey water from a river on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation to a river that helps irrigate northern Montana cropland have failed, causing local flooding and raising concerns about the availability of drinking water for at least 14,000 residents this summer,...
Which states could have abortion on the ballot in 2024?
Deadlines are coming up between now and July 5 in five states where advocates are trying to gather enough voters' signatures to put abortion-related questions on ballots in November's elections. Measures that would enshrine the right to abortion in state constitutions are already on...
Much of US braces for extreme weather, from southern heat wave to possible snow in the Rockies
After days of intense flooding in Florida, that state and many others are bracing for an intense heat wave, while the Pacific Northwest will experience unseasonably cold weather and there is a potential for late-season snow in the Rocky Mountains early next week. The chaotic weather...
Many Senate Republicans were done with Trump after Jan. 6. Now they want him back in the White House
WASHINGTON (AP) — Three years ago, Donald Trump had few friends left in the Senate. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell declared in a speech that Trump was “practically and morally responsible” for the violent Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol by spreading “wild...
