Marty Trillhaase

Lewiston

Editorial Page Editor at The Lewiston Tribune

Opinion page editor for the Lewiston Tribune.

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Articles

OPINION: These politicians are not looking out for you

Feb 26, 2025 | cdapress.com | Marty Trillhaase

If you think Idaho politicians are looking out for you by pulling a requirement that they publish public notices with the state’s independent newspapers, we’ve got some Florida swamp land to sell you. At issue is House Bill 166, the second attempt to emasculate public notification requirements this year. It cleared the House on Thursday by a narrow 36-32 margin and now heads to the Senate. Rep. Lori McCann, R-Lewiston voted no. Reps.
OPINION: Labrador has made primary vote all about him

Sep 16, 2024 | dnews.com | Marty Trillhaase

Here’s a quick and easy way to decide how to vote on the Open Primaries Initiative. If you want to keep Raul Labrador as Idaho’s attorney general — or even elevate him to governor — then vote against it and retain the closed Republican primary that allows him and his allies to engage in minority rule.
OPINION: Media won’t cause Kohberger’s change of venue

Sep 8, 2024 | dnews.com | Marty Trillhaase

Brian Kohberger, the man accused of murdering four University of Idaho students in late 2022, may get his trial transferred out of Latah County as his defense team wants. But prejudicial media coverage won’t be the reason. Kohberger’s lawyers argued in an Aug. 29 change of venue hearing that the people of Latah County are so biased against their client that he cannot get a fair trial.
OPINION: Lawmakers send kids home with bloody knees

Aug 26, 2024 | dnews.com | Marty Trillhaase

Idaho’s physicians are afraid to relieve the suffering of women undergoing crisis pregnancies for fear of violating the state’s abortion ban and going to prison. Idaho’s librarians are worried about allowing minors to roam freely throughout their bookshelves for fear they might encounter “harmful” materials, triggering costly litigation.
OPINION: Reproductive freedom in Idaho is two years away

Aug 19, 2024 | dnews.com | Marty Trillhaase

Two years from now, Idaho voters will go to the polls and restore the reproductive rights state lawmakers have taken away from them. Just as they used the initiative and referendum process in the past to repudiate their ideologically sclerotic Legislature on everything from education to health care and tax policy, voters will repeal this draconian abuse of government power over the private medical decisions of Idaho women and their families.
OPINION: Signing that bill? Tell us it ain’t so, Gov. Little

Aug 11, 2024 | dnews.com | Marty Trillhaase

Just because Idaho Gov. Brad Little tells you one thing today doesn’t mean you can count on it tomorrow. First he implemented tough but prudent public health measures that went a long way toward safeguarding Idahoans against COVID-19 in the early weeks of the pandemic — only to yield to political pressure by reopening the state to the point that the hospitals, overwhelmed by COVID-19 infections, were on the brink of rationing health care.
OPINION: Freedom to vote is worth even $40 million cost

Jul 28, 2024 | dnews.com | Marty Trillhaase

If — as Idaho Secretary of State Phil McGrane now says — implementing the Open Primary Initiative would cost $25 million to $40 million, so what? Idaho makes these kinds of investments all the time. What could yield a better dividend than eliminating the rigged closed Republican primary election that has imposed minority rule on the rest of us?
OPINION: Doubling down on Idaho’s abortion mistakes

Jun 26, 2024 | dnews.com | Marty Trillhaase

It’s a classic case of the dog catching the car. What seemed politically astute in the abstract has devolved into a disaster in the two years since the U.S. Supreme Court reversed Roe v. Wade, empowering Idaho’s lawmakers to enact a ban on abortions. They can’t say they weren’t warned about how this would compromise women’s health and drive doctors out of the Gem State. But they certainly know better now.
OPINION: Cheers and Jeers: The wrong century

Jun 7, 2024 | lmtribune.com | Marty Trillhaase

JEERS ... to Sens. Mike Crapo and Jim Risch, both R-Idaho. Wednesday, they joined most of their Republican colleagues by blocking a federal right to contraceptives. Only two GOP members of the Senate — Maine’s Susan Collins and Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski — joined with Senate Democrats. But the move fell nine votes short of clearing the threshold for cloture.
OPINION: Treated with contempt, voters deliver a rebuke

Jun 2, 2024 | lmtribune.com | Marty Trillhaase

If ever a group of people displayed utter contempt for the voters of Idaho, it has to be the Republican precinct potentates punishing the legislators those voters selected. Rather than accept that ordinary Idahoans decide who should be the GOP’s nominees, these central committee members stepped in and declared who was and was not entitled to be considered a legitimate Republican. And what constituted heresy? Consolidating the Idaho presidential and state primary elections.