"Rep. Patrick Goggles won re-election to the House in District 33 by just 26 votes, 1,473 to 1,447, according to unofficial results released by the Fremont County clerk. Given the high voter turnout, this was a closer election, on a percentage basis, than 2010, when Goggles won by 16 votes.

“I expected the race to be close,” Goggles said in a phone interview. “I knew the Republicans had a well organized, well funded get-out-the-vote effort.”

Young people organized a get-out-the-vote effort on the Wind River Indian Reservation this year, in part for Patrick Goggles, the only Native American member of the Wyoming state legislature who nearly lost his seat in 2010. The victory would seem to vindicate their ground-game strategy of intense, personal canvassing, coupled with traditional native feasts for voters.

“The closeness of the race says that we can’t take these results for granted,” Goggles said. “We have to register new voters every two years, to have a strategy to get out the vote, and to get people to vote early, to vote absentee and to vote regularly.”"

Get the Story:
Final Results (WyoFile 11/7)
Turnout was strong, results slow to come (WyoFile 11/6)

Related Stories:
WyoFile: Getting out the votes on the Wind River Reservation (11/6)