Janice McGeachin

Janice Kyes McGeachin (born January 18, 1963) is an American far-right politician and businesswoman who served as the 43rd lieutenant governor of Idaho from 2019 to 2023.

McGeachin was born Janice Kyes on January 18, 1963, in Las Cruces, New Mexico.

She graduated from Skyline High School in Idaho Falls and earned her B.S. in finance and accounting from the University of Arizona.

McGeachin is a Christian.

McGeachin has had a number of business ventures.

She owns an Irish pub in Idaho Falls and co-owns a wholesale automotive parts supply store and a torque converter remanufacturing facility with her husband.

McGeachin unsuccessfully ran for Bonneville County commissioner in 2000, her first bid for elected office.

A member of the Republican Party, she was previously a member of the Idaho House of Representatives from 2002 until 2012.

Educated at the University of Arizona, McGeachin owned several businesses in Idaho Falls.

She entered politics in 2002 when elected to a seat in the state house.

As a Republican, she was a member of the Idaho House of Representatives from 2002 to 2012.

As chair of the state House Health and Welfare Committee, she cut Medicaid funding and voted against legislation to create a state-based health insurance exchange.

McGeachin supported Mitt Romney in the 2008 Republican Party presidential primaries and the 2012 Republican Party presidential primaries.

An ally of the Tea Party movement, McGeachin was considered a possible Republican primary challenger to U.S. Representative Mike Simpson in 2010, but chose not to run.

McGeachin was a delegate for Donald Trump at the 2016 Republican National Convention, and was vice-chair of Trump's Idaho campaign committee.

In April 2017, McGeachin filed to run for lieutenant governor of Idaho.

In the voter pamphlet she wrote, she hoped to help the governor "by increasing our freedoms and liberties, free from the bonds of excessive government regulations".

Her candidacy was supported by state Senator Dean Mortimer.

She was elected lieutenant governor in the 2018 election, to serve with the governor, Brad Little.

She is the first female lieutenant governor of Idaho.

As lieutenant governor, McGeachin aligned herself with Donald Trump and frequently clashed with Little.

She unsuccessfully challenged Little in the Republican primary for governor in the 2022 election.

McGeachin narrowly won the Republican primary election on May 15, 2018, with 28.9% of the vote, then defeated Democratic nominee Kristin Collum in the November general election.

During the 2018 campaign, McGeachin took security guards with her to a debate at the Idaho Public Television station in Boise, although there was no known threat against her, and characterized them as "friends."

In February 2019, McGeachin posted a photo on her Facebook page of her posing in front of her Idaho State Capitol door with two members of the Three Percenters, an anti-government militia movement group.

The men wore shirts promoting Todd Engel, who was sentenced to prison in connection with the Bundy standoff fatal encounter with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF).

For the caption, she wrote "Sending love to Todd Engel from the Idaho Capital and 'getting to know' the new Senate Pages."

McGeachin faced public criticism for the photo and quickly deleted it.

In a subsequent statement, McGeachin described the men as "two Second Amendment supporters who were here to support Todd Engel, an Idahoan who was treated unjustly by the court system," and said that she deleted the post after "a few people had begun erroneously assigning sinister motives which are contrary to my true character."

The Idaho Falls Post Register editorial board criticized McGeachin for embracing the 3 Percenters and militia movement.

In February 2022, McGeachin appeared as a surprise video guest speaker at the America First Political Action Conference, hosted by prominent white nationalist Nick Fuentes.

McGeachin was apparently one of the highest-ranking elected officials to address the far-right conference.

McGeachin's speech to the conference was criticized by Democrats and some Republicans for its antisemitic and pro-Putin contents.

In 2021, McGeachin convened an "education indoctrination task force" co-chaired by fellow Republican Priscilla Giddings.

The committee was premised on the notion that "the scourge of critical race theory, socialism, communism, and Marxism" was "infiltrating" the Idaho school and college system.

Committee members discussed proposals to abolish the Idaho State Board of Education.

Idaho teachers described McGeachin's committee as a McCarthyist attack on teachers and a distraction from the challenges faced by Idaho's education system in reality.

The Idaho Statesman editorial board described the effort as "a manufactured witch hunt" driven by the "far-right fringe of Idaho's politics."

The president-elect of the Idaho School Boards Association resigned from McGeachin's task force a week after its first meeting, writing that the task force seemed aimed at "partisan campaigning."

In August 2021, a state judge fined McGeachin $750 for violating the Idaho Public Records Act by failing to turn over documents requested by the Idaho Press Club.