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Citizen grand juries and county militias: The quiet rise of Tactical Civics in Montana

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Tactical Civis meeting Ennis
Buy Now John Pollorena leads a group prayer during a Tactical Civics chapter meeting at the Madison Valley Public Library in Ennis on Nov. 7. Tactical Civics seeks to establish county grand juries and militias to pursue government officials they deem corrupt.
Bart Crabtree
Buy Now Crabtree testifies in support of House Bill 589, to establish citizen grand jury in Montana state law. Rep. Sheldon-Galloway, R-Great Falls, carried the bill on Crabtree's behalf.
Jim Abell
Buy Now Jim Abell poses for a photo in Helena on Nov. 18.
J6 remembrance
Buy Now From right, Jordan “J.D.” Hall, Randy Pinocci and Steve Wagner lead a small group of people in prayer during a Jan. 6 remembrance ceremony on Jan. 6, 2022, in the Montana State Capitol Rotunda.
Rep. Lola Sheldon-Galloway, R-Great Falls
Buy Now Rep. Lola Sheldon-Galloway, R-Great Falls, on the House floor of the state Capitol in 2023.
Rep. Greg Kmetz
Buy Now Rep. Greg Kmetz, a self-described right-wing Republican from Custer County, heads up Patriot Roundtable, a group founded in 2022 out of hard-right Republicans’ need for a stage to broadcast information not available through traditional sources.
Nick Murnion
Buy Now Nick Murnion, Garfield County attorney at the time of that standoff and a target of the Freemen, is now a district court judge in that district. 
David Zuniga’s militia handbook, “Time to Start Over, America.”
Buy Now  David Zuniga’s militia handbook, “Time to Start Over, America.”
Montana Liberty Rally Unmasked
Buy Now Protesters gather outside the Montana State Capitol for the Montana Liberty Rally Unmasked protesting then-Gov. Steve Bullock's public health measures aimed at combating the COVID-19 pandemic in July 2020.

EAST HELENA — Steve Wagner stepped on the stage and gazed out over the pews. He was at the Canyon Ferry Road Baptist Church to baptize a few dozen believers in a new Christian nationalist movement, one that’s crystalized around the idea that citizen-spurred grand juries and county militias are the instruments against omnipresent government corruption.

The stakes, Wagner told them through a wired microphone headset, could not be higher.

“We know we are sitting ducks. This criminal gang in Washington, D.C., right down through the channels of our state in the temples of government, we know that they could pick any one of us off at any minute, and there’s not a lot we can do about it,” Wagner told the audience.

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