Department of Justice opens criminal investigation into Ellsworth
The Department of Justice on Wednesday announced it is opening a criminal investigation into former Senate President Jason Ellsworth, R-Hamilton, following a referral from the Legislative Audit Division on Feb. 14.
According to the DOJ, the Division of Criminal Investigation will 'conduct a thorough investigation specifically focused on potential criminal conduct as defined by the criminal code,' but would not share additional information about the ongoing investigation.
'We look forward to a legitimate fact-finding grounded in reality, not the political whims of a public servant clinging to his job,' Joan Mell, Ellsworth's attorney, said on Wednesday pushing back against earlier findings from the Legislative Auditor.
Separately, Attorney General Austin Knudsen sent a letter to current Senate President Matt Regier, R-Kalispell, that the Senate has the ultimate authority to enforce ethical proceedings against its own members.
Late last year, Ellsworth quietly signed a $170,100 contract with a business associate to track and analyze a series of bills related to judicial reform following the 2025 legislative session. The no-bid contract raised questions among legislative and administrative staff for starting out as two identical contracts that appeared to circumvent regular procurement rules.
Findings from the Legislative Auditor earlier said Ellsworth abused his power and wasted state resources in securing the contract, prompting the Senate to convene its Ethics Committee, which alleged criminal and ethical violations. Mell has called the results defamatory.
However, the Senate voted on Feb. 6 to refer the investigation to the DOJ, with Democrats in the chamber saying it had become too political for lawmakers to continue. The referral was for both the criminal and ethical allegations, but Republicans, including Regier and the Attorney General, had questions about whether the DOJ was the correct venue for ethics, stalling progress.
On Friday, Legislative Auditor Angus Mciver sent his own referral from the waste, fraud and abuse hotline investigation to the DOJ, which the department took up this week.
Regier had sent a letter on Friday to Knudsen asking how to go forward with the ethics investigation, saying he believed disciplinary matters of legislators remained under the Legislature's purview.
In his response, Knudsen said the DOJ did not have the jurisdiction to enforce an ethics complaint against a legislator, and affirmed that 'the Montana Constitution confers exclusive authority to the Legislature to enforce ethical proceedings against legislators.'
He also cited statutes indicating that the Commissioner of Political Practices is another avenue, but that the commissioner lacks jurisdiction 'if a legislative act is involved in the complaint.
'The Department of Justice takes no position at this time whether the allegations in the referred motion constitute a protected 'legislative act,'' Knudsen wrote. 'Whether an act is a legislative act is a fact-dependent inquiry.'
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