Tim Thornburg

“My grandparents homesteaded in this area  – and it’s where I was born and raised.

My wife and I have a micro-dairy that makes kefir, yogurt, butter and cream cheese. We also produce raw milk. 

And that’s where we ran into a problem.

A local store opened up in October last year where they sell local products, so we took our stuff in there. The local inspector came in and threw a fit, saying we had to pull our milk because we were using a designated agent to sell it – somebody besides my wife or me. They weren’t worried about any of the other dairy products, even the flavored milk, just the plain raw milk.

When the store called me, I called my senator Tim Salazar and he said, ‘Well, we’ll see about that.’ He instantly started working on the problem, calling the agricultural department and everything else he could do.

I also called Rep. Tyler Lindholm, who wrote the original Food Freedom Act that made it legal to sell raw milk. He pulled up the bill, and when he saw the amendments he told me, ‘They screwed up my bill!’ He and Tim [Salazar] worked together and got a bill passed to fix it. A lot of senators and representatives argued in favor of that bill – and people who were fighting it haven’t said a thing about it since. 

It’s incredible to know I have somebody representing me who will help. I went to a political meeting a while back and everybody was complaining about their representatives. I told them I never have to worry about mine, but I want to help other people clean house because their representatives screw up what mine are doing. 

I want to expose those people when the elections come around.”

Tim Thornburg
Pavilion, Wyoming