A private contractor involved in an ethics investigation regarding the Montana Senate is contesting claims of misconduct tied to former Senate President Jason Ellsworth, a Republican. Bryce Eggleston, who resides in Stevensville, defended himself in a deposition that was released, stating that it was not Ellsworth who made the decision to split a $170,100 contract into two separate agreements.
Under oath, Eggleston clarified that he was the one who created the contracts and calculated the costs for his services, directly challenging a recent finding from the Legislative Auditor. This report claimed that Ellsworth intentionally bifurcated the contract to circumvent Montana’s competitive bidding regulations for projects exceeding $100,000, labeling this as a misuse of Ellsworth’s official position. “The original proposals were drafted by me,” Eggleston asserted during his deposition.
Eggleston further elaborated on his reasoning for splitting the contract, indicating that if he intended to subcontract any portion of the work, separate agreements might be necessary. He described the task at hand as performing post-legislative analyses on the implementation of up to 27 bills aimed at reforming Montana’s court system once they received approval. According to Eggleston, this work would entail extensive monitoring of the judiciary to evaluate how courts applied the new laws, along with preparing analyses on aspects of these laws that might require adjustments. He approximated the service cost to be $6,300 for each bill and indicated he separated the contract to allow for additional help if necessary, as his firm, Agile Analytics, of which he is the sole employee, could be overwhelmed by the workload. Agile Analytics was established just weeks before the submission of the contracts.
Eggleston has contested multiple assertions made in the Legislative Audit Division’s findings, stating that he was never approached by the investigators for input. In his deposition, he mentioned he had received multiple inquiries from the media but chose not to engage.
The deposition was submitted alongside a request for amendments to the Legislative Auditor’s findings, prepared by Ellsworth’s attorney, Joan Mell, who also conducted the 120-page deposition of Eggleston. Notably, the auditor’s report omitted Ellsworth’s testimony, as he had requested legal representation for the auditor’s discussions. Ellsworth expressed to the Montana Free Press that the auditor had initially shown a willingness to accommodate his request but provided less than two days for him to secure a lawyer.
The Senate Ethics Committee held its first meeting on Wednesday. This four-member committee, equally representative of both political parties, convened to outline procedures for investigating the recent contract awarded to Eggleston during the waning days of Ellsworth’s presidency in the Senate. On Tuesday, the current Senate President, Matt Regier, from Kalispell, announced the hiring of Matt Monforton, a conservative figure, to represent the Senate in these proceedings. Monforton, a former legislator, has voiced critique against Ellsworth via social media since the 2025 Legislative term commenced.
Regier reassured the press on Wednesday that Monforton was retained as his private attorney in this context, following inquiries about whether the Senate had employed him without exploring other options. However, the committee quickly found itself divided on whether Monforton could provide an unbiased perspective, as Sen. Laura Smith, a Helena Democrat and former federal prosecutor, contended that Monforton’s past remarks about Ellsworth should disqualify him. Along with Sen. Chris Pope from Bozeman, Smith suggested collaborating with the Republican members of the committee to identify a neutral attorney.
“This is a committee decision regarding the type of (attorney) that should guide us through what needs to be a fair and impartial process,” Smith expressed to her colleagues. Nonetheless, Republican Senators McGillvray and Mandeville maintained that legislative committees ultimately do not appoint their staff and that the choice was at the discretion of Senate President Regier.
This ethics inquiry is the latest development in an unfolding conflict between the Senate Republican leadership and its former leader, Ellsworth of Hamilton. He aligned with Democrats from the outset of the session to push through an unexpected amendment to the Senate Rules, resulting in several members of a particular committee receiving more favorable assignments. Ellsworth later described this committee as a design by Senate Republicans to marginalize a number of lawmakers, including himself and a mix of both Republican and Democratic colleagues.
Following this disruption, Senate leadership halted committee bill hearings for a week in a bid to regain authority over Senate Rules. However, their attempts proved unsuccessful. By January 17, news broke regarding the contentious contract with Eggleston, and less than a week later, the Legislative Auditor released a report suggesting that Ellsworth had engineered two contracts strategically to bypass state competitive bidding requirements, which also led to Eggleston receiving the work despite his previous employment under Ellsworth.
