Montana Governor Greg Gianforte is actively recruiting businesses from Washington state, pointing to a landmark expansion by Sedro-Woolley-based Janicki Industries as evidence that the state’s regulatory environment and business climate are drawing serious investment from the Pacific Northwest.

A Major Manufacturing Commitment

Janicki Industries, a precision manufacturing company with existing facilities in Washington and Utah, has selected Great Falls as the site for its next major production campus. The company plans to pour $800 million into the Montana facility over the next decade, adding roughly two million square feet of manufacturing space — nearly doubling the company’s current footprint, which already exceeds one million square feet across its existing locations.

The jobs picture is similarly significant. Within five years, the Great Falls campus is expected to employ a thousand workers, with total employment climbing past 2,000 once the build-out is complete. Janicki currently employs more than 2,000 people companywide, meaning the Montana project represents a commitment approaching the size of its entire existing workforce.

Gianforte’s Pitch: Fewer Rules, More Room to Build

Gianforte, who chairs the Republican Governors Association and is in his second term leading Montana, framed the Janicki announcement as a direct consequence of the state’s ongoing push to reduce the regulatory burden on businesses. Montana has eliminated or streamlined roughly 35 percent of all state regulations under his administration, a figure Gianforte has made central to his economic development pitch.

“We want entrepreneurs, they’re like golden geese. Montana’s open for business,” he said, adding that his approach to governing business is one of deliberate restraint: “I’m here to stay out of your way. I think most entrepreneurs just want to be left alone.”

Washington Governor Bob Ferguson’s office did not respond to a request for comment on Montana’s active recruitment of companies from his state.

Montana’s Manufacturing Footprint Is Already Growing

Gianforte pointed to other high-profile presences in Montana as signals of the state’s trajectory. Boeing operates a facility in Helena spanning more than 250,000 square feet, and the Department of Defense selected Bozeman as the home for one of only six military innovation hubs established nationwide — a distinction that Gianforte has used to reinforce Montana’s pitch to advanced manufacturing and technology-oriented firms.

Those examples, combined with the Janicki commitment, form the backbone of a broader argument that Montana is no longer just an agricultural and energy state but a legitimate destination for capital-intensive manufacturing and defense-adjacent industry. The state’s relatively low cost of doing business and its deregulatory record are increasingly central to how Gianforte markets Montana to out-of-state investors and site selectors. His role at the Republican Governors Association also gives him a national platform to amplify that message in conversations with business and political leaders across the country.

Broader Political and Economic Context

The Janicki announcement arrives at a moment when several Washington-based companies and workers are reassessing their options amid that state’s regulatory and tax environment. Montana has positioned itself as a direct alternative, a competition that takes on political overtones as Gianforte — widely seen as a national figure within the GOP — sharpens his state’s contrast with Democratic-governed neighbors.

For Great Falls specifically, a city that has long sought economic diversification beyond its traditional agricultural and defense base, a campus of this scale would represent a generational shift. Two thousand manufacturing jobs in a mid-sized Montana city carries outsized economic weight, creating demand across housing, services, and the broader supply chain.

Gianforte’s recruitment push also fits within a national conservative governance trend of measuring executive success by business attraction and regulatory rollback. Montana has pursued similar cooperative strategies on the federal side, recently expanding a shared land stewardship agreement with federal foresters to nearly one million acres — another signal, supporters argue, that the state can manage large-scale economic and environmental commitments simultaneously.

The Great Falls facility is expected to take shape over the coming decade, with hiring for the first wave of positions anticipated to begin within the near term.