Montana Gov Tells Peers: I'm Coming to Get Your States' Jobs

Montana's Democratic governor, who presides over an unemployment rate well below the national figure of 9.6 percent, told his statehouse peers this week that "the most important thing" he does is bring home jobs, The Wall Street Journal reports. Gov. Brian Schweitzer, who easily won another term in November, also said he’ll poach from other states.

"My advice to new governors is if they see me getting off a plane in their state, they need to have me arrested. Because I’m coming to get their jobs,” Schweitzer said in remarks at a Las Vegas meeting of Western-state governors.

Montana’s 7.3 percent unemployment rate is the envy of a region where joblessness has remained high. New governors in the West inherit unemployment rates well above the nation's 9.6 percent: Colorado at 8.4 percent, California at 12.4 percent, and Nevada at 14.2 percent.