i tried calling .copy on it and then passing it in the function. that didn't work. when i tried coppying in the function itself it still changed the original list. the function is in another file
main.py
win_condition.check_r_win(board)
win_condition.py
def check_r_win(board):
    board = _board.copy()
    for col in board:
        while(len(col) <= ROWS):
            col.append("-")
 
    