With Rosendale out of the Senate running, what’s next for the Montana GOP?

This story is adapted from Capitolized, a weekly newsletter featuring expert reporting, analysis and insight from the editors and reporters of Montana Free Press. Want to see Capitolized in your inbox every Thursday? Sign up here. 

For months, Montana Congressman Matt Rosendale had teased a run for U.S. Senate. Montana Republicans, he contended, wanted a true conservative who would govern like they campaigned, someone who would not just beat incumbent Democratic U.S. Sen. Jon Tester and stand up to Joe Biden but also take on fellow Republicans who hew too close to the Washington, D.C. “uniparty,” the bipartisan political establishment that represents the status quo.

As he neared his announcement earlier this month, his rhetoric intensified. He said the D.C. establishment — people like Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Montana U.S. Sen. Steve Daines, the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee would not dictate how Montanans should vote. He openly accused Daines and allies, who had instead backed Tim Sheehy, of attempting to strongarm him out of the race. 

“The leadership is trying to select, instead of allowing the people of Montana to select, who is going to be their next U.S. senator,” Rosendale said when he formalized his bid on Feb. 9. “So when you see Mitch McConnell entering into, participating in this election process, and the Senate committee getting so heavily involved, I think it’s offensive to the people across the state. I really do.”

Six days later, Rosendale was out of the race.

Officially, the campaign cited former President Donald Trump’s endorsement of Sheehy, which Rosendale said forced him “to calculate what my chances of success would be with Trump supporting my opponent.”

The campaign was apparently caught flat-footed by the announcement, which came the day Rosendale declared his candidacy. And there was a confluence of other factors: The Rosendale campaign’s early fundraising numbers were anemic compared to those of the financial juggernaut that Sheehy was assembling; the Club for Growth, a billionaire-backed political group that was once one of Rosendale’s biggest financial supporters, had mended a fractured relationship with Trump and indicated it would not spend money for Rosendale; Sheehy had already reserved ad space touting Trump’s endorsement. 

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That Trump’s endorsement of Sheehy in particular was a surprise to Rosendale stretches credulity. For reasons both personal and political, Rosendale and Trump’s relationship had long been in question. Sheehy, meanwhile, was well ahead of Rosendale in endorsing Trump and had appeared as a surrogate for the former president at the Iowa caucuses in January. 

But there was still hope that Trump would at the least remain neutral, perhaps persuaded by inner-circle congressional allies like Matt Gaetz, a Florida firebrand who campaigned for Rosendale in Montana. 

“Personally, I would think that it would have taken a lot of pressure on Trump for him to step in the middle of the primary like this,” state Rep. Ed Butcher, a Republican hardliner from Winifred and a Rosendale backer, told Capitolized earlier this month.

But Butcher added that “it’s obvious from following the politics at the national level that McConnell has done everything he can to block Rosendale from running … and he obviously has had a little influence on Trump.” And Trump may well have to work with McConnell if Republicans take the Senate and send Trump back to the White House, Butcher said.

Rosendale, meanwhile, was openly discussing the possibility of a change of leadership in the Senate, drawing a comparison to his support for ousting former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy. 

Some politicos and members of the largely anonymized online political commentariat have speculated that behind the scenes there are more sinister reasons for Rosendale’s about-face, something more out of “House of Cards” than real life. But for now, the only explanation of Rosendale’s decision to drop out that anyone is willing to put their name behind on the record is that without Trump’s endorsement and a dependable source of campaign resources, there was no path to the Senate for Rosendale. 

What’s next for Rosendale is unclear. He can still register to run for re-election in his current district until March 11, but several other Republicans have already filed to take his place on the assumption that his Senate run would leave his seat open. While his incumbency advantage and name recognition in eastern Montana mean that he would be a formidable opponent of any Republican challenger, the slate of his would-be replacements have shown little interest in changing course now that they’ve begun campaigning. 

As of Wednesday, when former Congressman Denny Rehberg entered the House race, emboldened by favorable polling, Rosendale’s campaign said the incumbent has yet to make up his mind as to his future. As of Friday, Rosendale’s congressional fundraising account on WinRed — an online clearinghouse for GOP campaign donations, the counterpart of Democrats’ ActBlue — was suspended. 

The fate of the movement that Rosendale represented, and how that movement will treat Sheehy and his prominent backers in the state — Daines, Gov. Greg Gianforte, Congressman Ryan Zinke — is another open question.

“We can do worse than Tim Sheehy, we probably will someday, we’re certainly doing worse right now,” state Sen. John Fuller, a Freedom Caucus member from Kalispell, told MTFP. “This is all about winning.” 

It’s true, Fuller said, the GOP has divisions. 

“But the reality is, Republicans have a vibrant party with a large tent that has a divergence of opinion within it,” he said. “The result will be scuffles. But I’m confident come June that we will step forward and defeat Jon Tester.” 

The state party’s official slogan is, after all, “Better Together.” 

But the political machinations of the last several months have left some Republicans with a sour taste in their mouth. When Mike Berg, the communications director for the NRSC, suggested that Rosendale was a “plant from the Democrats” in a press release late last year, the Flathead County Republican Central Committee drafted a letter expressing displeasure with that characterization and questioning why Daines had not publicly rebuked the claim. The letter generated no apology but a response from Berg justifying his “political hyperbole,” namely that Rosendale had said on a radio show that he “prayed” for a smaller Republican majority that his band of hardliners could more effectively drag to the right.

“It’s going to be awkward for Daines for sure,” said state Sen. Jeremy Trebas, R-Great Falls, one of 37 state lawmakers who issued a letter encouraging Rosendale to run for Senate back in August. Daines used to show up to county party dinners and events, Trebas said, but now he typically just sends videos. Whatever Rosendale’s plans are, top GOP figures who backed Sheehy have a “base problem,” he said. Those officials see Sheehy as a path to 51 members in the Senate. But that doesn’t necessarily resonate with those Republicans who want not just a majority but a majority they consider truly conservative.

The response Sheehy got from some party members at the GOP’s recent winter kickoff — held just after Rosendale announced his run for Senate and just before he packed it in — illustrates this point.  

“Gianforte was up there giving a speech,” Trebas said. “Toward the end, he said, ‘We’re going to send Tim Sheehy to the U.S. Senate.’ And that’s about the time I started to boo.”