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March 7, 2024
Montana Democrats this weekend attended the party’s annual Mansfield Metcalf dinner, a tony (and boozy) fundraising event sometimes called “Democratic prom” at which the party’s top officials deliver speeches and rally the troops ahead of the coming election.
At this year’s dinner — the 46th annual — the message was clear. As Montana Democratic Party executive director Sheila Hogan put it, “2024 is a pivotal election for Montana. You’ve heard it before, but this is it.”
Leading the charge for the party is U.S. Sen. Jon Tester, the lone Democrat with a statewide constituency in Montana and a top target of national Republicans as he seeks a fourth term this fall. Almost every speaker Saturday evening — candidates for office, party officials, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, the featured guest — made sure to emphasize that the path to Democratic success in Montana goes through Tester’s hometown of Big Sandy.
“We have a guy at the top of the ticket who understands what the Legislature does, understands what it means to have good candidates up and down the ticket, is willing to put money into a coordinated campaign that will benefit all of us, and we didn’t have that last cycle,” House Minority Leader Kim Abbott, D-Helena, said of Tester.
Tester was himself once a legislative leader. But when he was in the state Senate, Montana Democrats had a majority. Now they find themselves in the super-minority, only able to exert meaningful influence on the legislative process when the fractious Republican caucus turns on itself or runs afoul of the governor’s office.
Abbott pledged that Democrats would win “10, for sure” legislative seats this November.
“Kendra took care of that,” she said, referring to Kendra Miller, one of two Democrats on the most recent Montana Districting and Apportionment Commission. The commission finalized new legislative districts last year, with the body’s non-partisan fifth member siding with Democrats on the new map.
“We’re gonna win some [expletive] legislative seats. We’re going to make it a little better in that building. We deserve to be in the majority, we deserve to take back the governor’s mansion and the rest of our statewide offices,” Abbott said.
Democrats painted the GOP as a “confederacy of fanatics” and “radical jackwagons” intent on limiting Montanans’ freedom and selling the state to the highest bidder.
“It is no secret. The stakes are high in this election. The Montana we know is on the line, it’s on the ballot in November,” Tester told the crowd.
Most of the speakers discussed abortion. Democrats are counting on voters being turned off by the GOP’s embrace of hardline abortion restrictions in a post-Dobb’s world. The Montana GOP’s platform calls for a ban on “elective” abortion without exception.
“And then there’s a little thing called freedom, and freedom as it applies to rights; that’s also on the ballot,” Tester said. The last time I ran for re-election, Roe v. Wade had been the law of the land for 50 years. My folks’ generation did the fight on that. I will tell you that the Republican attacks on freedom and our women’s health care are only just beginning.”
Montana Republican legislators have passed several abortion restrictions since Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte took office in 2021, but most have been blocked by judges. Abortion access in Montana is presumptively constitutional under the Montana Supreme Court’s 1999 ruling in Armstrong v. State.
Spirits at the dinner were generally high. But there was also a palpable tension. Several sheriff’s deputies patrolled the banquet hall. Outside, a group of protestors with a group called Montanans for Palestine lined the road into the Lewis and Clark County Fairgrounds, holding signs calling for a permanent ceasefire of the war in Gaza and specifically calling out Tester for his position as chairman of the influential Defense Appropriations Subcommittee in the Senate.
The tension boiled over when a pair of protestors disrupted Tester’s speech.
The first held up a Palestinian flag and shouted, “I am a Jew! I am a Democrat” and later, “You have blood on your hands.” Deputies grabbed the man and dragged him out of the building. Staffers began holding up Tester signs and initiated a “Let’s go Jon” chant. A second protestor, Leticia Romero, spoke up a few minutes later but was quickly drowned out and removed from the building by sheriff’s deputies. Deputies told Capitolized that neither protestor was cited nor arrested and that they had anticipated a disruption of the event.
“Sen. Tester is funding genocide. We will not forget, and we will not forgive. There’s children being murdered with our tax money, and veterans know that,” Romero, a Missoulian who said she is a veteran of American wars in the Middle East, told Capitolized after being ejected from the dinner.
Tester did not directly address the protestors and referred Capitolized to a spokesperson when approached after his remarks.
“Isn’t it great to be popular?” he asked the crowd after Romero was removed.
A spokesperson for Tester later said that the senator has called for humanitarian aid into Gaza and supports “the use of strategic pauses in military action.” The spokesperson also said Tester has met with the organizer of Montanans for Palestine, Brendan Work.
Tester has faced public questions about his stance on the war in Gaza before. At a town hall in Butte last fall, he was asked why he wouldn’t support a full ceasefire.
“The truth is, it’s a horrible situation,” Tester said then. “There are no good answers here. And it’s not a good sight, what’s going on in Gaza right now. It wasn’t a good sight on Oct. 7”
Tester’s spokesperson added that “there are countless other Montanans who have strong feelings about the conflict and support Sen. Tester’s actions” and that “Tester has met with and held discussions with several other groups, including Jewish faith leaders across the state, who have urged the senator to support America’s ally Israel in their war against Hamas.”
—Arren Kimbel-Sannit
Close-Up
Verbatim
“To be clear, Elsie has never told Congressman Rosendale that she would exit the race. To suggest anything else is a blatant lie.”
—Sam Rubino, a campaign consultant for Republican congressional candidate (and term-limited state Superintendent) Elsie Arntzen, posting on X. Arntzen and a league of other Republican candidates are forging ahead with their campaigns despite incumbent Matt Rosendale’s own recently confirmed hopes for re-election. Many of those candidates previously suggested they would not seek the seat if Rosendale ran for re-election. But once he announced a highly anticipated bid for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Jon Tester — a bid he aborted after only six days — the floodgates opened. “We have been fortunate to have rock-solid conservative representation in Rep. Rosendale; Arntzen is committed to building upon that legacy should Rosendale toss his hat in the ring for U.S. Senate,” Rubino said in a statement over the summer when Arntzen launched an exploratory committee. “Should Rosendale seek re-election to the House, the Arntzen exploratory committee will cease operations, return each and every nickel donated to the committee, and will fully back the Rosendale re-election bid,” Rubino said at the time.
New Senate Polling
A new Emerson College poll shows Montana’s incumbent Democratic U.S. Sen. Jon Tester in a close race with Republican challenger Tim Sheehy.
The survey, conducted with 1,000 voters from Feb. 26 to March 2 via text, email and web polling, shows Tester leading Sheehy 44% to 42%, with 14% undecided. The poll’s margin of error is ±4.6%, so Tester’s advantage is statistically insignificant.
That said, the underlying data show some positive indicators for the longtime incumbent: Independent voters surveyed broke for Tester by 10 points, and 14% of voters who said they would support former President Donald Trump in 2024 said they would also support Tester. Support from independents and even some Republicans will be key to Tester’s continued survival in a state that supported Trump in the last presidential election by double-digit margins.
Voters were also asked their thoughts about Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte, who is seeking re-election this year. Thirty-seven percent of respondents said they approve of Gianforte’s performance as governor, while the same percentage said they disapprove.
—Arren Kimbel-Sannit
Court Report
A Lewis and Clark County district court judge on Tuesday denied a request from Gov. Greg Gianforte to stay enforcement of a prior order directing the governor to allow lawmakers an opportunity to override his veto of a 2023 marijuana tax revenue bill.
Judge Mike Menahan’s order started a 14-day clock for Gianforte to either appeal the ruling to the Montana Supreme Court or initiate the process for lawmakers to override the veto, which involves a mail poll. Gianforte could potentially pursue both actions simultaneously.
As Menahan wrote: “If the poll proceeds concurrently with the appeal process, the entire issue may be resolved at the same time. Should the Montana Supreme Court overturn this court’s judgment on appeal, the governor’s veto will stand regardless of the results of the poll. On the other hand, if the Montana Supreme Court affirms this court’s judgment, the results of the poll will control [the bill’s]’ status.”
Senate Bill 442, passed by a broad bipartisan margin, allocates marijuana tax revenues to conservation, veterans and county infrastructure programs. Gianforte vetoed the bill on the last day of the 2023 Legislature, but the timing of his veto effectively precluded lawmakers from overriding the veto while the Legislature was in session. Several stakeholder groups challenged the legitimacy of the veto in court shortly after the session ended.
—Arren Kimbel-Sannit
On Background
Tester pressed on Superfund cleanup, Israel-Hamas war during town hall: Sen. Jon Tester previously fielded questions about the war in Gaza at a town hall last fall, per NBC Montana.
Montana 2024 Poll: U.S. Senate Tester 44%, Sheehy 42%: New Emerson College polling shows Tester with an insignificant lead over Republican challenger Tim Sheehy.
Court denies Gianforte’s request to stay ruling in veto lawsuit: As Montana Free Press reported, a district court judge this week started the clock for Gov. Greg Gianforte to either allow lawmakers to overturn his veto of a marijuana funding bill or to appeal the court’s previous ruling — or both.