This story is adapted from the MT Lowdown, a weekly newsletter digest containing original reporting and analysis published every Friday.
As our team here at MTFP gears up for this year’s inevitably busy election season, we’re planning to focus our election coverage primarily on two things: first, how various power players and moneyed interests are trying to influence how Montanans cast our votes and, second, how those votes are likely to translate to government policy after the winning candidates are sworn in.
If you have questions or insight about electoral influence dealing, drop political reporter Arren Kimbel-Sannit a line at [email protected]. (And if you don’t already, take a minute to subscribe to Capitolized, Arren’s weekly politics newsletter).
As for the policy stakes, it’s clear already that Montana’s candidates will have plenty to say about the issues that drive our state and federal politics, debates that cover the wonky waterfront from school funding and property taxes to immigration policy and climate change.
That campaign trail rhetoric might address the issues Montana voters are truly most concerned about this election cycle. Or it might not — in which case it will be our job to push candidates to talk about the stuff they’re neglecting.
To do that job well over the next 10 months, we need your help. We want to make sure we have a solid grasp of the issues that are animating your kitchen table conversations. To that end, we’re running a reader survey this week and hoping you might take a few minutes to share what’s top of mind as you start to evaluate Montana’s candidates this year.
When we did a similar survey back in 2022, the input that readers like you provided was hugely helpful as we compiled a Q-and-A feature for our election guide and reported other election stories. We expect that to be the case again as we stare down the most crowded ballot Montana has seen in several election cycles.
(One last note: There is of course also a presidential election on the ballot this year. In keeping with our past practice, we’ll be leaving that coverage largely to national news outlets.)Thanks for your thoughtful attention. And as always, we’re just an email away if you have thoughts you’d like to share without working through a survey. Reach me at [email protected] or our full newsroom at [email protected].
