In Montana Senate Race, A Battle Between Past and Future

The battle for control of the United States Senate increasingly appears set to come down to the contest between three-term Democratic incumbent Jon Tester and Republican veteran and businessman Tim Sheehy in Montana.

While it is possible that Democrats could somehow defeat Rick Scott in Florida or Ted Cruz in Texas, and thereby hold the Senate while losing Tester’s seat, few are placing short odds on that outcome – including the Democrats themselves, as evidenced by their spending. Republicans, in turn, are also optimistic they can win other competitive races. But aside from the retiring Joe Manchin’s West Virginia seat, Tester’s seat looks to be the one Democrats are most in danger of losing.

The Real Clear Politics polling average currently has Sheehy leading Tester by 5.2 percent, but the most striking factor in the race is the sheer consistency. Tester has trailed in every public poll released since February save one Democratic internal poll released without vital contextual data.

Even that poll had Tester up a mere two percent, while Trump only led Kamala Harris by 13 percent in a state he won by 16 percent in 2020. This is hardly comforting for Democrats, when Gary Peters (D-MI), the head of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee conceded to Politico that Trump was likely to win the state by 20 percent or more.

Other polling has been equally ominous for the incumbent Tester. A recent poll of Montana’s 1st Congressional District showed Tester leading Sheehy by one percent, 45 percent to 44 percent. That might seem like good news for the Democrats, but Tester won the current district by 10.4 percent in 2018 while winning by 3.1 percent statewide. The result would imply that he is headed for a 7 percent loss.

History is not on Tester’s side. While polling was accurate in Tester’s 2018 race in the final weeks, correctly predicting a three percent margin, Tester was leading by as much as 15 percent at the start of September 2018.

That is a striking contrast to 2024, where he is already trailing by more than five percent. In 2020, polling vastly overestimated Democratic candidates across the board in Montana, showing a competitive race for governor as well. Outgoing Democrat Governor Steve Bullock also led Republican Senator Steve Daines. Democrats lost the gubernatorial race by 17 percent, and Daines won by 10 percent.

Those 2020 polling misses point to a wider problem facing Tester and a key reason why he is doing so much worse than Sherrod Brown in Ohio, the other Democrat incumbent running in a state Trump won in 2020. It is not just polling that is against him, but the trends within Montana itself. Since 1990, Montana has been among the fastest-growing states in the country, growing by more than 40 percent. That means it has grown by 20 percent since Tester’s first election, and seven percent since his last reelection in 2018 alone.

Driven by migrants fleeing the high-tax, high-crime West Coast states, the growth has been a disaster for the Montana Democratic party. Democrats held the Governor’s office for sixteen years between 2004 and 2020, and during Tester’s first term, his colleague was another Democrat, Max Baucus. But no Democrat came within single digits of winning statewide office in 2020, and in 2022 Republicans won supermajorities in both houses of the legislature – a legislature where Democrats had majorities when Tester first ran.

Montana’s dynamic demographic transformation provides a contrast with Ohio, where the population has been static. But candidates also matter, and Tester’s political appeal is less well suited to the state in which he is running for reelection than Brown’s.

While both Tester and Brown have relied heavily on the advantages they have built up over decades of incumbency, Brown has worked to define himself in terms of policy. Brown accomplished this by identifying himself as an opponent of free trade and champion of manufacturing at a time when the Democratic Party as a whole was championing free trade and Barack Obama was castigating rural Americans for “bitterly clinging” to their “guns and religion.” While Brown’s claims to be a “different sort of Democrat” ring hollow to anyone familiar with his voting record, one reason his support is declining as the 2024 campaign proceeds, it was a brand that allowed Brown to introduce himself to a new set of voters as they entered the electorate. Sherrod Brown is the anti-free trade, union guy.

Tester, by contrast, chose to market himself as a personality. If you ask Montanan voters familiar with Tester, they will tell you he is a rancher, a farmer, a big guy who looks the part of a 2000s advertisement for the state. For two decades, appearing as if he walked right off the set of a Montana Chamber of Commerce advertisement provided an appeal that cut through ideology.

However, Montana is changing, and in 2024 Tester’s schtick now looks at best campy and at worst anachronistic. The Montana of 2024 is no longer the world of populist planters, but that of the state’s booming tech sector. In the battle between the archetypes of Montana 2006 when Tester first ran and Montana 2024, there is no advantage in being past-your-sell-by-date. You are merely overdue for retirement.

If Tester had some sort of policy pitch he could make to the 2024 Montanan electorate, especially those voters who have moved to the state over the past 20 years, he might still be able to make a case for reelection. But Tester never developed one. Even Montanans who know Tester would struggle to identify a single issue where he disagrees with the national party or a way in which he added value by pushing the national party to adopt positions helpful to Montana. Sherrod Brown could, somewhat tenuously, claim he was making the case for a protectionist policy within the Democratic Senate Caucus. Removing him would then leave the Democrats further dominated by free traders. What does Tester contribute? No one knows.

Tester’s reelection campaign consequently lacks a rationale. He is on the wrong side of every major policy issue, and even his championing of the state’s industries is undermined by the fact that it is Sheehy who is in touch with what they are in 2024. In a state where national Democrats are toxic, what use is a Democrat who acts as if his job is to explain the national party’s policies to Montanans rather than to explain their views in Washington? There isn’t one.

Senator Peter Welch (D-VT) accidentally let slip the truth when he observed that he didn’t believe “it’s going to be a resource issue” when it came down to Tester’s prospects. Money can be invaluable in aiding politicians when it comes to getting their message out, but all the money in the world can do little if a politician has nothing to say.

When it comes to why he is best equipped to represent Montana in the U.S. Senate from 2025 to 2031, Jon Tester has nothing to say. He votes the wrong way, represents the wrong party, and appears to be running for reelection in the wrong decade.

By contrast, Tim Sheehy represents what once made Jon Tester appealing, while also being a better match for the state’s politics than Tester ever was. As a former Navy Seal, he represents the generation that lived through the ups and downs of the post-9/11 world. As someone who founded a successful aerospace firm, he understands why so many of the best and brightest have found a promised land in Montana over the past three decades, and what they need to bring that promise into the future. He does not need to offer excuses for his votes. He is the best in Montana in 2024, and it is easy to see why voters believe he will be among the best of next year’s Senate class.

Odds are that Sheehy will have the chance to live up to those expectations, as he seems set to deliver Republicans their 51st seat.

Walter Samuel is the pseudonym of a prolific international affairs writer and academic. He has worked in Washington as well as in London and Asia, and holds a Doctorate in International History.