AOC's return visit to Montana pleases both progressive Democrats and conservative Republicans – for different reasons. President Trump's effect on Montana's election is yet to be measured. A last minute infusion of PAC money to a Democratic Senate candidate raises questions. Voter interest in this mid-term election is hard to gauge.
Campaign Beat is MTPR's weekly political analysis program. MTPR's Sally Mauk is joined by Rob Saldin of the University of Montana’s Mansfield Center and Political Science Department, and Seaborn Larson, Senior Reporter at Lee Newspapers’ Montana State News Bureau.
Sally Mauk Rob, we've mentioned before the western district Democratic House candidate Sam Forstag has been endorsed by Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and now AOC is returning to Missoula to speak at a Forstag rally. Montana progressives are elated, but so are Republicans who are no fans of AOC or Forstag.
Rob Saldin Yeah, everyone's happy with this one, Sally. For Forstag, first things first here, the game is over if you don't win the primary. Your top concern is trying to lock that down and for the purposes of the primary, AOC no doubt helps him. She's a star and it'll generate a lot of enthusiasm, a lot attention for Forstag. It also, I think, helps to differentiate him from the rest of the field. He's got two high profile endorsements from Bernie Sanders and AOC. You just don't get a better signal from the Democratic socialist wing of the party than that. There's a big constituency for that in the Democratic primary, particularly in a crowded field where something far less than a majority may well be sufficient to win the thing. But of course, you're right, Sally, Republicans are elated too. They look at this and say, if Forstag wins, those same connections to the DSA wing of the progressive movement could very well be liabilities come November. There's a theory of the case on the left that leaning into that has its own potential crossover appeal for more Trumpy working class voters, and that it'll gin up turnout among young voters in a way that a centrist moderate type of candidate wouldn't. But it does tell you something that Republicans are just as excited about AOC's visit to Missoula as Democrats are.
Sally Mauk Sam Forstag also, Rob, had a very flattering profile recently in Esquire magazine authored by Montana-based writer Cassidy Randall. He continues to get a lot of national press that other candidates in his race are not getting.
Rob Saldin He sure does, Sally. This latest piece, as an example of long form writing is very well crafted, but as a piece of journalism and a piece political journalism in particular, it's striking insofar as it's entirely in the tank for Forstag. There's no real discernible attempt to offer a different perspective or even a bit of journalistic detachment. The Forstag campaign literally could not have come up with anything more favorable to their candidate than what you see in this piece, so he has to be thrilled with it.
Sally Mauk Seaborn, on the Republican side of that House race, a Republican poll released by Jake Eaton, who works for candidate Aaron Flint, has Flint with a healthy lead over his Republican opponents with Secretary of State Christi Jacobsen in second place. Taking the poll with a large grain of salt, does it surprise you that Jacobsen is in second over Al Olszewski?
Seaborn Larson I definitely think it's interesting, Sally, that Jacobsen's coming in second place with about 20% of respondents in this poll. That's a decent margin behind Aaron Flint, who had about 30% of those respondents. Jacobsen has obviously got name ID from being a statewide elected official, which this year has included putting several mailers out with her face and name on it in service of running an election. But she's also not been to a lot of these Republican events. There's been no event that carries all four Republican candidates this primary. With Flint at about 30% of the respondents in this. Jacobsen has 20%. About 13% of respondents said they would vote for Dr. Al Olszewski, another prominent Republican in this primary, while 33% said they were undecided. The poll did not appear to include Ray Curtis. He's the fourth Republican in this race who has been attending some events, but he's raised no money and he's been intentional about that. You'd expect, though, that he'll pull some voters next month just for being on the ballot. Like you said, this poll came from an outfit called The Political Company, which is directly tied to the Flint campaign. What we don't have are the questions asked of respondents or the methodology used in getting this poll together. As far as caveats go on polling, that's a pretty big one. But it's Montana and there's often very few polls out there. That's been the case in this cycle with the Western Congressional District and other campaigns surely have internal polling, but they're not flashing it around.
Sally Mauk Meanwhile, Seaborn, some legislators from both parties have voted to subpoena Jacobsen for information about voter data that she has turned over to the federal government. That continues to be a concerning thing for many Montana politicians.
Seaborn Larson Right. For months now, the Secretary of State's office has been withholding this information that it gave to the Trump administration when it asked Jacobsen's office for unredacted voter information to look for non-citizens. It's a little closer to a threat than an action. Representative Kelly Kortum, a Democrat from Bozeman who made the motion last week, said they're drafting it to incentivize the Secretary of State's office to turn over the information they've requested.
Jacobsen's deputies have confirmed that they gave more to the feds than the redacted voter file that's available to anybody, but has refused to say what additional information that is. They say it's not everything but admitting that in an open meeting could bring down a lawsuit from the federal justice department against the state. States that haven't given that over to the Trump administration have been sued for it. So, Jacobsen's in a bit of a pickle, and this game of keep-away from legislators has riled up Democrats, to be sure.
But Republicans are not really standing for it either. Theresa Manzella and Kathy Love, two hardline Republicans from the Bitterroot Valley, joined Democrats on Kortum's motion to begin drafting the subpoena for these records. I want to note these are two GOP lawmakers who are very much in the camp that supports this kind of effort by the Trump administration to root out non-citizens in the voter rolls. So, it seems they're unhappy with Secretary of State's office trying to blow this whole request off.
Sally Mauk Rob, national polls on President Trump show increasing discontent among American voters with his performance. One of the big questions this campaign season is how that will affect congressional races. In Montana, Trump has endorsed Troy Downing, Aaron Flint, and Kurt Alme. I want to play a couple of recent ads by Flint and Alme, and then we'll discuss. Here's the Flint ad.
Arron Flint Ad "While you break your back putting food on your table, Congress is getting richer on our dime. I'm Aaron Flint, and I'm running for Congress to fight the corruption. We need to ban members of Congress from trading stocks. And if Congress won't balance the budget, they shouldn't get paid. No balanced budget, no paycheck. I'm very proud to be endorsed by President Trump. I'm Aaron Flint, and I approve this message because I am ready to fight this swamp. (Announcer) Aaron Flint, endorsed by President Trump."
Sally Mauk And here's the Alme ad.
Kurt Alme Ad "Kurt Alme is one of us, and he's running for Senate to take Montana to Washington and never forget where he came from. Because Montana isn't just home, it's who we are. Montana's own. Kurt Alme for U.S. Senate."
Sally Mauk It's notable, Rob, that that recent Alme ad, unlike the Flint ad, makes no mention of Trump or his endorsement.
Rob Saldin Yeah, it's perhaps something to keep an eye on, Sally, though I'm not sure I necessarily read that as an attempt to put some distance between himself and Trump. In the vast majority of things Alme's put out, including a mailer I received just this week, he does very prominently tout that Trump endorsement. For both Alme and Flint, it's kind of like the upcoming AOC rally we were just talking about. You have to deal with the primary first. Flint's got a contested primary, and even for Alme, this primary is not inconsequential. Not so much because there's doubt, he'll be the nominee, but because a poor showing would raise real questions about his viability in the general, and it would fuel the narrative that there's upset over the illegitimate way he became the nominee and so forth. Both Flint and Alme are focused on the primary and whatever else you might say about Trump at this point, he still packs a punch in GOP primaries. In fact, we saw yet another example of that just last week when a bunch of Republican incumbents in Indiana who had opposed Trump's call to push through one of these new gerrymandered congressional maps were defeated in their legislative primaries by Trump endorsed challengers. Donald Trump is still a good bet in Republican primaries.
Sally Mauk Democratic candidates, at least in their primary races, are not shy about condemning Trump. Here is Senate candidate Reilly Neill at a recent debate.
Reilly Neill "I'm just going to level with you; our president's an idiot. He absolutely has no idea what he's doing, and he's not responsible to the American people or to the other branches of government."
Sally Mauk Rob, that's a popular message in a Democratic primary, but would it be as resonant in the general?
Rob Saldin Yeah, I guess we'll see. There certainly is no hesitation on bashing Trump for Reilly Neill or any of the other Democrats for that matter. That's certainly not going to do any harm in the primary. And for those Republican candidates who like to emphasize their connections to Trump, it's possible that while there's still an advantage to that in the primary it may not be all upside come November. But Sally, it is still Montana, and Trump has proven his political strength in this state time and time again, so I'd say the jury's definitely still out on that one.
Sally Mauk Seaborn, another Democratic candidate in that Senate primary, Alani Bankhead, recently received an infusion of money from a PAC called Progressive Vet. That late support is raising a lot of eyebrows.
Seaborn Larson Right, Sally. This organization was formed less than three weeks ago, and as of Thursday it spent $592,000 for Bankhead. That's quite a boon for a first-time candidate who has raised a little more than $15,000. Such a boon that people and reporters, I guess, have been asking questions. Who is throwing over half a million dollars into this race so suddenly? As we mentioned on this show a few weeks ago, a Republican PAC began sending out ads ostensibly attacking Neill, another Democrat in this race, but those attacks were something you'd see in a pro-Democratic party package. Neill herself has been posting online about how much it's helped her fundraising and elevated her profile. Progressive Vets says it's swooping in to counter Republicans meddling in Democratic elections, but the conspiracy theory goes like this: Reilly Neill has been adamant that if she wins this primary she will not drop out and support Seth Bodnar, the independent candidate in this race who has incredibly slim odds of winning if a Democrat remains in the race. That's why a Republican PAC would spend money to elevate her in the primary. So when another group comes along with no apparent ties to anybody and its treasurer won't tell us who the progressive group's donors are, that gap becomes easily explained if you believe that there are forces trying to get a Democrat out of this primary who would back out and support Bodnar. Jon Tester, Montana's most prominent Democrat, has urged just that. Bankhead, for her part, has denied being any part of this and has told us multiple times she would not drop out if she wins this primary.
Sally Mauk You mentioned the PAC treasurer, tell us who that is.
Seaborn Larson Moffie Funk, a former Montana legislator. I believe she's been involved in a little bit of lobbying on education in recent sessions, but she's a known quantity in Montana Democratic politics.
Sally Mauk And has ties to Tester.
Seaborn Larson Absolutely.
Sally Mauk Lastly, since absentee ballots have been mailed out, I've heard several people say they've never heard of most of the candidates on the ballot. That makes me wonder just how much interest there is in this election. Voters are generally unhappy with the status quo, but does that translate to action or apathy? What do you think, Rob?
Rob Saldin Sally, interest is always down in midterms relative to presidential cycles. That gives an advantage to the party that has more engaged voters in general, and in any given cycle, a more activated base. And in this particular campaign, both of those factors work to the advantage of Democrats. For a long time, Republicans had the more reliable voter base, and that made a real difference in lower salience elections, including midterms, of course. That's changed over the last decade and it's now clear that Democrats are more dependable when it comes to turnout. Republican turnout does suffer when Trump isn't appearing on the ballot, which of course is the case this fall. In this particular cycle, with Republicans in control of Washington and an unpopular Republican president and so forth, the broader electoral environment only reinforces that Democratic advantage. This year, Democrats have plenty of motivation to get out there even if there aren't some of the old familiar names on the ballot that we've been used to in the past.
Sally Mauk And just a reminder to our listeners, you can find information about the candidates on the MTPR website. Rob and Seaborn, thank you. I'll talk to you next week.
Campaign Beat is MTPR's weekly political analysis program. MTPR's Sally Mauk is joined by Rob Saldin of the University of Montana’s Mansfield Center and Political Science Department, and Seaborn Larson, Senior Reporter at Lee Newspapers’ Montana State News Bureau. Tune in on-air Fridays at 5:45 p.m. during All Things Considered, or Saturdays at 9:45 a.m., before Weekend Edition. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
