The dangers of unregulated AI are a focal point in the 2026 campaign. Shooting things out of the sky has become a staple of Montana campaign ads. Republicans hope to to keep transgender issues front and center. And a new poll shows the Senate and western district House races tightening.
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, there is a new issue that has arisen in campaigns across the country and that is the threat posed by artificial intelligence, not just to jobs, but to our very survival. The debate is not just over data centers threatening resources, but how do you regulate AI to keep us safe? Some, like Donald Trump and Montana Senator Steve Daines, think the issue is overblown and Daines in an interview this week with Fox News even said this:
Sen. Steve Daines "We have no business as a bunch of bureaucrats here in Washington, as elected leaders who most don't even use AI on a daily basis. Why would you want to have those elected leaders being the ones regulating it?"
Sally Mauk And he's basically saying Rob, Congress is not smart enough to regulate AI.
Rob Saldin Right. It's a surprising formulation, because for one thing, you could say that about nearly everything that Congress works on. But it's also just out of step, Sally, with the moment. Public opinion is fairly clear on AI. Awareness has increased a lot and concern over it, as you suggest, it well outpaces enthusiasm about AI. Now, in recent months, this has started at least a little bit to sort by party with Democrats being more alarmed about AI than Republicans. But so far, at least, that's more about intensity than a fundamental disagreement. Across the board it's clear that Americans have serious concerns about AI in general. They don't like these data centers. They want some regulations in place for all the reasons you suggest.
Sally Mauk Does this create a problem for Montana's Republican Senate candidate, Kurt Alme, who has been pretty quiet, as far as I know, on this issue?
Rob Saldin Yeah, characteristically quiet on these matters, but to the extent that his well-known supporters with the same party label are out of step on this issue, well, that's not very helpful for Alme. And one clear indication, I think, of that basic reality is that Seth Bodnar has seemingly recognized this and is more than happy to jump into the fray.
Sally Mauk Out-of-control technology is also an issue raised in a new ad by the independent Senate candidate Seth Bodnar. And in this ad, Seaborn he's literally taking aim at Flock security cameras.
Seth Bodnar "Flock off, man. Are you tired of security cameras watching your every move? Yeah, me too. I got a message we can send to them. Gettin' groceries? They're watchin'. Buildin' a new deck. Goin' to church. Seein' the doctor. They're watching. Buyin' ammo for the season? They're watching. Now the whole thing isn't just creepy as hell, it's also part of a massive economy designed to buy and sell our personal data. Now we've known for years that Big Tech follows us online, but now these Flock cameras are literally tracking our every move. And all this data needs a place to live in the cloud. So that's why they want to build data centers right in our backyards. They are all getting rich, we're getting screwed, and nobody is holding them accountable. (Just for fun). So my opponent, Kurt Alme, is just sitting back and watching it all happen. I won't. Not by a long shot. (Shoots rifle at a bag of flour and something resembling a camera)"
Sally Mauk The ad ends with Bodnar blasting a fake camera to smithereens. I saw this Seaborn and immediately recalled this ad by former congressman Matt Rosendale back in 2014.
Matt Rosendale "I'm Matt Rosendale, and this is how I'd look from a government drone. And this is what I think about it ('shoots' drone out of the sky). The federal government is too big and too powerful. More taxes and regulations put Montana families out of work. Spying on our citizens - that's just wrong. I'm Matt Rosendale and I approve this message because I'm ready to stand tall for freedom and get Washington out of our lives."
Sally Mauk Seaborn, ads, shooting something out of the sky seem inevitable anymore in a Montana campaign.
Seaborn Larson These ads are silly, Sally, but they are buzzy as well. They also give candidates a chance to burnish their Second Amendment credentials by showing them actually handling and shooting a firearm. Perhaps more importantly, they also give a candidate a way to obliterate some object of political zeitgeist. This is an old trick in Montana politics. As you said, for Rosendale back in 2014, it was the proliferation of drones and concerns about government surveillance. In 2024, Monica Tranel played up what we all refer to as the Chinese spy balloon incident. That's when a Billings Gazette photographer captured the object flying way overhead. Tranel gunned down the balloon with a shotgun while talking about fears of Chinese entities buying up farmland. Now it's 2026 and Bodnar's campaign has picked up on the growing resentment toward Flock cameras. These AI surveillance cameras used in some places by law enforcement. The video is also anti-data center, speaking to what emerged as one of the most animating issues for voters earlier in this election cycle and that scare has sort of advanced to what Rob was talking about earlier - AI companies developing something that's potentially uncontrollable.
Sally Mauk Rob, a recent Montana Free Press poll shows Alme with an 8-point lead over Bodnar, taking polls for what you will, but he's closing the gap, perhaps, from earlier polls, and that's still a healthy lead, though, for Alme.
Rob Saldin It is, although I think if you're Bodnar, you look at this and it clearly reinforces the sense that Bodnar is the strongest alternative to Alme. And Alme's 38% is not a very impressive figure for the Republican. But the bigger thing that this poll also underscores, Sally, is the thing we've been talking about from day one, that there's this other alternative to Alme on the ballot - Alani Bankhead, she's pulling in 16% of the vote and Bodnar doesn't have 16% to give. Now, again, this one thing that really struck me about this poll is Alme's support is just at 38%. That's pretty low. Now, of course, he's not a well-known figure. And to the extent that he is known, it's mostly tied to the controversial way that he became the nominee. So, there's certainly some space for his numbers to improve. But still. I would have thought that the party label would be doing more work for him. And in fact, just for a comparison, I went back and looked at the polling from Sheehy/Tester two years ago. Sheehy, of course, was new on the scene at that point, like Alme is in this cycle. But despite that, two years ago, Sheehy was still polling at or above 50% all through the summer and fall. So that 38% for Alme really does stand out.
Sally Mauk Well, that same Free Press poll, Seaborn, shows Democrat Sam Forstag and Republican Aaron Flint in a virtual tie in the western district House race.
Seaborn Larson Right. As we've said here all year, this race is widely considered the most competitive among Montana's federal races. Still, I think it's a little surprising, Sally, that they appear to be really neck-and-neck in this poll from the Montana Free Press and Rutgers-Eagleton. Congressman Ryan Zinke is retiring after this year, so it's an open seat. And while Zinke won it comfortably in 2024, former Democratic Senator Jon Tester won that district, even as he took a serious statewide loss to Republican Tim Sheehy. The district is 16 counties and Tester won just five of them, but it's where you'd expect to see Forstag pull big numbers this year, too. That's Bozeman, Missoula, Butte, Anaconda. Forstag seems to be doing well with younger voters, taking most of his support from the 18 to 44 age group. He's polling low with 65-plus voters, while the inverse is true for Flint. He's got 51% of voters over 65, according to this poll. Men also favored Flint in this one while women are leaning towards Forstag.
Sally Mauk Forstag has this new ad out, once again showing him sawing down a tree.
Sam Forstag "My mom used to say that in his infinite wisdom, God gave us two ears for listening, two hands for working, and one mouth for talking. So act accordingly. So, while Aaron Flint's been talking on the radio, I've been working, fighting fires on our public lands and fighting for working people in Montana. I'm Sam Forstag. I approve this message because we all know this country's got problems. Now we can keep talking about them or we can get to work fixing them."
Sally Mauk Notwithstanding his implication that talking on the radio isn't work, Seaborn, and I beg to differ, this is a pretty good ad with mom and God and a chainsaw.
Seaborn Larson Yeah, you know, Forstag's really leaned into that identity as a wildland firefighter/smoke jumper this entire campaign, and it's landed him a lot of national spotlight. He's also made the working class a central theme to his campaign messaging. For those who haven't seen this video, there's a whole lineup of union endorsements that cycle through the frame at one point. Flint's campaign, by the way, made a lot of hay out of his own union endorsement in Butte earlier this year, but the thing that Forstag aims at here - Flint's radio career - is also one of Flint's strengths in this race, at least in my mind. He's been tapped into the Conservative airwaves across the state for 10 years. He's taken his show on the road into communities, and he's proven to be a skilled communicator through that job.
Sally Mauk Aaron Flint also has a new ad out.
Razel Graf sitting with her mom, Erin (Razel) "My mom was an All-American at Montana State. Now, she's my coach. My teammates and I just want to compete and win. But Sam Forstag expects us to compete against boys. (Erin Graf) Sam Forstag lobbied the Montana Legislature to let men play women's sports and enter the locker rooms of my girls. (Razel) That's not right, safe, or fair. (Erin) So we're with Aaron Flint because he'll stand up for women and protect female athletes.
Sally Mauk And the issue of transgender athletes has been an effective campaign strategy for Republicans, Rob. Do you think it has traction in this race, or are voters maybe more worried about bread and butter issues this time around?
Rob Saldin I think it definitely still has some traction, Sally, and I think we'll be seeing a lot more of it in the next six weeks. The trans issue, particularly when it's framed in this manner about girls and women's sports, that definitely works to the advantage of Republicans. The American public just is not on the same page as the activist groups that have raised the salience of this issue in recent years. And while Democrats sometimes complain that they get unfairly associated with anything some group on the left says, well, it's also the case that Democrats are often quite hesitant to push back on those groups, or to draw distinctions. So that leaves a lot of fertile ground for Republicans like Aaron Flint to work with. The other thing going on here, I think, is that Flint just doesn't have a whole lot of things he can run on. This is a very tough environment to be a Trump enthusiast running for Congress. And it leaves Flint, basically, I think with two real viable paths. He can attack his opponent and try to drive down Forstag's positive ratings, which that Free Press poll shows is quite strong. We actually saw Flint do a little bit of that this week, I think, with an effort from him and some of his supporters to try to paint Forstag as a lobbyist rather than a smokejumper ...
Sally Mauk And just to interrupt, he was a lobbyist.
Rob Saldin Absolutely. Yeah, you don't hear Forstag talk about that. He likes to lean into the smokejumper bit, as Seaborn was explaining earlier, but Flint would like us to think about him as a lobbyist.
The other thing Flint can do, and you see it in this ad, is to try to raise a salience of these divisive cultural issues. That approach, you know, it can be dismissed as a cynical distraction from kitchen table issues and so forth. But of course, one of the reasons these things become so divisive is because people do care about culture. They take these issues seriously, both on their own terms, but also as meaningful indicators of a candidate's broader outlook and priorities.
Sally Mauk Lastly, Seaborn, the Montana Free Press poll also shows incumbent Troy Downing has a huge lead over Democrat Brian Miller in the eastern district House race. And that's no surprise.
Seaborn Larson You're right, Sally. The Republicans should really consider this seat very safe. Perhaps the more interesting question has been whether an independent can outperform the Democrat here. It's happened before in this district. Here we have independent Mike Eisenhower, a physician and military veteran who's taken the campaign really seriously, gone out and received endorsements from some big names like Tester and the AFL-CIO, the largest labor federation in Montana. But he hasn't really made a splash even since bringing on more professional staff this summer. Meanwhile, Democrat Brian Miller's had an incredible ability to grab attention
Sally Mauk Guys, we're out of time this week. We'll have a lot to talk about next week as well. I'll talk to you then. Thanks.
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.
