Multiple high-profile and lesser known Democratic donors, some of whom appear to have never donated to Montana Republicans before now, are throwing financial weight behind GOP candidates running in party primaries for the state Legislature. The thousands of dollars in donations are benefiting a slate of Republican legislative candidates facing closely watched primary contests against farther-right GOP candidates, according to a review of campaign finance records, an email obtained by Montana Free Press and interviews with a consulting firm advising several of the candidates. The results of those primaries will influence the make-up and dynamics of the Republican caucus in the 2027 legislative session. MTFP identified at least five people who typically donate to Democrats but who sent campaign donations to the more centrist Republicans in the first three months of this year. The donations range from $100 in a single donation to more than a thousand dollars across multiple candidates from a scion of the Rockefeller fortune, according to campaign finance records. The maximum an individual can donate to a legislative candidate in Montana is $470. The monetary support from traditionally Democratic donors comes as the Montana Republican Party has “rebuked” this specific slate of centrist Republicans. The state party added nearly all of the moderates’ primary opponents to an “honor roll” of GOP-supported candidates with a resolution on Tuesday. Those who didn’t make the list criticized the party for involving itself in the primary, a characterization that the state party chairman justified in an email to MTFP. “Since Democrats are involved in (our) primaries, it is only ‘correct’ that the MTGOP to be involved also,” Chairman Art Wittich wrote Thursday.   The developments are turning up the temperature on a feud that has dominated Montana politics in recent years: infighting among Republican legislators and the state Republican party, a private organization that serves as a standard-bearer for — and increasingly an enforcer of — the party’s conservative principles.  While the power grappling between moderates and hardliners in Republican primaries has been years in the making, that dynamic reached a new level during the 2025 Legislative session. Nine moderate Republicans in the Senate formed a coalition with Democrats, effectively putting the party-line Republicans into the minority, despite the fact that the Republicans as a whole nearly had a supermajority. That drove the Montana Republican Party to publicly reprimand its members for partnering with Democrats. When the Legislature adjourned, many lawmakers, lobbyists and political observers questioned whether a similar cross-party coalition would take shape in 2027 when legislators gavel back in. The recent campaign spending of some donors may indicate that a strategic effort to ensure bipartisan alliances may already be underway. Most of the 150 legislative seats are on the ballot this year, but only a handful are considered flippable from one major party to another. Most are reliably Democrat or Republican, meaning the fiercest competition often takes place in primary contests among candidates of the same party. Montana’s 2026 primary election is June 2.  In a March 30 email sent to nearly 75 people and addressed to a Missoula-based group called the “League of Liberal Advocates,” a copy of which was obtained by MTFP, one donor explicitly laid out his personal rationale for donating to Republican candidates.  “Guess what I’m doing? I’m contributing to a slate of candidates the MT legislature needs. Guess what else? They’re Republican,” read the email from Burt Caldwell, a Missoula resident. “In these races the final outcome will be a Republican,” the email continued. “The best chance for a reasonable Legislature is to elect moderate Republicans who work for their constituents, not ‘the party.’” The email listed a slate of specific Republican candidates running to represent House and Senate districts that span the state, from Plentywood to Hamilton to Belgrade. Those candidates include Rep. Llew Jones, R-Conrad; Rep. George Nikolakakos, R-Great Falls; Rep. John Fitzpatrick, R-Anaconda; Rep. Linda Reksten, R-Polson; Rep. David Bedey, R-Hamilton; Rep. Ken Walsh, R-Twin Bridges; Sen. Shelley Vance, R-Belgrade; and Rep. Curtis Cochran, R-St. Regis. Other candidates referenced in the email are Susan Geise, Russ Nelson, Chisholm Christensen, Doug Martens and Michele Binkley, who did not serve in the Legislature last year.  POLICIES OVER PARTY The Republicans that have so far benefited from traditionally Democratic donors are many of the same dozen or so candidates that have hired the two-year-old Helena-based consulting firm Fireweed Campaigns. Fireweed’s president spent six years as a political director and lobbyist for Montana unions and, before that, worked for the arm of the Montana Democratic Party tasked with getting Democrats elected to the Legislature. Other Fireweed staffers have long histories of working in Republican politics. Some conservative political players have blasted Republican candidates for hiring the firm because of its staffs’ past connections to the Democratic party.     The Republican candidates employing Fireweed — which provides fundraising, door-knocking, digital advertising and campaign finance compliance services — include some incumbent legislators who less frequently advocate for hot-button culture war policies compared to some of their Republican colleagues. Political observers often call this slate of Republicans “moderate,” though the candidates themselves typically object to that term and maintain that they are, in fact, the true conservatives. Caitie Butler, left, and Lauren Caldwell, right, staff members of Fireweed Campaigns, pose outside their office on April 8, 2026, in Helena. Credit: Victoria Eavis, Montana Free Press Many of the candidates employing Fireweed are also those who infuriated other members of their party in the 2025 session by partnering with Democrats on high-stakes legislation regarding property taxes, state finances and Medicaid expansion.  Fireweed President Lauren Caldwell, the daughter of Burt Caldwell, the Missoula donor who sent the email explaining his support for Republicans, explained in an interview with MTFP that the firm doesn’t emphasize a candidate’s political affiliation when reaching out to potential donors. Instead, Fireweed touts the policies and practices their candidates have supported, including support for rural hospitals, tax reductions, and maintaining nonpartisan judicial elections. A willingness to work across the aisle with Democrats, Caldwell said, is another attribute.  “If those are things that struck you as positive for Montana … here are candidates that you should consider investing in,” Caldwell said, describing Fireweed’s donor pitch in an April interview. Caldwell emphasized that her firm takes a party-neutral approach with donors, too. “I can genuinely say we do not ask donors that we talk to what their partisan affiliation is,” she said. CHECKBOOK TRACKING Exactly how much money longtime  Democratic donors have so far routed to Republicans this cycle is difficult to quantify. Campaign finance numbers are public, but become available for review only every couple of months. The latest release happened last month, and covered the period between Jan. 1 and March 15.  Well-known Democratic donor Miranda Kaiser, a member of the Rockefeller family and president of the Rockefeller Family Fund, has donated to Democrats and nonpartisan candidates in Montana’s local and statewide elections exclusively since 2022, according to publicly available campaign finance filings. Campaign finance records show that Kaiser lists an address in Wilsall in addition to a New York residence. So far in 2026, Kaiser has given $250 donations to six Republican candidates working with Fireweed. MTFP contacted Kaiser in early April. She has not responded to multiple requests for comment about her recent donations to Republican candidates.  Anne Avis, a part-time resident of Clyde Park and media philanthropist, donated to a handful of Democratic and nonpartisan candidates in Montana’s statewide and local elections from 2008 to 2024. (Editor’s note: Avis is a financial supporter and board member of Montana Free Press. Board members do not have input into MTFP stories or editorial decisions.) Since the start of 2026, she has contributed between $450 and $470 to at least 10 Fireweed candidates, dwarfing her previous state and local Montana political donations. Avis did not respond to an interview request about her recent donations. Homes display signs in support of Montana state Senate candidate Shelley Vance, R-Belgrade, on April 8, 2026, in Belgrade. Credit: Lauren Miller, Montana Free Press, CatchLight Local/Report for America A handful of other Montana donors appear to have never before donated to a Republican and sent contributions to some of Fireweed’s candidates this year, including Jones, Nikolakakos, Reksten, Geise and Binkley.  In an April interview, Rep. David Bedey, the Hamilton Republican who is using  Fireweed’s services, said that when he is knocking on voters’ doors, Democrats tell him they know a Republican victory is inevitable in their district, so they support him over the primary candidate further to the right. In Bedey’s case that’s Rep. Kathy Love, R-Hamilton. “The fact that there are Democrats that are donating should come as no surprise to anyone,” Bedey said. “We should welcome people coming across the aisle to do that because what they want is good government.” Caitie Butler, a communications staffer at Fireweed, said the firm wants to help make sure Bedey’s brand of Republican politics has a shot in competitive primaries.  “We know that these candidates need support from anyone who’s willing to give it to them, and anyone who will kind of get the importance of those races … and see the difference between them and their opponent,” she said.  ‘NOT INTERESTED IN HOLDING TO A PARTY LINE’ The fact that Fireweed is working to bolster certain Republicans has created consternation among Democrats and Republicans both — the Montana Republican Party went as far as issuing a recent resolution in March “rebuking” these candidates’ affiliation with the firm.  Caldwell said that Fireweed’s support of Republican candidates is a phenomenon partly of the Montana Republican Party’s own making, as well as a response to the onslaught of outside money being spent against the “moderates,” particularly by Americans for Prosperity, a conservative nonprofit. In the midst of the 2025 session, after it was clear that the alliance between the nine GOP senators and Democrats was withstanding the pressures of the Legislature, the Montana Republican Party disowned the nine Republicans and said they would not support their future campaigns. Since then, the state Republican Party also formed a new “Conservative Governance Committee” and sent out a candidate questionnaire — actions that Bedey and other candidates criticized as political purity tests.  Rep. David Bedey speaks on the House floor at the Montana State Capitol in Helena on Wednesday, April 26, 2023. Credit: Tommy Martino / AP The Montana Republican Party then took it a step further on Tuesday when its executive board passed a resolution identifying “honor roll” candidates that have contested primaries. All of the Republican opponents of the candidates that have so far paid Fireweed Campaigns were endorsed on that list. It is rare for the state party to involve itself in primary elections to this degree, multiple GOP candidates who did not nab the state party’s support told MTFP. When asked about the list, Montana Republican Party Chairman Art Wittich said in an email to MTFP that the “MTGOP supports candidates who support the Party, hence the Honor Roll.” Following news of this resolution, Rep. Llew Jones, of Conrad, called it a “purge,” and Rep. George Nikolakakos, of Great Falls, said the party was “obviously” putting its thumb on the scale in the primary election.  “The MTGOP is an irrelevant joke, is getting clobbered in fundraising and is wasting its time with garbage like this when it should be focused on [the Western congressional race] and the Supreme Court race,” Nikolakakos said in a text message to MTFP. “We’re going to lose seats in the [Legislature] and very possibly a congressional race and Supreme Court race, so when that happens Wittich and the entire exec board should be prepared to resign.” In response to those comments, Wittich said Jones’ and Nikolakakos’ “cries are weak.” Weeks earlier, on March 31, the Montana Republican Party passed another resolution admonishing the Republican candidates working with Fireweed and calling on the candidates to return campaign contributions from Fireweed staff members. The resolution accused Republicans of coordinating with “progressive organizations” and said the state party would discuss “taking further actions” to protect voter trust if the relationships continued. Fitzpatrick, another candidate employing Fireweed, hit back in a response letter to Wittich and, in Fitzpatrick’s words, the “other Party Bosses.”  “Your demand to fire my campaign consultant is truly pathetic,” Fitzpatrick wrote. “With the terrible job you have done running the Republican Party, I think you have better things to do than to complain about my vendors.”   The frustration about a perceived alliance between Democratic-aligned donors and Republican candidates has not been isolated to the ranks of the GOP. Some Democrats have argued that the shift in donation trends threatens to further weaken an already struggling Democratic Party. “A moderate Republican still votes against our interest the overwhelming majority of the time, and playing this short game will only entrench Democrats as the minority party in Montana for the foreseeable future,” said Joe Hancock, chairman of the Gallatin County Democratic Central Committee, in an April text to MTFP.  Caldwell defended her firm’s work in response to that criticism.  “People who want to work for the party or want to advance the Democratic Party are welcome to do that work,” Caldwell said in an April interview. “I am personally not interested in holding to a party line if it comes at the expense of getting good things accomplished.”  The Montana Democratic Party, for its part, is decidedly not supporting moderate Republicans, according to the party’s highest-ranking member.  “Do I know that there are people that are talking about supporting moderate Republicans? Yes, but there is no plan that I’ve been a part of,” Senate Minority Leader Pat Flowers, D-Belgrade, said in a recent interview. Flowers, who is not running for reelection, helped lead the bipartisan coalition in the Senate in 2025. He acknowledged that, if Democrats remain in the minority, some members of his caucus would like to form some kind of majority with Republican colleagues.  However, the political path to that scenario, Flowers said, is “unpredictable.”  Editor’s note: Anne Avis is a Montana Free Press board member. MTFP board members have no involvement in decisions about editorial content. The post Why some Republican legislative candidates are attracting longtime Democratic donors appeared first on Montana Free Press. ...read more read less