Now that the dust has settled on Montana’s June 2 primary election, Montana Free Press reporters have had a chance to refocus from the trees (individual candidates and races) to the forest (the big-picture political landscape). Here are our top 5 takeaways from Tuesday’s vote.  REPUBLICAN H AND-OFF STRATEGY PROVES EFFECTIVE  Two federal candidates apparently handpicked by their Republican predecessors won their primary races, demonstrating the effectiveness of a strategy seemingly designed to keep GOP power in institutionally approved hands.  In early March, just two days before the filing deadline, Western District House Rep. Ryan Zinke announced he would not seek re-election to a third term, citing health issues. Conservative talk show host Aaron Flint entered the race shortly thereafter, immediately issuing a press release touting endorsements from Zinke, Gov. Greg Gianforte, Sen. Tim Sheehy and other Republican officials.  Days later, and just two minutes before the filing deadline on March 4, incumbent Republican Sen. Steve Daines withdrew from the 2026 U.S. Senate race. Kurt Alme, a former Montana U.S. District Attorney, had registered his campaign eight minutes before the filing period closed. About two hours after that, Alme announced his Senate run, citing endorsements from Daines, President Donald Trump, Sheehy and Gianforte.  Aaron Flint talks to various supporters and guests at his primary watch party on June 2, 2026, at Brannigan’s Pub in Kalispell. Credit: Lauren Miller, Montana Free Press, CatchLight Local/Report for America In addition to their predecessors’ endorsements, Flint and Alme also inherited Zinke and Daines’ campaign staffs, respectively.  Zinke and Daines’ decisions to withdraw at the last minute were widely interpreted as designed to dissuade competition from entering the House and Senate races — a move that drew ire from other candidates, even as it only partially accomplished that goal. (Secretary of State Christi Jacobsen and former state legislator Al Olszewski both quickly joined Flint in the Republican scrum for the House seat.) Independent Seth Bodnar, who was already queued uo to vye against Daines for the Senate seat the two-term incumbent had just abandoned, wrote on X that Daines “withdrew at the last minute to coronate his handpicked successor instead of giving [Montana Republicans] a voice at the ballot box.” In a video shared to social media, Western House candidate Olszewski said Daines had “betrayed the trust of all Montanans.” And two state lawmakers, one from each side of the aisle, said they plan to push legislation to prevent such maneuvering in the future.  But popular or not, the gambit proved successful Tuesday night. Both Alme and Flint were declared winners of their respective primaries less than an hour after polls closed at 8 p.m. Tuesday.  Jessi Bennion, assistant teaching professor in Montana State University’s political science department, said that while Zinke and Daines’ maneuver was “unprecedented” in Montana, she doesn’t think it will have much impact on either candidate’s chances in the general election.  “Voter memory is really short,” she told Montana Free Press Wednesday afternoon. “Voters just don’t remember stuff like that, usually. And if someone was to remember, it would be a primary voter. So, we’re going into the general and I just don’t think it’s going to play at all. It won’t be an issue, probably, for the average Republican.” —Nora Mabie ENDORSEMENTS MATTERED Sam Forstag, who won the Democratic nomination in Montana’s Western U.S. House District, received endorsements from two of the nation’s highest-profile progressive politicians: U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent who caucuses with Democrats, and New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.  Jeremy Johnson, a political science professor at Carroll College, said the endorsements likely drew more public attention to Forstag, which can help drive voter turnout during a primary election. Johnson also recalled that Montana’s Democratic presidential primary vote went for Sanders in 2016, so the independent senator’s support likely still means something to Democratic voters in Montana’s Western Congressional District. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez leaves the stage after introducing Sam Forstag at a campaign rally at the Wilma Theater, May 28, 2026, in Missoula. Credit: Lauren Miller, Montana Free Press, CatchLight Local/Report for America But now that Forstag is squared off against Republican Aaron Flint in the general election, Johnson said, the Sanders and AOC endorsements could land differently.  “Some conservatives will not like it at all — but they are also people who wouldn’t vote for [Forstag] anyway,” Johnson said.  Conservative primary voters tracked with the endorsements of Republican President Donald Trump, propelling Kurt Alme and Aaron Flint to decisive victories. Trump posted on Truth Social about both candidates in March, and shared more hype about the two candidates on election day.  Johnson said the victories by Alme (who faced dramatically underpowered primary competition) and especially Flint (who faced a more formidable field) are a sign that “the Trump endorsement remains powerful.” “He has a lot of control over the Republican Party — substantial control,” Johnson said. Johnson noted that the success of Trump-endorsed candidates is hardly unique to Montana. Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie, Texas Sen. John Cornyn and Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy all lost recent primaries to competitors armed with the president’s support.  Even so, Trump’s approval rating in Montana is higher, at 49%, than his 37% approval rating nationwide, according to a recent Montana Free Press-Eagleton poll. And about 55% of Montana Republicans said a Trump endorsement would make them more likely to vote for a candidate, according to the same poll. About 39% of Republicans said a Trump endorsement would have no effect on their choice.  —Zeke Lloyd IN WITH THE NEW A new generation of candidates advanced in multiple primary races Tuesday night, suggesting an appetite for generational change among Montana’s electorate. Aaron Flint, a 46-year-old conservative radio talk show host and first-time candidate, handily beat Secretary of State Christi Jacobsen and former legislator Al Olszewski, both Flint’s elders. And Sam Forstag, a 32-year-old former smokejumper and union leader, and another first-time candidate, bested 56-year-old Ryan Busse, a former firearms executive who ran for governor in 2024.  Alani Bankhead, a 43-year-old Air Force veteran who was virtually unknown in the state’s political circles before entering the race for U.S. Senate, beat Reilly Neill, a former state legislator who ran an unsuccessful write-in campaign for Montana’s Eastern Congressional District in 2024. Bankhead will face two other first-time candidates, Republican Kurt Alme, 59, and independent Seth Bodnar, 47, in November’s general election.  Alani Bankhead hugs supporter and Kara Paul at the Rialto Bar in Helena as election results roll in suggesting that Bankhead could win the U.S. Senate Democratic primary. Credit: Mito Habe-Evans for MTFP Regardless of who wins the races for U.S. House and Senate, it’s already clear that the state’s 30-year run of sending baby boomers to Congress — which began with Republican Rick Hill’s first election as Montana’s at-large House representative in 1996 — is over. Bennion said she isn’t surprised to see new faces advance. Voters, she said, want something new. “Generally, when I look at polling and I look at voters, they’re just not happy,” she said. “They’re not happy with the way things are going, the direction of the country. … The public is not happy, and so it doesn’t surprise me at all that new faces, younger people are coming in.” Younger candidates, Bennion added, provide an opportunity for Democrats and Republicans alike to “insert some life into maybe some doldrums about politics right now.” —Nora Mabie OUTSIDE MONEY HAS OUTSIZED INFLUENCE ON SENATE DEMS By the time it was over, the lowest-funded Democratic U.S. Senate primary in decades had turned into a $5 million romp by political action committees doing what the field’s four candidates couldn’t afford to do: advertise.  Ads portraying Democrat Reilly Neill as a Kamala Harris-loving liberal bent on impeaching Donald Trump started arriving in Montanans’ mailboxes May 7, one day before county election offices mailed absentee ballots to voters. The responsible PAC, More Jobs, Less Government, then launched mailers and TV ads characterizing Democrat Alani Bankhead as a Democrat ready to work with President Donald Trump on immigration enforcement.  The message seemed to be that Neill valued affordable health care and removing Trump from office. Many Democrats do. Bankhead, as portrayed in the ads, came off as a red square peg on immigration, and an odd fit for a party that held protest rallies across Montana after ICE agents killed two Minnesotans in January.  The candidates could do little to counter the ads. A $5 million infusion of PAC money in a U.S. Senate race isn’t unusually large. Spending by PACs in Montana’s 2024 Senate race surpassed $170 million. But combined, the primary’s four Democrats had spent just $260,000 of their own money — not just on advertising, but on everything, according to federal elections reports. And the lion’s share of candidate money belonged to Neill’s campaign. Bankhead, who won the primary, spent less than $20,000. More Jobs, Less Government had two years earlier spent $22 million, the most of any PAC, to oppose the reelection of Democratic U.S. Sen. Jon Tester. Its top individual contributors that cycle were billionaires from the world of finance: Stephen Schwarzman, of Blackstone; Paul Singer of Elliott Management; and Ken Griffin of Citadel. Schwarzman’s company owned shares of Bridger Aerospace, Sheehy’s wildfire fighting business, and Tallgrass Energy, where Sheehy’s brother Matt was the executive.  Finance reports this election cycle showed the More Jobs, Less Government PAC using the services of S2R, a campaign consulting firm co-founded by Jason Thielman, former chief of staff to U.S. Sen. Steve Daines. More Jobs spent $1.8 million on ads aimed at defining Neill and Bankhead, but it wasn’t the biggest spender in the Senate primary. Progressive Vet PAC — which, like More Jobs, acts independently of candidate committees — spent $3.3 million promoting Bankhead and a small amount opposing Neill. Progressive Vet stacks like a nesting doll over yet another committee, the American Values Project PAC, whose sole contributor is Jason Carroll, founder of Hudson River Trading, which builds trading algorithms. Carroll’s donation history favors Democrats. Progressive Vet didn’t just run ads promoting Bankhead. The PAC also reports paying for staff to call voters personally and encourage turnout for Bankhead, who captured 44% of the vote to Neill’s 33%.  How outside money might stack up for Bankhead in the coming general election against Republican Kurt Alme and independent Seth Bodnar — who so far has built the field’s most formidable war chest by far — remains to be seen.  —Tom Lutey and Jacob Olness REPUBLICANS’ STATEHOUSE SCHISM CONTINUES  Across roughly 40 primaries that pitted two warring Republican factions against each other, some influentially iconoclastic lawmakers lost their primaries, while others held on to their seats. Hardline Republican victors include former lawmaker Steven Galloway in Great Falls, who defeated Rep. Ed Buttrey, R-Great Falls, a key architect of Medicaid expansion. Outside Anaconda, Trish Schreiber defeated John Fitzpatrick, R-Anaconda, who shepherded substantial budget bills during the 2025 session. And in northwest Montana, 20-year-old Finley Warden defeated moderate Rep. Linda Reksten, R-Polson. Warden had made a name for himself by publicizing recordings he took at an educator conference organized by the Montana Federation of Public Employees. And state Sen. Shelley Vance, R-Belgrade, one of the nine senators who split with the state party during the session, lost to party loyalist Rep. Caleb Hinkle, R-Belgrade. But hardline Republicans didn’t unseat all their targets. Rep. Llew Jones, R-Conrad, an influential tactical leader of moderate Republicans, won his Senate primary against Rep. Zack Wirth, R-Wolf Creek. And Rep. George Nikolakakos, R-Great Falls, who has been in hot water with the state GOP, won his state Senate primary against Public Service Commissioner Randy Pinocci, a party loyalist. And in another state Senate race, relative centrist Rep. David Bedey, R-Hamilton, defeated Rep. Kathy Love, R-Hamilton. A sign supporting state Rep. Llew Jones, R-Conrad, stands outside a Conrad business on April 23, 2026. Credit: Lauren Miller, Montana Free Press, CatchLight Local/Report for America Jones’ coalition also played some successful offense in Billings, with GOP loyalists Sen. Barry Usher, R-Billings and Rep., Nelly Nicol, R-Billings, also losing this week.  Carroll College political science expert Jessi Bennion told Montana Free Press during a Wednesday interview that legislative moderates held on to important seats. “Generally, there’s wins and losses on both sides, but the Llew Jones race really stands out,” Bennion said. “And the Bedey race in Ravalli County, that was a big win for the more moderate wing.” University of Montana political science expert Rob Saldin, on the other hand, said party’s right wing emerged from the primary with more to celebrate. “Any time you’re taking out incumbents, even if you’re trying to take out a whole bunch and you only managed to take out some, that’s more notable to me than some of these incumbents managing to hang on,” Saldin said. But Saldin emphasized that the statehouse’s Republican schism is squishier than pundits and journalists sometimes make it seem. Republican factions, he said, shouldn’t be conceived as diametrically opposed, but rather as loose coalitions that can shift depending on the issue. Saldin said how legislators align in the 2027 session will depend on the topics that emerge as most important. “We just don’t have all the answers to those questions quite yet,” Saldin said. —Zeke Lloyd The post What the June 2 primary results tell us about politics in Montana appeared first on Montana Free Press. ...read more read less