MT-AL: Rob Quist (D) vs. Greg Gianforte (R) vs. Mark Wicks (L), May 25

[MT Treasurer]

Gianforte raises $1.5 million, Quist $750K for US Congress; Independent Group pledging $700,000 to boost the Gianforte campaign

Don't read too much into these numbers, though.

Of course you also forgot the Democratic bases of Silver Bow and Deer Lodge Counties, Trump and Fox almost flipped them, but Gianforte got destroyed in both. If they go from being 70% D to 50-50, that hurts Democrats and helps Republicans going forward.

That might help them a little, but it is cancelled out by Gallatin County trending Democratic. It has little impact overall.

[MT Treasurer]

No surprise, but the mail-in ballot bill is dead

[MT Treasurer]

The lack of help from the DSCC seems to confirm their shift from WWC to upscale suburban districts.

I think this is actually a good thing. If he gets money from the DSCC then the GOP can run 'Quist is Pelosi's puppet!' campaign ads

Yeah, I agree with this. The only thing they came up with was that "Quist is a Bernie Sanders Democrat!" ad, which was pretty bad. Not saying that they shouldn't energize their base, but IMO nationalizing this race would be a dumb idea for both of them, this isn't GA-06. Others here might disagree, but I think they would be well-advised to keep their distance from the national parties.

It would be nice if someone actually polled this race, it has received surprisingly little attention outside of Atlas so far.

[MT Treasurer]

Gravis polled the race, and has it at Gianforte +12:

Gianforte 50%
Quist 38%
Wicks 3%
Breck 2%
Uncertain 7%
http://gravismarketing.com/polling-and-market-research/current-montana-polling-3/
1,222 Voters; MoE +-2.9;  Poll Dates ? - It was released today.


Breck is apparently the Green Party candidate.  Did we miss him getting ballot access, or is Gravis polling someone not on the ballot?

There hasn't been any decision yet. It probably won't take much longer to settle this, though. As for the poll itself... thank God finally someone decided to poll this race. The GCS polls were nice, but too D-friendly. I'm also not really buying the results of this poll, honestly. I really don't see Gianforte winning by double digits. Trump's approval numbers look a bit too high, while Bullock's seem a bit too low. Montana is one of the few states where Democratic strength is often underestimated by the polls.

[MT Treasurer]

Uh, back on topic... While this race doesn't tell us much about 2018 Senate race, it's somewhat of a proxy war between Daines and Tester. Daines is Gianforte's best buddy and encouraged him to run for the special election, and Tester was trying hard to get Quist nominated behind the scenes. So a big Gianforte win/a Quist victory would be pretty disappointing for Tester/Daines, respectively.

[MT Treasurer]

It's official: There will be only three candidates on the ballot: Gianforte (R), Quist (D), Wicks (L)

Do you think the victor of this race might run for Senate in 2018/2020 (depending on the party)?

Actually, I really don't think it will happen. Quist will be quite old in 2020 and Bullock is already the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination for Senate for that race. Gianforte would be foolish to run for Senate right after winning a special election to the House, he should focus on locking down the House seat. Either Fox or Rosendale will probably be the nominee for Senate, but we'll see.

[MT Treasurer]

Google Consumer Survey poll, April 6-8, Sample size: 333, MoE: 5.4%

45.4% Rob Quist (D)
43.5% Greg Gianforte (R)
11.1% Mark Wicks (L)

Link.

[MT Treasurer]

Looks like Republicans are going to spend quite a bit here, after all. Not taking anything for granted.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/gop-pours-money-into-montana-house-race-1492023603
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/republicans-arent-taking-any-chances-in-montana-house-race/article/2620137

[MT Treasurer]

An interesting thing to watch in this race will be the East-West divide. Basically all GCS polls so far have shown the gap to be unbelievably high (sometimes even more than 40 points), with Quist leading in the Western part of the state and Gianforte in the East. I doubt it will be that dramatic on election day, but we'll see.

Another thing to keep in mind is that the early returns are skewed toward Democrats. So please... don't freak out when Quist leads 55-40 with 5% in. Oh wait, this is Atlas, why am I even saying this.

[MT Treasurer]

Quist is done

Pulling my Predict shares...

Too early to tell, but if things continue at this rate (I'm not talking about the nudity thing, btw), it'll be Gianforte's race to lose. Quist would do best if he localized the race as much as possible and focused on education, public lands, social security, etc.

[MT Treasurer]

Um, you people realize that Bullock ran tons of attack ads against Gianforte in 2016, right? It's not like they have much more stuff to use. This is a big reason why Gianforte is going negative that early and wants to define Quist as soon as possible.

Right now all I'm hearing is "GIANFORTE IS FROM NEW JERSEY!!1!", which is not a winning strategy. Sorry. Their last presidential candidate moved to New York to win a Senate race, but Gianforte moving to Montana 20 years ago is a big deal?

And yeah, I agree that it's the best for Quist not to be associated too much with the national Democratic party.

[MT Treasurer]

And here is the first and last "official" debate between the three candidates

I actually watched the entire thing for some reason. Not that these debates really matter, but I thought it was a very underwhelming performance by Quist (he dodged a lot questions and kept repeating his usual "But Russia" and "But millionayhs" talking points, etc.). Remember when he sounded like a dove?

Say what you want about Gianforte, but he sounded pretty authentic for the most past, especially at the end.

[MT Treasurer]

Meanwhile, Amanda Curtis is sitting at home laughing and attempting to resist the urge to make a YouTube video about all of this.

[MT Treasurer]

This story isn't being reported very thoroughly in local media and I would be surprised if this changed anyone's vote. Also, you can call Rob Quist many things, but "Socialist" isn't one of them. The man is basically a generic Democrat, and his voting record wouldn't be any different than Ossoff's, who Wulfric seems to be endorsing enthusiastically.

[MT Treasurer]

Btw, Quist cast his ballot yesterday.

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[MT Treasurer]

I'm actually thinking that a poorly timed senate fight over the ahca could give Quist about a ~5% boost from spooked democrats turning out and annoyed moderate republicans thinking about checking the party's current agenda and thus defecting.

This thing isn't going to hurt Republicans unless they can pass it in the Senate - in other words, not going to happen. But I admire your optimism.

If Quist wins, it won't be because of this.

[MT Treasurer]

Quist was never dead and Dems were always going to make this close because it's Montana. Apparently, Trump jr. is also going to campaign with GF again.

I assume Quist is trailing by 5 right now.

This seems about right, honestly.

[MT Treasurer]

Greg Gianforte reportedly owns shares of funds that have holdings in other companies, including Russian natural gas utility Gazprom, that are sanctioned by the U.S. Gianforte owns $92,400 shares in ISHARES MSCF Russia AND $150,000 in VanEck Vectors Russia ETF, the report said. Gianforte made millions after founding a technology company in the 1990s. A spokesman for Gianforte told The Guardian that the candidate will place his assets in a blind trust should he win the election.

Source - The Hill / report-montana-gop-candidate-has-financial-links-to-russian-firms

Some people are apparently getting very desperate. This story is very old and Quist brought it up during the debate when he dodged a question.

[MT Treasurer]

New Gravis poll coming soon:

Gravis Marketing‏ @GravisMarketing
Montana Poll being released on Monday will show @RobQuistforMT  gaining ground.

https://twitter.com/GravisMarketing/status/860859344526729216

Or...well.. their last poll was simply awful (I believe it was Gianforte +12, right? That was never going to be the result). Democrats are coming home to Quist, as expected. Tossup.

Then again, I'd like to see someone other than Gravis polling this race.

[MT Treasurer]

Still sticking with Pianoforte +5.

[MT Treasurer]

Why is Gravis polling the Green Party candidate, Breck?  I thought he was thrown off the ballot.  Did that change?

No, it didn't. Lolgravis.

[MT Treasurer]

Why is Gravis polling the Green Party candidate, Breck?  I thought he was thrown off the ballot.  Did that change?

No, it didn't. Lolgravis.

Not only is Breck not on the ballot (he appealed all the way up to the Supreme Court to no avail), but according to his own website, he missed the deadline to accept write-ins, and endorsed Doug Campbell's write-in campaign.

So, LolGravis, indeed.

I mean... even if he were on the ballot, there's no way all Third party candidates combined would get 8% of the vote. I'm also not sure why Undecideds went from 2% in the first survey (conducted April 27th) to 10% in the second one (conducted from May 2nd to the 4th) when the debate was held on April 29 and the race hasn't been getting any less attention since then.

Are you planning on doing another GCS Survey before the election, cinyc?

[MT Treasurer]

Unless a Republican in Montana holds consistent double digit leads in the polls, they aren't safe. This race certainly isn't over yet, even the MT GOP knows this.

[MT Treasurer]

Unless a Republican in Montana holds consistent double digit leads in the polls, they aren't safe. This race certainly isn't over yet, even the MT GOP knows this.

If a democratic internal has Gianforte +7, the actual state of things is probably around Gianforte +12.

I wouldn't unskew polls like that, plus that "internal" poll was taken several weeks ago. The state is too inelastic and Democratic for him to win by 10+ points, and special elections can be unpredictable.

I mean, Pianoforte will probably win, but Republicans need to campaign here as if they are 10 points behind and take nothing for granted.

[MT Treasurer]

Amanda Curtis would've ran a better campaign than this.

Yeah, I wish she would have won the Democratic nomination. She'd probably have been my favorite Democrat in Congress and the GE campaign would have been more entertaining as well, LOL.