What did Tester do that Heitkamp, McCaskill and Donnelly didnt?

[Thatkat04]

Is it the flattop?

[Xing]

He rode his tractor around quite a bit too.

[Dr Oz Lost Party!]

He didn't shy away from his Democratic label as far as the other three. Might not be the reason, but I find it interesting.

My guess is that it's his sexy and over-powering haircut.

[Thatkat04]

He rode his tractor around quite a bit too.

Keys for a democrat to win in a ruby red state:

✓ Flatop
✓ Tractor
✓ Missing fingers

/s

[Technocracy Timmy]

Montana elected a fairly left wing Demcorat (whose only moderate on guns and energy policy afaik) to be their Governor in both 2012 and even in 2016. Now look at the Governors of ND, MO, and IN.

For whatever reason the state is more liberal than it’s 2016 Presidential margin would lead one to believe.

[InheritTheWind]

Montana elected a fairly left wing Demcorat (whose only moderate on guns and energy policy afaik) to be their Governor in both 2012 and even in 2016. Now look at the Governors of ND, MO, and IN.

For whatever reason the state is more liberal than it’s 2016 Presidential margin would lead one to believe.

It's kinda funny how good of a touchstone that ended up being. ND, MO, IN, MT, WV all had gubernatorial races in '16; the first three elected Republicans, the last two elected Democrats (Justice's  switch notwithstanding) despite Trump's romping upballot.

Then, come 2018, the first three turf out their incumbent Dem senators, but the last two re-elect them.

[Adam Griffin]

Montana's older voters are more Democratic in relation to the state as a whole when compared to the other 3 states mentioned (Tester basically tied among 65+), it has a fairly large college educated population and it also - unlike many other interior western states - seems to be attracting a substantial number of people from other parts of the country who vote Democratic (and, with the exception of ND, a person moving there has a greater impact on voting outcomes).

I'd also point out that one-third of MT's electorate this year was under the age of 40 (I could be wrong, but that seems at least moderately larger than most other states this year) and Tester won them by almost 25 points.

[Mr. Smith]

He ended up with Maryland Matt, whereas Hawley, Braun, and Cramer were actually good campaigners...or at least no so laughably bad.

[FalloutBoy97]

Ran in a state more willing to elect democrats downballot. I mean honestly, particularly now, there isn’t much any democrat can do to win a federal race in ND MO or IN. There is only so much a candidate can do to fight the fundamentals. Barbara Comstock didn’t do anything worse than her previous campaigns and still got shellacked.

[TML]

Unlike the other three, Tester didn't alienate progressive base voters; instead, he made active efforts to increase turnout in college-dominated areas (Missoula, Bozeman) and Indian Reservations, and refrained from denouncing progressive positions.

If Tester had copied the old Democratic playbook of running as Republican-lite, he would almost certainly have been eaten alive, just like the other three.

[smoltchanov]

Unlike the other three, Tester didn't alienate progressive base voters; instead, he made active efforts to increase turnout in college-dominated areas (Missoula, Bozeman) and Indian Reservations, and refrained from denouncing progressive positions.

If Tester had copied the old Democratic playbook of running as Republican-lite, he would almost certainly have been eaten alive, just like the other three.

Simplification at least, lie - at most.

[Don Vito Corleone]

Montana elected a fairly left wing Demcorat (whose only moderate on guns and energy policy afaik) to be their Governor in both 2012 and even in 2016. Now look at the Governors of ND, MO, and IN.

For whatever reason the state is more liberal than it’s 2016 Presidential margin would lead one to believe.

It wasn't long ago at all that North Dakota was very friendly to Democrats downballot (In 2004, the Liberal Byron Dorgan not only won in a landslide but outran Bush, and 6 years later, he was still comfortably leading every Repubican challenger bar one, John Hoeven), perhaps even more so then Montana is today. The question then, is why North Dakota's (and Missouri's, for that matter) downballot Democratic strength faded away while Montana barely budged, if at all.

[lfromnj]

I found the real reason
We all know its populism but the famous singer John Denver had many #populist songs.
Country Roads is the most famous so Manchin won but less known is Montana skies. There are no Denver Indiana MO or ND songs so thats why they lost but Tester and Manchin won.

[Person Man]

Montana is elastic. That simple.

[Karpatsky]

Montana is elastic. That simple.

But why? I can't imagine the demographics are that different from the Dakotas.

[lfromnj]

Montana is elastic. That simple.

But why? I can't imagine the demographics are that different from the Dakotas.

Its more unionized than both the Dakotas.

[Zaybay]

Montana is elastic. That simple.

But why? I can't imagine the demographics are that different from the Dakotas.

MT has a Western half that contains rather sizable cities, and a little metro(I like to think that MT as its own little bubble, even though its small towns and farms, the small towns vote like Urban areas, especially in 2018). Not to mention the colleges it has, which, especially in a small state, can be rather influential.

[The Dowager Mod]

It's the haircut.

[Starry Eyed Jagaloon]

Run in the West.

[Orser67]

Montana elected a fairly left wing Demcorat (whose only moderate on guns and energy policy afaik) to be their Governor in both 2012 and even in 2016. Now look at the Governors of ND, MO, and IN.

For whatever reason the state is more liberal than it’s 2016 Presidential margin would lead one to believe.

It wasn't long ago at all that North Dakota was very friendly to Democrats downballot (In 2004, the Liberal Byron Dorgan not only won in a landslide but outran Bush, and 6 years later, he was still comfortably leading every Repubican challenger bar one, John Hoeven), perhaps even more so then Montana is today. The question then, is why North Dakota's (and Missouri's, for that matter) downballot Democratic strength faded away while Montana barely budged, if at all.

Increasing national polarization is a huge factor, but in ND, at least, the energy boom also played a role. Energy workers are disproportionately Republican and ND is a low-population state, so the influx of energy workers helped shift the state from "elastic red state" to "inelastic red state."

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

Ran against a carpetbagger.

[Co-Chair Bagel23]

On election night when Rosendale was slightly up, a lot of Trumpists were yelling that the dems in the Trumpy states had all lost except for Manchin because of kavyes. They said that because it fit their narrative, but they went silent after Tester won. Now what's the real commonality? They were both decently popular incumbents in flexible states with horrible GOP opponents, both of whom were carpetbaggers from the Northeast with a history of under-performances even when they won in their adopted states (Rosendale won by barely 7 points when Trump won by over 20, Fatrick was held to a single digit victory while Trump won by over 41 points, etc.)

[ηєω ƒяσηтιєя]

Montana elected a fairly left wing Demcorat (whose only moderate on guns and energy policy afaik) to be their Governor in both 2012 and even in 2016. Now look at the Governors of ND, MO, and IN.

For whatever reason the state is more liberal than it’s 2016 Presidential margin would lead one to believe.

It wasn't long ago at all that North Dakota was very friendly to Democrats downballot (In 2004, the Liberal Byron Dorgan not only won in a landslide but outran Bush, and 6 years later, he was still comfortably leading every Repubican challenger bar one, John Hoeven), perhaps even more so then Montana is today. The question then, is why North Dakota's (and Missouri's, for that matter) downballot Democratic strength faded away while Montana barely budged, if at all.

Two reasons:

1) The energy boom.
2) The presidency of Barack Obama.

[MT Treasurer]

*sigh*

Tester did exactly what Heitkamp did: He outperformed Clinton by 25 points (actually it was 24% in Tester's and 25% in Heitkamp's case, but that’s a negligible difference.) Basically the same margin, even though Cramer had a lot of things going in his favor that Rosendale just didn’t have (no contentious primary, no half-hearted/late NRSC support, a far weaker opponent, a far more Republican state in which pretty much all the urban areas are way to the right of Missoula/Bozeman/etc., a state in which Trump was much more popular than in Montana, etc.).

I don’t see how you could possibly argue that it was Tester (who everyone here expected to win, in case you forgot) who "overperformed." Rather, Donnelly, McCaskill, Nelson, and Morrisey all underperformed the fundamentals.

[Roronoa D. Law]

Rosendale wasn't that strong of a candidate compared to Cramer, Braun, and Hawley. MT GOP just recently got a bench of candidates. Heitkamp probably would have won had she went against Campbell or Schmidt. Although Schmidt would probably give her a run for her money.

As for McCaskill and Donnelly, I guess you can say Tester had a better understanding who was going to vote for him and who wasn't. It cute to go to every county but at the end of the day, there are not that many persuadable voters. I'm not sure but there were probably enough voters in KCMO, St Louis, NWIN, and Indianapolis to change the outcome.