Yellowstone County Conservatives Have Bigger Fish to Fry
The two most important races on the ballot for conservatives in Montana this year are getting James Brown elected to the Montana Supreme Court, and getting Ryan Zinke elected to the Western Congressional District.
Montana Congressman Matt Rosendale (R-MT) appears to have it in the bag, as the Eastern Congressional District was drawn more heavily Republican to begin with during the state's redistricting process. Especially now that the Democrats appear to be splitting their votes between Penny Ronning and Gary Buchanan.
I just got back from the Western Congressional District. It is clear that conservatives are now united behind Ryan Zinke, and against the two open borders "libs" running in the race against Zinke. Anyone propping up the open borders "lib"ertarian candidate is seen as merely helping the Democrat and would bear the blame if the Democrats were able to pull it off.
Meanwhile, back in Yellowstone County it has been interesting to see the division amongst some conservatives over the county commissioner race. Mark Morse won the GOP primary against the incumbent Denis Pitman. I've always enjoyed conversations with both Morse and Pitman. Pitman is now waging a write-in campaign. Write-in campaigns are always long shots, but in this case there is no Democrat in the race so at least it doesn't risk pulling votes away from the Republican and towards the Democrat.
On many occasions, I've heard Yellowstone County conservatives debating the race, and I just can't help but wonder- don't Yellowstone County conservatives have bigger fish to fry? Shouldn't all of their efforts be spent on the Montana Supreme Court, competitive legislative districts, and Congressional races that could determine who controls Congress?
State Senator-elect Barry Usher (R-Billings) weighed in with his thoughts over the weekend: