Free Republic

Pro-Life Republican Tim Sheehy, a businessman and former Navy SEAL, has won the Montana Senate race, unseating Democratic Senator Jon Tester, who is an ardent abortion advocate. With strong support from GOP leadership, Sheehy emphasizes issues like veterans’ welfare, national security, and economic growth. Senator Tester, a three-term Democrat, ran a well-funded campaign but lost 53-44 percent in a key Senate pickup for Republicans. Sheehy released the following statement after his victory: “I’ve been serving our country since I was 18, because when your country calls, you must answer, and I am incredibly honored by your support and the trust...

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — Republican Tim Sheehy defeated three-term Democratic U.S. Sen. Jon Tester. The victory by the former U.S. Navy SEAL bolsters the GOP’s new Senate majority. Sheehy closely aligned his campaign with Donald Trump and leading conservatives while painting Tester as a corrupt Washington insider. The Republican also promised to address the southern border crisis and curb government regulation. Outside groups poured record-breaking amounts of money into the contest. Democrats entered the election with a narrow two-seat majority in the Senate. Tester — a moderate and the chamber’s only working farmer — was considered one of the most...

As election day draws closer, pro-life groups have been sounding the alarm about a proposed constitutional amendment to the state ballot that would grant Montanans nearly unlimited access to induced abortion (the direct and intentional killing of preborn human beings). The constitutional initiative known as CI-128 has been heavily funded by pro-abortion groups such as abortion giant Planned Parenthood and the ACLU. The national ACLU and ACLU of Montana have planned to spend the most they have ever spent on Montana — $1.3 million — on abortion-supporting campaigns they hope will reach the state’s voters. The pro-life Women Speak Out...

CV NEWS FEED // In a shift that has stunned the pro-abortion community, Dr. Forrest Smith, a veteran abortion provider, is now calling on voters across the nation to reject all 10 state abortion amendments on the ballot in the upcoming election. Having performed thousands of abortions over his long career, Dr. Smith has undergone a profound change of heart and now advocates for ending abortion, especially for viable babies. “There is no need to kill viable babies,” he declared, urging the nation to consider alternatives. Dr. Smith, who has also delivered thousands of babies over his 54-year career as...

An individual aligned with the Democratic Party was flagged by an election official for "tampering" concerns after surveillance footage caught him making contact with a ballot box, the Montana Secretary of State's office tells Fox News Digital. Crystal Cole, the Glacier County election administrator, reported her concerns to the Montana secretary of state's election unit about what she viewed as potential "tampering" with a ballot box on Sunday, according to an email shared with Fox News Digital. Cole told the secretary of state’s office that she called the individual shown in the video footage, who told her he had been...

Authorities in Montana say a 911 caller discovered his friend dead in a tent in what appeared to have been a fatal bear attack — but officials soon discovered the camper was actually the victim of a brutal murder. Dustin Kjersem, 35, was found dead in his tent on Saturday morning along Moose Creek Road north of Big Sky, Montana, Gallatin County Sheriff Dan Springer said at news conference Wednesday. A friend who was supposed to have met Kjersem went searching for him when he didn't show up as scheduled on Friday. The friend ultimately discovered Kjersem's body in a...

Republican Senate candidates have the edge in three critical states where they can flip blue seats red, while several other races are either on a knife’s edge or show Republicans within striking distance, according to a National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) polling memorandum. The memo, first published by Politico on Tuesday, shows Republicans ahead in Montana, Ohio, and Wisconsin against three Democrat incumbents. This is a major development considering Democrats currently hold a 51-49 seat majority in the Senate. If West Virginia’s senate race breaks for Republicans, as expected, and GOP incumbents successfully defend their seats while bringing home these...

… [J]on Tester is a divisive leftist who bragged that he “loved” violent, inciting messaging depicting their beloved President Trump dead in front of the White House. *** Tester ... is polling competitively against Republican Tim Sheehy with Trump on the ballot. Tester’s ability to close polling gaps late in the campaign demonstrates that his resilience in this race must not be underestimated, making the upcoming election extremely important. *** Tester’s overall voting record is abysmal. According to a report in the Daily Caller from March 2023, “Tester supported President Joe Biden’s position on legislation and nominees more than 99%...

Former President Donald Trump has made gains in 19 states in the past week, according to a major election forecast. Pollster Nate Silver's forecast shows that the Republican presidential nominee has made marginal gains in six swing states during the past week and in Florida, Texas and New Mexico. Trump has also made gains in New Hampshire, California, Montana, Washington, Massachusetts, Indiana, Missouri, Maryland, Rhode Island and Nebraska, including in its 2nd Congressional District. Nebraska does not use the "winner takes all" system for awarding Electoral College votes. Two votes are awarded to the winner of the statewide popular vote,...

Two constitutional initiatives to change how Montanans vote will be on the ballot in November, and both are deceptive. Two of them will help Democrats and ensure, ironically, despite supporters’ claims, that election winners are not likely to have a majority of the total votes cast. Supporters sell CI-126 as giving voters more choices in primary elections. Montana is already an “open” primary state where voters can choose whether they want a Republican or Democrat ballot, but this initiative would allow people to vote for a Democrat in one race and then a Republican in another one. These are called...

Every vote counts. That's especially true for Montana Democrat Jon Tester, who faces the toughest Senate reelection race in the country this November—which may help explain why he privately met with a professional pole dancer earlier this month. Tester’s public schedule reveals a private meeting with Tiffany Rose and Jamie Goguen on Sept. 19, between two Senate floor sessions. Rose is a Montana resident and self-described "pole dance instructor" with tens of thousands of followers on social media. A spokeswoman for Tester did not respond to a request for comment. Such a meeting is peculiar for Tester, who represents a...

John Tester has been a bit of a counter intuitive for the state of Montana in the last decade or so. Since the 1990s Montana has been a relatively conservative political state, with the GOP controlling the state house and senate for all but 3 sessions since 1995. There was a brief window in 2005 to 2011 where Democrats manages a 50/50 division in the state senate, (with 2007 term technically being a 50 R, 49 D 1 I) and also had control of the state house through those terms as well. However, since that time, The GOP has pulled...

The Sen. Jon Tester campaign ran a full-page ad in our local newspaper on Sept. 4. The ad brazenly said that “Sheehy’s plan closes” our local hospital and that “49 rural Montana hospitals” will close if Tim Sheehy gets elected.The lies about the “privatization” of VA medical benefits need to be exposed. Veterans are understandingly concerned about this issue. Sheehy and his wife are combat veterans themselves, and they would never propose or support efforts to reduce veterans’ medical benefits.Sheehy is opposed to nationalizing our health care, which I agree with. It is obvious that keeping private, employer, Medicare, and...

Republicans are feeling better and better about their chances of knocking off Sen. Jon Tester (D) in Montana’s hotly contested Senate race, which would greatly increase their chances of winning back the chamber next year.Several recent polls have shown Republican businessman Tim Sheehy leading Tester by a few points, within the margin of error but not what Democrats are hoping for in a state seen as critical to their chances of keeping Senate control.The race is still expected to be tight, but multiple election forecasters have shifted their ratings of the contest from toss-up to leaning Republican.The election seems to...

Montana’s Jon Tester and Ohio’s Sherrod Brown lead the list of Roll Call’s most vulnerable senators...Republicans need a net gain of two seats to take the majority next year — or one seat and control of the White House, since the vice president breaks ties. And with Manchin’s retirement, the GOP is all but guaranteed to pick up the seat in ruby-red West Virginia. While our list looks only at vulnerable incumbents, there are several high-profile open seats whose outcomes will also shape the balance of power in the chamber. One of the biggest Senate battlegrounds is in Arizona, where...

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) is plowing ahead with his plan to avert a government shutdown despite GOP opposition that is large enough to tank the effort, setting the stage for a potentially embarrassing vote on the House floor that will foil the Speaker’s funding strategy. At least six Republicans, including hard-line conservatives and defense hawks, have said they will vote against Johnson’s government funding gambit, which pairs a six-month continuing resolution (CR) with a Trump-backed bill requiring proof of citizenship to vote. Republicans can only afford to lose four of their members if all Democrats vote “no” and there is...

A Montana county declared the wrong winner in a race after overcounting votes. During a post-canvassing audit of the Butte-Silver Bow County primary that was held in June, election officials suspected an overcount of more than 1,000 ballots, prompting a judge to order a recount. The recount discovered that 1,131 more votes were counted than voters who voted. Data shows a very similar number of votes in each precinct was overcounted. Election officials are not entirely sure what happened, though Butte-Silver Bow County Clerk and Recorder Linda Sajor-Joyce told leaders she believes the extra ballots were from sample data that...

The U.S. Senate race in Montana will almost certainly decide who controls the chamber in 2025. It may also mark the beginning of the end of split-ticket voting in a presidential year, when every election becomes intimately tied to the fight at the top of the ticket. Since 2006, Montana Sen. Jon Tester, a Democrat, has narrowly survived three Senate races in his solidly Republican state by outperforming Democratic presidential candidates by up to 20 percentage points. He is attempting to do so again this year by disassociating himself from the campaign of Vice President Kamala Harris, who trails former...

College athletes in Montana are being offered cash to make endorsement videos for Sen. Jon Tester as he campaigns for one of the Democrats' most vulnerable seats of the 2024 cycle, according to emails shared with Fox News Digital. A group called "Montana Together" recently sourced athletes at the University of Montana (UMT), offering payments in exchange for the promotion of Tester, according to the school's athletic director, Kent Haslam.... The group was offering student athletes a range of offers from $400 to $2,400 in exchange for a video "spreading the word" .....

The Montana Democratic Party sued the secretary of state and the state of Montana on Thursday to get the Green Party's Senate candidate removed from general election ballots. The Democrats are asking a judge to permanently bar Republican Secretary of State Christi Jacobsen from certifying any Green Party candidate in the Senate election, including who was slated to be on the ballot, Darby resident Robert Barb. That said, there were only hours left after the lawsuit was filed for the secretary of state to certify the November ballots, so it's unclear how it was meant to play out if ballots...