Who’s running for office in Montana’s 2024 election (2024)

Montana’s 2024 ballot will host a suite of consequential elections —among them a race that could decide the balance of the U.S. Senate, two open seats on the Montana Supreme Court, two U.S. House races, the governorship, and a bevy of other statewide offices. And, for good measure, there may be some major ballot measures thrown in too. With less than a year to election day, campaign announcements are coming fast and furious from seasoned politicians and grassroots activists alike.

It’s enough to bewilder a political junkie, much less a more casual observer. So Montana Free Press has combed through our campaign filings, email inboxes and press clippings in an effort to round up some basic cliff notes on the Montana candidates who are running for state or federal office in 2024.

For the time being we’re not getting into state legislative races here — though you can find our coverage of who filed where in those races here. We’ve also omitted ballot initiatives, none of which had yet qualified for the ballot as of March. 20.

The primary election is June 4, 2024, and the general election is Nov. 5.

We plan to update this guide periodically —and keep your eyes out for the full-fledged election guide we’re hoping to launch in early May. If you’re aware of something we should add here, don’t hesitate to reach out to MTFP political reporter Arren Kimbel-Sannit at akimbel@montanafreepress.org.

Federal Races

Elections that will determine Montana’s representatives in the U.S. Congress. Campaign finance reports for these races are filed with the Federal Elections Commission.

U.S. Senate

One of Montana’s two seats in the upper chamber of the national Congress in Washington, D.C. U.S. Senators are elected to six-year terms. The state’s other U.S. Senator, Republican Steve Daines, is out of cycle and next up for re-election in 2026.

Jon Tester, a Democrat from Big Sandy, was first elected to the U.S. Senate in 2006. At the time, Montana had a Democratic governor, attorney general, superintendent of public instruction, and state auditor.

Tester won that race and subsequent elections in 2012 and 2018 by slim margins. But while he’s served in the U.S. Senate, Democratic control of other statewide offices has slipped away, leaving him Montana’s only statewide-elected Democrat. Those circ*mstances and the fact that Democrats hold a narrow two-seat majority in the U.S. Senate mean Tester will be a top target for Republicans. This is certainly the highest-profile race in the state in the 2023-2024 election cycle.

Candidates

• Incumbent U.S. Sen. Jon Tester, a Democrat, farmer from Big Sandy and onetime president of the Montana Senate, has long been a known quantity in the state. But he’s also served in Washington, D.C. for almost 18 years, and could face stiff political headwinds this cycle. “I know that people in Washington don’t understand what a hard day’s work looks like or the challenges working families are facing in Montana,” Tester said in a statement announcing his reelection campaign in February. “Montanans need a fighter holding Washington accountable.”
• Tim Sheehy is the perceived frontrunner for the Republican nomination in the Senate race. A former Navy SEAL originally from Minnesota, he is the CEO of Bridger Aerospace, a Belgrade-based aerial firefighting company. His wealth and military background make him an attractive candidate for national Republicans and he has been endorsed by Montana U.S. Sen. Steve Daines, the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee,Gov. Greg Gianforte and U.S. Rep. Ryan Zinke. But, by many of those same virtues, he’s a target of criticism from some in the Montana GOP. “I think Americans are feeling underrepresented,” he told Fox News Digital shortly after launching his campaign. “They’re tired of a government that they don’t feel is working for them.”
• Former Public Service Commission member and Montana Secretary of State Brad Johnson entered the Republican field in October. In a November interview with MTFP, he said he feels he has a better chance of beating Tester than anyone else in the race.
• Sid Daoud, a Kalispell city council member and the chair of the Montana Libertarian Party, announced his intention to run for the seat in November. “I think the other two big parties in Montana are going to be surprised about how well put together and how professional this campaign is going to be,” Daoud told the Flathead Beacon. “We’ve been reduced to the role of spoilers and some people call us like ‘Republican-lite. We’re a different and we’re a unique political party. We have our own platform.”
• Charles Walkingchild, a Republican and Helena environmental contractor who unsuccessfully ran for Montana’s eastern U.S. House district in 2022.
• Michael Hummert, a Democrat and U.S. Navy veteran who lives in Helena. He brands himself a “realist” who wants to send Tester back to his farm.
• Billings’ Robert Barb is running for Tester’s seat as a member of the Green Party, as is Helena’s Michael Downey.

FORMER CANDIDATES

• Matt Rosendale, a Republican, currently represents Montana’s eastern U.S. House of Representatives district. A prominent member of the House Freedom Caucus, he’s an outspoken hard-right critic of his own party and was an important figure in the ouster of former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. Rosendale, who has launched broadsides against both Tester and Sheehy, formally announced his campaign for U.S. Senate on Feb. 9 but pulled out of the race days later after former President Donald Trump endorsed Sheehy. Rosendale previously ran against Tester in 2018 and lost.

MT-01 (Western District)

One of Montana’s two districts in the U.S. House of Representatives, the first district generally includes Montana’s western third and many of its major cities: Bozeman, Missoula, Kalispell, Butte and Hamilton. U.S. Representatives are elected to two-year terms.

The race for Montana’s First Congressional District in 2024 will likely see familiar names on the ballot. In 2022, Republican Ryan Zinke, a former U.S. Secretary of the Interior under Donald Trump, defeated Democratic attorney Monica Tranel by about three percentage points. As Zinke seeks re-election, Tranel is making another go at the seat.

candidates

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• Republican Ryan Zinke, a former Navy SEAL from Whitefish, has twice been a congressman, served as a cabinet secretary under Trump, and did a stint in the state Senate from 2009 to 2013. Once seen as a relatively moderate state lawmaker, he’s since publicly embraced Trump, serving as the president’s interior secretary until 2018, when he resigned under the weight of numerous ethics probes. “We face a lot of problems. I haven’t seen any problem that’s not fixable,” Zinke told reporters after filing his campaign paperwork with the Montana secretary of state on Feb. 9. “But it’s going to take a lot of courage and a lot of purpose.”
• Monica Tranel, a Democrat, is an attorney and former Olympic rower who has long been involved in Montana’s public affairs. A former attorney for the Public Service Commission and Montana Office of Consumer Counsel, she’s developed a reputation for representing ratepayers in legal battles with Northwestern Energy, Montana’s main regulated utility. She fashions herself as a populist crusader who stands up to corporate interests in the courtroom — while still making overtures to the purple center.
• Kalispell pastor Mary Todd, a Republican who is again trying to defeat Zinke in the GOP primary. Zinke has proven to be vulnerable to right-wing challengers in the past — in 2022, he defeated Flathead County hardliner Dr. Al Olzewski in the primary by only two points — though Todd only captured about 10% of the vote in that race.
• Ernie Noble and Dennis Hayes, both Libertarians, are also seeking to oust Zinke this year.

MT-02 (Eastern District)

Montana’s second district in the U.S. House of Representatives. It stretches from Helena to the North and South Dakota borders. U.S. Representatives are elected to two-year terms.

Just about everything in the 2024 race for Montana’s second district, which spans the eastern two-thirds of the state, hinged on the plans of the district’s incumbent, U.S. Rep. Matt Rosendale. Rosendale’s announcement that he would not seek re-election officially opened the gates for thebevy of Republicans vying to replace the outgoing hardliner. There are also some Democrats in the race, but they’ll likely face a steep climb in a district that leans heavily Republican.

candidates

• Elsie Arntzen, a Republican, is the incumbent superintendent of public instruction but cannot run again because of term limits. Arntzen, who filed a statement of candidacy for the U.S. House in August, was first elected state superintendent in 2016 following a long career in the Legislature. “Our schools need to focus on education and not indoctrination. As the Superintendent of Public Instruction, I fought to keep parents in the driver’s seat and keep our focus on academics instead of agendas. I am proud to have a proven track record of partnering with parents,” Arntzen tweeted from her campaign account in November.
• Troy Downing, Montana’s current state auditor — a position once held by Rosendale — announced his candidacy in November. His primary issue is reducing government spending, he told MTFP. Downing, an Air Force veteran, has a background in the tech sector and owns WildRye Distilling in Bozeman.
• Joel Krautter, an attorney and former Republican state lawmaker from Sidney who has since moved to Billings, has also said he will run for the seat if Rosendale makes a go at the upper chamber. During his brief, one-term legislative tenure from 2019–2020, Krautter was a prominent bipartisan, voting to renew Medicaid expansion in the 2019 session. He then lost a contested primary to a Republican hardliner, Brandon Ler, in 2020. Krautter told MTFP of his run for Congress: “I believe that we need a new generation of leadership in Washington, D.C.”
• Ric Holden, a Republican, is a farmer and former state legislator from outside Glendive. Holden described himself as a longtime friend of fellow Dawson County resident Rosendale, who moved to Montana from Maryland in the early 2000s and purchased a ranch in the area. Holden last served in the state Senate during the 2002 special session. He said he wants to run for Congress to represent Monantana’s agricultural interests in Washington, D.C.
• State Sen. Kenneth Bogner, a Republican from Miles City, formally launched his bid for House Jan. 9. A former Marine, Bogner told MTFP his biggest issues were border security and the national debt. “I feel like I am the strongest candidate because I have the experience, both the military experience to solve these national security issues, like the border, and also experience with passing legislation,” Bogner said in an interview in January. “I believe time is of the essence. We need someone ready to go as soon as they get to Congress.”
• Former Congressman Denny Rehberg, a Republican who represented Montana’s at-large district in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2001 to 2013, announced he would run for the state’s eastern district in February. “Joe Biden is making America unrecognizable – and I want our country back,” Rehberg said in a statement announcing his candidacy. “I am a fifth-generation Montana rancher. I got into public service because I was moved by past generations of Montanans. I want to return to public service because I am worried about future generations of Montanans.”

• Stacy Zinn, of Billings, a former Drug Enforcement Administration official, announced her candidacy in November.. In a press release announcing her campaign, she primarily emphasized her desire for tighter border security and her experience fighting drug trafficking.
• Kevin Hamm, a Democrat from Helena, is a community organizer, LGBTQ activist and a former candidate for Public Service Commission. He’s perhaps best known locally for running Montana’s statewide Pride celebration. “I got 18 months to get in front of these people. We’ve got three-quarters of the counties in the state of Montana in my district. We have half the people and three-quarters of the land. So, we’ve got a lot to do,” Hamm told the Billings Gazette in May.
• Ming Cabrera, a Democrat from Billings, is a retired pharmaceutical rep who announced his candidacy for the eastern district in September. He told the Billings Gazette his pharmaceutical experience would help him advocate for lower prescription drug costs.
• Steve Held, a Democrat from Broadus and the father of one of the plaintiffs in Montana’s high-profile youth climate litigation, filed to run for the eastern district in late February.
• Helena’s John Driscoll, a writer, former lawmaker, and Public Service Commission member who has run for office in the past both as a Democrat and what he calls a “Lincoln Republican.” But he’s firmly in the Democratic camp now, he told MTFP in March, saying that one of his few campaign expenditures so far is a Lewis and Clark County Democratic Party ballcap. He says his top issue is climate change.

Statewide races

Elections that determine who fills state-level elected roles. Campaign finance reports for these races are filed with the Montana Commissioner of Political Practices.

Governor

Montana’s chief executive, the governor appoints the heads of most agencies, signs legislation into law and acts as state government’s most visible elected official. Governors are elected to four-year terms.

Incumbent Gov. Greg Gianforte is a Republican in a state that supported Donald Trump over Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election by almost 17 points. Republicans swept every state office in 2020, won a legislative supermajority in 2022, and will look to hold ground — including the governorship — in 2024.

candidates

• Greg Gianforte announced his intent to run for a second term in January. “There’s still work to do, as we build on what we’ve done,” he said in a statement. “Serving as your Governor has been the honor of my life, and today I humbly ask for your support to serve another term.” Before becoming governor, Gianforte served in Congress. In 1997, he and his wife, Susan, founded RightNow Technologies in Bozeman, selling the company to Oracle for $1.5 billion in 2011. He will again run with Lt. Gov. Kristen Juras as his running mate this year.
• Ryan Busse, a Democrat who lives in Kalispell, came to national prominence following the 2021 publication of his memoir, Gunfight, which chronicles his career in and eventual disillusionment with the firearms industry. He announced a challenge to Gianforte in September, faulting the governor for failing to steward the state’s quality of life. “Unfortunately the Montana that I love, and that my kids have been raised in, is being threatened right now. It pisses me off that Greg Gianforte just wants to sell this state to his rich buddies and turn it into a playground so only they can afford to live and play here,” he said in a campaign launch video. Busse’s sons, Badge and Lander, were among the plaintiffs in Montana’s landmark youth climate lawsuit. Busse, originally from Kansas, was an executive at firearm manufacturer Kimber America until 2020.His running mate is Helena constitutional attorney Raph Graybill.
• Tanner Smith, a first-term Republican member of the state House from Lakeside, announced a primary campaign against Gianforte in June. He said he blames the governor for allowing recreational marijuana to proliferate in Montana, which he feels is responsible for an increase in crime. “Our state is decaying around us,” he told MTFP at the time.His running mate is Republican Public Service Commission member Randy Pinocci.

• Jim Hunt, a Helena attorney and retired Montana National Guard lieutenant colonel, entered the race for governor as a Democrat March 8. Hunt, who lost his bid to be the Democratic candidate for U.S. House in 2008, said he launched his campaign in order to challenge the Gianforte administration’s handling of property taxes and reproductive rights. He said he doesn’t have any notable disagreements with Busse, the only other Democratic candidate. “I’m more interested in criticizing our current governor than Ryan Busse,” Hunt said.
• Kaiser Leib, a Helena technology entrepreneur and stand-up comedian, filed to run for Governor March 11 as a Libertarian. In an interview, Lieb told MTFP that he was frustrated the other major candidates for governor had moved to Montana from out of state. “When somebody comes here from someplace else, they bring their own views, they bring their own approach to living life,” he said. “That might not be what Montanans expect.”

Attorney General

Montana’s attorney general is the state’s top law enforcement officer and prosecutor. The head of the state Department of Justice, the AG represents Montana in court and leads the Montana Highway Patrol. The AG is elected to four-year terms.

Attorney General Austin Knudsen, a Republican elected to a first term in 2020, has struck an aggressive posture as the state’s chief attorney, challenging the Biden Administration in court, defending dozens of legal challenges to laws passed by Montana’s Republican supermajority, and publicly impugning the integrity of the Montana Supreme Court, which has repeatedly ruled against him in cases challenging GOP-supported laws.

In a departure from his predecessor, the comparatively middle-of-the-road Republican Tim Fox, Knudsen doesn’t appear to have qualms about being labeled a staunch partisan. “Montanans had the chance to vote for ‘status quo’ a couple different times in the AG’s race. They didn’t do it. Overwhelmingly, I got voted for. I’m an aggressive guy. I think people knew what they were voting for with me,” he told MTFP in 2021. Knudsen faces a Democratic challenger who is positioning himself as a defender of Montana’s legal institutional order.

candidates

• Austin Knudsen had already been Roosevelt County Attorney and speaker of the Montana House of Representatives when he handily won the attorney general’s race in 2020. He announced his re-election bid in November. “President Biden has been a disaster for Montana,” Knudsen said in the statement. “He has abdicated his duty to secure the border, allowing drugs to pour into our country, making the fight against crime in Montana more difficult. His administration and its allied anti-gun activists attack the right of law-abiding citizens to keep and bear arms.” His candidacy has been endorsed by the Montana Republican Party, meaning he’s unlikely to face a serious primary challenge.
• Ben Alke, a Democratic attorney who works at a private firm in Bozeman, launched his campaign for attorney general in October, explicitly criticizing Knudsen’s tenure. “The office of attorney general is a serious job. You’re the chief legal officer of the state of Montana. You’re the chief law enforcement officer,” Alke said at a campaign launch event. “The criteria that you think about when you’re making decisions has nothing to do with politics. It is not about your political party. It’s about seeking the truth.”
• Daniels County attorney Logan Olson registered to run for attorney general as a Republican ahead of the state’s filing deadline earlier this month.

Montana Supreme Court

There will be two open seats on Montana’s highest court this cycle as Chief Justice Mike McGrath and Justice Dirk Sandefur retire. The Montana Supreme Court takes all appeals from lower state courts and administers the state’s legal system. Justices are elected to eight-year terms.

While it’s the high-profile civil litigation before the Supreme Court that gets the most press — debates about abortion access, guns on campus, the very nature of Montana’s constitutional order — Supreme Court justices in Montana are required to take every appeal they get. That means that justices also oversee cases related to divorce, abuse and neglect, domestic violence, utility rates and estate law among other issues.

candidates

Chief Justice

• Jerry Lynch, a former federal magistrate court judge, first filed to replace Mike McGrath as chief justice of the Supreme Court back in June. Lynch lauded McGrath for a “brilliant career in public service” in an October op-ed with the Helena Independent Record, and said a “historic election” awaits in 2024. “If the past is prologue — and no doubt it will be — Montana voters should expect to be pummeled with negative advertising in support of extremist candidates who act like politicians, not judges,” Lynch wrote. “These candidates likely carry personal agendas or are motivated by the influence of dark-money lobbyists and corporations.”
• Cory Swanson, the current Broadwater County Attorney, announced his bid for the chief justiceship on conservative talk radio in late November. Swanson, a former deputy attorney general under Republican Tim Fox, has no judicial experience but told MTFP that his recent tenure in the trenches of trial court would be a valuable asset on the bench. “The court should do its very best to leave the policy advocacy issues to the political branches, it should do its very best to interpret the statutes and evaluate them relative to constitutional claims,” Swanson, who described himself as a judicial conservative, told MTFP. (He clarified that a judicial conservative is not necessarily the same as a political conservative — he just believes in judicial restraint, he said).
• Doug Marshall, an attorney from Helena, is running for McGrath’s seat on the Supreme Court.

Supreme Court Seat No. 3

• Katherine Bidegaray is a district court judge representing Montana’s 7th judicial district, which includes Dawson, McCone, Prairie, Richland and Wibaux Counties. She filed to run for Sandefur’s seat on the Montana Supreme Court in June. Bidegaray was first elected to the bench in 2002. “I feel lucky to live in a state that has adopted protections in its constitution for very important rights,” she told KTVH in July. “I think that I have demonstrated in my 21 years as a district court judge that I will look at issues fairly and impartially, that I have done my work for all Montanans.”
• Dan Wilson, a district court judge from Flathead County, also filed for Sandefur’s seat in June. “The Supreme Court may only declare a legislative enactment to be unconstitutional if it is shown to be beyond a reasonable doubt that the legislation is in conflict with the constitution itself. That, I can tell you, is a very tall order,” Wilson told a room of Republicans at the Glacier Country Pachyderm Club’s weekly meeting, per the Flathead Beacon. He also spoke at a dinner for Flathead County Democrats, the Beacon reported and emphasized his commitment to non-partisanship at both meetings.
• Former Republican state lawmaker Jerry O’Neil, a paralegal who is not admitted to the practice of law in Montana, filed to run for Sandefur’s seat shortly before the filing deadline earlier this month. He says he’s running to “break the monopoly of the bar association.”

Montana Superintendent of Public Instruction

The state’s top education official.

Elsie Arntzen, an outspoken conservative and two-term superintendent of public instruction, is not able to run for re-election due to term limits. Several state officials with experience in the public education world will compete for the open seat this cycle, including two of Arntzen’s former deputies, who will square off in a Republican primary next June. The winner of the general election will take charge of the Office of Public Instruction, an agency tasked with overseeing Montana’s entire K-12 public education system, picking up the threads of numerous initiatives, modernization projects and controversies that have punctuated Arntzen’s tenure in office.

CANDIDATES

• Former Deputy Superintendent Sharyl Allen, Arntzen’s longest-tenured right-hand through two terms, filed to run for her boss’s position in June. Allen, running as a Republican, has served as a superintendent in a string of districts in Arizona and Montana, including in the small Rocky Mountain Front communities of Augusta and Conrad. So far, she’s focused her campaign on issues including student safety and respect for family values in education.
• Susie Hedalen, another Republican, is also a former deputy superintendent to Arntzen and current vice chair of Montana’s Board of Public Education. Hedalen is the superintendent of the Townsend School District, and has attracted endorsem*nts from Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte and Attorney General Austin Knudsen.
• On the Democratic side, state Sen. Shannon O’Brien, D-Missoula, launched her campaign this fall on the premise that the race for superintendent will be a “big fight” for the rights of children, for government accountability and for “simple fairness.” O’Brien, who sat on the Legislature’s Senate-side education committee last session, has spearheaded a number of successful changes to education policy in the past and hasn’t shied away from criticizing Arntzen’s time at OPI.

Montana Secretary of State

Montana’s top election official, the secretary of state also oversees business registration and maintains many other state records.

Republican Christi Jacobsen first stepped into the role of Secretary of State in 2020, having previously served as deputy to her predecessor, Corey Stapleton. She is now seeking a second term.

CANDIDATES

• Incumbent Secretary of State Christi Jacobsen announced her intent earlier this month to run for a second term, boasting of her efforts to reduce the size of her office and reasserting her commitment to “uphold the conservative values that make Montana great.” Her candidacy has been endorsed by the Montana Republican Party, meaning she’s unlikely to face a serious primary challenge.
• Democrat Jesse Mullen declared his candidacy this fall, anticipating that Jacobsen would pursue reelection. Mullen is the founder of the Mullen Newspaper Company, which currently owns 21 newspapers across the Rocky Mountain West. He has criticized Jacobsen extensively, for example accusing her in a November Reddit discussion of displaying “total incompetence” in the rollout of Montana’s new statewide election software.
• John Lamb, a Libertarian who unsuccessfully ran for Montana’s western U.S. House district in 2022, is this time around vying for Montana secretary of state.

Montana STATE AUDITOR

The state auditor, who also serves as Montana’s Commissioner of Securities and Insurance, regulates the insurance industry and investigates fraud.

Incumbent Troy Downing is seeking election to the U.S. House of Representatives, meaning this position will be open in 2024.

CANDIDATES

• Jim Brown, the current president of the Public Service Commission, formally announced his run for state auditor in January. A Republican attorney, Brown mounted an unsuccessful bid for the Montana Supreme Court in 2022. “I have an interest in serving the public and I have a skill set that serves the public interest well,” he told MTFP. “And as a fourth-generation Montana, I want to give back to the citizens of Montana.”
• John Jay Willoughby, an independent insurance agent from Helena, is also in the Republican primary field.
• John Repke, a Whitefish Democrat who works in finance, launched his bid for auditor at the Democratic Party’s annual fundraising event in Helena earlier in March. Repke unsuccessfully ran for the Public Service Commission in 2022.

Steve Gunderson and Keith Brownfield, both Republicans, initially filed to run for state auditor but will not appear on the ballot because they failed to file campaign finance paperwork with the Montana commissioner of political practices before a March 19 deadline.

PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION

The five-member body charged with regulating monopoly utilities to balance their financial health with the interests of their customers, who are unable to secure power, water and garbage service from other providers.

Three seats are up this election cycle: The District 3 seat in southwestern Montana that will be vacated by James Brown, who’s leaving after one four-year term to run for state auditor; the western Montana District 4 seat currently held by Jennifer Fielder, who is seeking re-election; and the south-central Montana District 2 seat currently held by Tony O’Donnell, who is termed out.

CANDIDATES

District 2

• Kirk Bushman, a mechanical engineer from Billings who served on the PSC from 2013 to 2016, is seeking the District 2 seat that will be vacated by Tony O’Donnell, who is termed out. Bushman ran unsuccessfully for another term on the commission in 2020. He told MTFP that he’s running to put his technical expertise to work and ensure there’s a “fair playing field” between renewable power generators and the utilities buying power from them. He’s worried, he said, that customers will be required to foot the bill for solar and wind projects that aren’t always able to generate electricity when demand spikes.
• Brad Molnar, a Republican state senator from Laurel who formerly served on the PSC from 2005-2012. A businessman who currently sits on the Senate Energy and Taxation committees, Molnar has served four terms in the Montana House and is in the midst of his second term in the Senate.
• Susan Bilo, a Gallatin College professor who teaches courses related to energy-efficient and renewable energy technologies, filed for the District 2 seat as a Democrat. Bilo formerly worked for the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. She said NorthWestern Energy’s recent rate increase and her desire to ensure that renewable technologies are given a “fair shake” at the commission inspired her to run. “We get so caught up in old technologies and old myths and aren’t willing to consider that technologies are different, economics are different and policies are different,” she said in a March interview with MTFP. “We have to be open to that.”

District 3

• Jeff Welborn, a termed-out state senator from Dillon, announced in February that he is running for the District 3 seat that will be vacated by Brown. Welborn said he’s running for the seat to protect customers from “unfair rate increases,” promote investment in Montana energy and ensure rural communities’ interests are represented on the commission. Welborn told the Montana Standard that he’s a true believer in an “all-of-the-above” energy approach that encompasses renewables. Until carbon-free technologies, including hydrogen-based fuel sources, mature more, he said he believes fossil fuel sources will have to remain part of the state’s energy mix.
• Rob Elwood of Harlowton, is taking another run at a District 3 seat, having unsuccessfully run for the seat in 2020 as an independent. This year, Elwood, who works remotely for health care provider Altera as an interface analyst, is running as a Republican. He told MTFP that “he’s an average Montanan that lives and works here” and that he considers limited access to cell phone coverage and internet in parts of eastern Montana a “travesty,” he would like to fix. He added that he would like to see the commission exercise more scrutiny when regulated utilities propose rate increases. Elwood is a former member of the Army National Guard and formerly served on the Harlowton City Council.
• Suzzann Nordwick, a Republican from Butte who holds a master’s degree in metallurgical engineering, filed for the District 3 seat in late January. According to her campaign website, she wants to prioritize “Montana’s energy independence’ and “traditional jobs.” Nordwick currently serves on the Butte Natural Resources Damage Restoration Council and formerly served as the president of the Butte Citizens Technical Environmental Committee. Nordwick ran unsuccessfully for the Montana Legislature in 2022, 2020, 2016 and 2014 and is the president of the Montana Federation of Republican Women.
• Leonard “Lenny” Williams, a Democrat from Butte who serves as the president of the Southwest Montana Central Labor Council, filed for the seat on March 11.

District 4

• Jennifer Fielder, a Republican former state lawmaker from Thompson Falls, filed for a second term on the PSC in mid-January. Fielder, the commission’s vice president, wrote on her campaign website that she has been “instrumental in transforming the once beleaguered agency into a model of good governance.” Fielder highlighted her work on the commission’s strategic plan, internal policies and software modernization as creating “higher standards of service, performance and conduct throughout the agency.” Fielder describes herself as a “refreshingly independent” commissioner who does not accept campaign contributions from individuals, businesses or special interest groups she regulates.