Sheehy has eschewed interviews with native and nationwide reporters, and there’s little proof of a major grassroots marketing campaign. The Montana GOP’s web site lists solely three occasions for all the month of October, none of them together with Sheehy. The occasions Sheehy does maintain are by invitation solely and never open to the media. His marketing campaign didn’t acknowledge repeated requests to interview him or to cowl an occasion with him speaking to voters.
An invitation obtained by NBC News confirmed Sheehy was elevating cash in Texas this week.
Still, Daines argued that Sheehy is connecting with voters and that his walled-off technique is working.
“He’s been in all of the counties in Montana, and he will get out the grassroots. Handshake-to-handshake is working so nicely proper now for Tim Sheehy,” Daines mentioned. “When he does occasions, I’m seeing turnout not like something I ever noticed once I ran and in contrast to every other candidate I’ve seen.”
‘If they lose him, then they’re simply going to fade’
Montana is one in every of simply 5 states with senators from completely different events, and that quantity is all however sure to go down this election. The query is by how a lot. And the prospect of Tester’s shedding in November has raised questions on Democrats’ skill to get elected in Montana in right this moment’s more and more polarized political panorama, notably with a shifting voters.
“Montana’s undoubtedly moved additional to the best when it comes to the best way it votes,” Daines mentioned.
“When I first ran for the U.S. House again in 2012, there was one statewide elected Republican and 7 statewide elected Democrats,” he mentioned. “Today, eight of the 9 main officeholders in Montana are Republicans.”
Longtime Montana political operative and strategist Pepper Peterson known as the Senate race “one for the political science books,” likening the shift he’s seeing in Montana to what he noticed working with Democrats in Tennessee within the early 2000s. If Republicans win, Peterson mentioned, “the Democrats are most likely lifeless for 16 years in Montana or so, possibly longer.”