KRTV.com | Great Falls, Montana
GREAT FALLS, MT – Republican candidate Greg Gianforte, Democratic candidate Rob Quist, and Libertarian candidate Mark Wicks square off in the only televised debate for Montana’s seat in the U.S. House of Representatives.
The candidates are vying for the seat formerly held by Ryan Zinke, who now serves as the U.S. Secretary of the Interior.
H/T Steve Linnabary via last month’s open thread.
Reason covers the special election results in Montana:
http://reason.com/blog/2017/05/26/republican-gianforte-wins-montana-house
@Andy Craig
A Libertarian candidate makes the choice to focus on issues other than foreign policy. OK.
A Libertarian candidate that completely omits any mention of foreign policy on their campaign website. I just can’t grok that.
Wicks does have a campaign Facebook note titled “Syria and our bombing.” – I wish I could find it to be more clarifying.
https://www.facebook.com/notes/mark-wicks-4-freedom/syria-and-our-bombing/620514924808974/
An Emerson College poll released April 25th on this race:
http://mtpr.org/post/poll-shows-gianforte-double-digit-lead-us-house-race
Summary: Gianforte (R) 52%, Quist (D) 37%, Wicks (L) 5%, undecided 7%
Andy, which counties in Wyoming did you visit? FSW seems to be limited to certain counties. Wyoming has around 23 or something counties in all, but focus is one 3-6 top picked counties.
http://www.freestatewyoming.org/support/detailed-analysis.html
1 Crook
2 Johnson
3 Sublette/Weston
4 Converse
5 Hot Springs
Those are the top picks, but other counties (Niobrara, Platte, Washakie, Big Horn, Goshen, Teton, Lincoln, etc) are mentioned and analyzed too. Number of FSWers with 25% support, Republican%, Registered Voter%, Private Land%, Private Acres/Person, Median Age, Family Size, Unemployment, Government Employment, High School Graduates, and College Graduates are among stats for each county and the state at large. Pros, Cons, and Summaries are also part of the country by county summaries.
Note: I mentioned six top pick counties and another seven counties as well for a total of thirteen counties. It mean, there are ten counties that haven’t been mentioned yet. I can’t be sure the current population stats, but I think the thirteen smallest counties were mentioned while the ten biggest weren’t. FSW seems to be organized on a county by county basis with the top 5 picks (especially the top 3 picks among them) being the counties most focused on. Also, based on my reading, FSWers tend to stay away from the urban, highly populated, Blue (Democrat) counties.
@Andy It would be more helpful for me to know which counties you visited in Wyoming.
Stephen Kent Gray said: “Then, Free State Wyoming focused on Wyoming. ”
I spent about 4 months in Wyoming, and from what I could tell, the Free State Wyoming Project is not doing much of anything. The Free State Project in New Hampshire is a lot bigger, and is more active, and better organized.
This make me wish the Free West Alliance still was active. The Free State Project choose New Hampshire from Alaska, Delaware, Idaho, Maine, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont, and Wyoming. The Free West Alliance formed after as a three state alternative focusing on Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming. Then, Free State Wyoming focused on Wyoming. All ten states would be better for Libertarians to win in, but the absence of active Free Alliances/Project in most of the states (except New Hampshire and Wyoming) means they lack the extra help the two states that do have.
Foreign policy is an important issue, and since US House is a federal office, it is relevant, so a candidate for US House ought to address it.
It’s not terribly unusual for House candidates to not put much, if any, focus into campaigning on foreign policy. Even those who do list it on their issues section, usually just have some throwaway lines calculated to not really offend anybody.
The House has some say on foreign policy, of course, but a lot less than the Senate, and individual freshmen Representatives in particular have very little pull on FP matters. It’s rare for them to even get on FP-related committees.
I focused a bit more on foreign policy in my campaign because it’s a topic I’m interested in and passionate about, but I wouldn’t necessarily ding a candidate for not having it as one of their top 3 or 4 or 5 talking-point agenda items for a House campaign. Particularly in a deep-red district/state like Montana, focusing on more domestic concerns and smaller-government stuff is probably a reasonable call.
Wicks did a good job in this debate.
Any candidate, even a Libertarian candidate, that cannot manage to find the time and energy to lay out his foreign policy position on his issues page earns a yawn from me.
https://wicksforfreedom.com/issues/
@ NewFederalist
I can’t find any scientific polls. Best I can find is a “consumer survey” from Google here:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2017/3/20/1645552/-New-Poll-Finds-Democrat-Rob-Quist-Ahead-In-Montana-Congressional-Race
But as noted, it’s unscientific and it’s from a month ago, and it’s my understanding there’s been a number of developments since then. For example, depending on how many people watched the debate, this could have been a big boost for Wicks.
Any reliable polls on the race? Not who won the debate but how the nominees stack up for the special election?
Most polling shows that the Libertarian, Mark Wicks won that debate. I watched a replay of it, and I think you could make that argument. Wicks wasn’t quite as polished as Gianforte, but Gianforte came across as too reheared and too slick. While there is a legitimate debate as to whether the winner was Wicks or Gianforte, no one watching that debate, except perhaps the most delusional of Democrats could come away with any conclusion other than Quist finished third. He was downright painful to watch.
Although this poll isn’t scientific, it appears that we are headed for a legimately equal three way race in this election:
https://meanwhileinmontana.com/poll-will-vote-replace-ryan-zinke-2/T
The clown in the hat is the Berniecrat Democrat.
Republican – Bald Guy
Democrat – Hat Guy
Libertarian – Hairy Head Guy
The easy way to remember who is who in the debate.
The poll to vote for who won the debate. Facebook is where someone shared it on my timeline. Then I shared it on my wall. Then I was able to find it again there.
https://meanwhileinmontana.com/poll-won-april-29th-montana-congressional-debate/
I hope the libertarian is not the clown with the hat, for once.