In what could turn out to be a , Democrat Monica Tranel announced her candidacy for the seat Monday. “Let’s see if the minivan has another 60,000 miles in it,” the Missoula resident said during a recent interview, referencing her main mode of transportation during the 2022 race. That year Tranel faced
Republican U.S. Rep. Ryan Zinke, the former Secretary of the Interior and previous congressman for the state. He a 7,837-vote margin that the Democrat sees as an opening to a chance at victory next year. “We came closer than any other race in a Trump plus-4-or-more district,” Tranel said. “We were taking on a very well-known (essentially) incumbent, a former Secretary of the Interior, twice elected to Congress. Ryan Zinke was a formidable opponent, and I had no outside support.” Zinke is expected to run for re-election after quashing any idea of making a bid for Montana’s
Senate seat in 2024 following his of fellow former Navy SEAL . While Tranel faced a three-way
Democratic primary last year, she emerged nearly 40 points ahead of the next-closest candidate. There’s no doubt next year’s
election will be dramatically different from the 2022 midterm. Montana will have one of the country’s hardest-fought and most expensive U.S. Senate races, as . His 2018 victory against Republican now-U.S. Rep. Matt Rosendale was at the time the state’s most expensive Senate race, with . Next fall's Senate contest is expected to blow that tally out of the water, and on top of that flood of money will be a long ballot with both of the state’s seats in the House plus every other statewide elected office, not to mention a presidential race, up for grabs. That will bring excitement, and cash, to Montana unlike what Tranel experienced last year, but could also make finding advertising space to purchase a challenge. “Certainly there will be a significant investment here, but that’s going to come from both sides,” Tranel said of the expected effects of the Senate race. “I’m going to do what I’ve always done. I’m the middle kid in a big family, I’m used to making my voice heard in a noisy space.” Like Tester, Tranel in the last race staked her place as a middle-of-the-road Democrat, often using the word “pragmatic” to describe her approach to issues and frequently referencing the state’s history of splitting tickets by electing both
Democrats and Republicans. Tranel said she’s running again for the same reasons as before — “to take on corporate greed and to work for Montana families and Main Street businesses” — and to pick up where she left off two years ago. “I came really close to climbing that mountain without any outside support,” Tranel said, adding that she would want to work on “pocketbook issues” that parallel her career as a lawyer where recently she litigated against a rate increase proposed by NorthWestern Energy. “The work for me is to tell my story, what I’ve done for Montana,” Tranel said. “I’ve kept $10 million in Montanans' pockets. I’ve spent my career working for Montanans here in Montana.” Tranel said she also wants to focus on using Montana’s natural resources to benefit people, like permitting reform to ease the path of the . She also wants to see action out of conversations with the Crow Tribe to tap wind energy there. “The issues that I really do want to focus on highlight how we can use Montana's resources really to benefit Montana,” Tranel said. Tranel pointed to population growth in western Montana increasing demand on natural resources like Flathead Lake, which is seeing concerningly low water levels. While Zinke has joined others in calling for a , Tranel called that a “not a real solution” and a “Band Aid that ignores the problem of the extreme drought. We are seeing the reality and the impact of the use of fossil fuel over the last 100 years.” Looking at places in the state like Lincoln County, Tranel said part of the solution will be logging projects to pull out some forest growth, adding that after years of extreme drought not doing so is “borrowing trouble.” “And we need to talk about solutions, and figure out how we're going to solve these problems and not just bury your head in the sand,” Tranel continued. Tranel said she'll aim to highlight her same concerns about Zinke as she did in the 2022 race, such as his past consulting work for
Oil companies. The 2022 election gave Tranel data points on where to focus this go-around, like underperforming areas like the Blackfeet Nation, Butte and Anaconda. In the last presidential election year, Montana
Republicans saw wins by big margins up and down the ballot. But Tranel said she plans to focus on reminding voters about legislative victories Democrats have notched at the national level that have brought federal money to Montana, like the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which passed
Congress with bipartisan support. “For me, it was about dusting off the purple DNA of our state,” Tranel said. She said like last race, she'll aim to reach out to not just Democrats but also Republicans and any voters who aren't sure what party fits them best. “It feels like the work isn’t finished for me,” Tranel said. "Where we left off ... it wasn't an end point. It was really an investment and it was a race that we started and we didn't finish the work. ... I'm not one to leave things unfinished. And it turns out I'm actually pretty competitive."