13 June 2022 — 0931 mdt

Jack Fallon prevailed where people knew him

Provisional ballots may affect the GOP primary elections
for PSC District 5 and Flathead county commissioner

By James Conner

Montana counts its provisional primary ballots today. Ann Bukacek leads Derek Skees by 74 votes for the Republican nomination for PSC District 5 (Flathead, Lake, Lewis and Clark, and Teton Counties). Jack Fallon leads two-term incumbent Pam Holmquist by four votes for the Republican nomination for Flathead county commissioner.

There are approximately 300 provisional ballots in the Flathead, and possibly proportional numbers in the other PSC-5 counties.

Over the week, I crunched some crude probabilities, concluding that there’s roughly an even chance that the provisional ballots will flip the county commissioner election, but only an outside chance that they will flip the PSC election.

Public Service Commission District 5

Skees may cut into Bukacek’s margin by a dozen or two votes, but that won’t be enough to overtake her.

Flathead County Commissioner

Eighty percent of the Flathead's primary ballots were cast in the Republican primary. That probably indicates a substantial number of Democrats cast Republican ballots, hoping to nominate so-called moderate Republicans. There was no Democratic candidate for county commissioner, but 367 write-in votes for county commissioner were cast in the Democratic primary.

Another indicator of Democratic crossover: Fallon's ratio of absentee to election day votes is higher than the other three GOP county commissioner candidates.

Fallon, a long time School District 5 trustee and community activist in Evergreen, the unincorporated precincts adjacent to the east side of Kalispell, prevailed in Whitefish and in the Montana House of Representative districts in the School District 5 area.

After the maps, the precinct and legislative district breakdown of the GOP commissioner vote.

Flathead County school districts

Flathead County legislative districts

Download the spreadsheet for this table.

Holmquist’s election day advantage seems to augur well for her share of the provisional ballots, but that might be offset by Fallon’s advantage in the School District 5 and Evergreen areas. I think the outcome after the provisional votes are counted will remain very close, and that there will be a recount.