14 March 2022 — 0503 mdt

Close of filing for Montana elective office; two kinds of incumbents; soapbox candidacies; candidate roster churn

By James Conner

Last day to file for elective office. The window for filing for elective office in Montana closes at 1700 MDT today. No statewide partisan offices are on the ballot, but two seats in the U.S. House of Representatives are (and already there’s a glut of candidates for each seat). So are two seats on the five-member Public Service Commission. Link to the filing rosters.

All 100 seats in Montana’s house of representatives, and 25 of 50 seats in Montana’s state senate are on the ballot. On the local level, there are partisan, and sometimes nonpartisan, contests for county commissioner, county sheriff, and various county offices.

Libertarians. None has yet filed for either of Montana’s two U.S. House seats. I’d lay better than even odds that Libertarians will file in both districts. Libertarians have filed in five house districts. I think a few more will join them. Whether a Libertarian will file for the PSC is an interesting question.

Democratic candidates are far more prone than Republicans to file on the last day. That's because it takes until the last day for the party to persuade candidates to run in districts typically dominated by Republicans.

Judicial elections nominally are nonpartisan (the political parties know the politics of the candidate and, carefully, will tell you). At least two Montana Supreme Court seats are on the ballot as are double-digit numbers of district courts.

The rosters of candidates will churn today with numerous last minute filers and more than a few withdrawals by candidates for various reasons. One filed, candidates have several days to file campaign documents with the commissioner of political practices. Those failing to file with COPP will get kicked off the ballot by Montana’s secretary of state. The final candidates list for the primary won’t be available for another week.

Two kinds of incumbents. Usually “incumbent” refers to a candidate who is running for re-election (I do not consider appointed office holders running for election to be true incumbents). If the current holder of an elective office is not running for re-election, the seat is said to be open. But every district has a second kind of incumbent: the political party to which the incumbent belongs. Thus, an open seat always has an incumbent political party. In most cases, there’s a high probability that a district’s incumbent political party will win the election.

Seats become open in five ways:

The incumbent is termed out.
Death of the incumbent.
Retirement of the incumbent.
Resignation of the incumbent.
The incumbent chooses to run for another office.

There are five open house and two open senate seats in the Flathead:

HD-7. Four term Republican Frank Garner is termed out.
HD-8. Republican John Fuller is running for SD-4.
HD-9. Republican Brian Putnum is not running for re-election.
HD-10. Republican Mark Noland is termed out and running for SD-5
HD-11. Republican Derek Skees is termed out and running for PSC District 5. His wife, Ronalee, is running to replace him.
SD-4. Republican Mark Blasdel is termed out.
SD-5. Republican incumbent Bob Keenan is termed out, and running for HD-10.

Soapbox candidates. Not all who file for office expect or even want to win the election. Instead, they want to use the platform the primary campaigns provide to amplify a message about a concern or policy they want the public to consider and take seriously. It's an honorable and sometimes colorful and entertaining tradition.

In 1965, for example, conservative National Review writer William F. Buckley, Jr., ran a soapbox campaign for major of New York City. When a reporter asked what he would do if he won, Buckley quipped “Demand a recount.”