BOZEMAN, Mont. — After 18 years of trying to unseat Democratic U.S. Sen. Jon Tester, Montana, Big Sky Country Republicans see potential victory and control of the Senate majority within their grasp in an increasingly acrimonious contest that is fracturing election spending records.

Montana voters, meanwhile, are exhausted — inundated with negative ads on their televisions, radios, phones and in their mailboxes.

Tester won by a narrow margin of 3,500 votes in 2006 and held on to three terms despite a dramatic political realignment in the Northern Plains of the United States. He faces what analysts consider his most serious challenge yet: Republican Tim Sheehy, a former U.S. Navy SEAL and wealthy aerospace executive aligned with former President Donald Trump.

At a weekend tester rally in Bozeman, Mont. — where Sheehy hosted an event with Trump in August that drew thousands — the crowd for the outgoing lawmaker numbered in the dozens.

Josh Olsen, an outdoor guide and test voter, worries that as Montana’s population grows, its electorate is becoming too partisan to support the small-town cereal farmer Big Sandy, who is relying on his cross-partisan appeal to give him another mandate.

“It worries me a hundred percent,” Olsen said. “There are more supporters coming here…If they come here and they are Republican, they vote for Sheehy.”

Tester, 68, took office as one of half a dozen Democratic senators in a five-state region stretching from Nebraska to Canada. He is the last one still in office, and Republicans have spent years trying to reduce his support, particularly in rural areas.

Montana is one of the least densely populated states in the United States, and only about a quarter of its residents live in cities of 50,000 or more.

“Outside of Montana’s cities, Republicans have made gains in most cities and rural counties,” said political analyst Jeremy Johnson of Carroll College. “It’s a challenge for Democrats.”

“Obscene” amounts of money

The Republicans have a deficit of two seats in the Senate.

Democrats, desperate to maintain their majority, are on track to outspend Republicans by nearly $50 million in the Montana race. Total spending is expected to exceed $315 million, or about $487 for each of the state’s 648,000 active registered voters — a record for a congressional race per voter, according to party officials.

Money fuels dueling ad campaigns with similar goals: to take down the adversary.

A Sheehy campaign ad talks about endemic corruption in Washington and calls Tester “one of the worst offenders.” A tester ad calls Sheehy a “fake cowboy” and attacks him for lying about having a gunshot wound to his arm.

Former Montana Gov. Marc Racicot called the influx of money into the sparsely populated state “absolutely obscene.” This comes more than a decade after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down restrictions on political spending on corporations and unions.

“You can’t even stand to turn on the television,” Racicot said in an interview. “You’re constantly faced with this anger, these grievances, these slogans – everything that’s going on in these campaigns – because there’s so much money at stake. It’s an abomination.

If Sheehy wins, a Republican-majority Senate could cripple the Democrats’ agenda if Vice President Kamala Harris wins the White House. Likewise, a Tester victory could help Democrats counter the actions of the Trump administration.

Much of the money comes from obscure political committees bringing together wealthy donors.

The nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center filed suit over alleged financial transparency violations by a pro-Tester group, Last Best Place PAC, which amplified some of the most inflammatory allegations against Sheehy. Another complaint from the advocacy group charges that a straw donor was used to hide more than $2.5 million in contributions to political committees, including one supporting Sheehy.

These allegations are unlikely to be resolved before the election.

Trump on the ballot

Trump won Montana overwhelmingly in 2016 and 2020. The 2024 election is the first where Tester and Trump are both on the ballot.

Sheehy’s campaign themes largely mirror those of Trump and the national party. He speaks out against immigration, inflation and social issues such as transgender children in sports.

Democrats have linked Tester’s campaign to abortion and women’s health care, hoping that the backlash that surfaced even in elections in red states after the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade will continue.

Tester distanced himself from Harris and other Democratic leaders. This political isolation reflects the Republican Party’s gains over the past two decades among rural voters who once supported Democrats.

Tester’s campaign outperformed Sheehy’s by more than three to one, propelled by a massive influx of small donations from out of state after Democrats sounded the alarm on the race.

“Jon Tester has more money but dollars don’t vote,” Sheehy’s campaign said in a statement. “Montanians just want common sense: a secure border, safe streets, cheap gas, cops are good and criminals are bad, boys are boys and girls are girls.

Lies and lobbyists

Sheehy, who arrived in Montana a decade ago and compares himself to early European settlers, sought to turn Tester’s tenure in the Senate into a liability.

Republicans say campaign donations to the Democrat came from industries that needed his vote. Tester previously faced scrutiny over donations from bank executives hit by a 2018 regulatory rollback and from Lockheed Martin employees who benefited from a 2021 defense bill. There is no indication of wrongdoing or that contributions influenced Tester.

He is the top recipient of lobbyist money among members of Congress, with $500,000 in donations this election cycle, and has raised a total of $88 million.

Tester said in an interview after the Bozeman rally that he didn’t know who donated to him or whether any lobbyists were present that night.

“I have policies to write, people to rally,” he said. “If it makes sense for Montana, I will support it.”

Sheehy also receives money from national groups. He received $109,000 from lobbyists and previously lobbied government officials himself, seeking business for the aerial firefighting company he founded with his brother.

Sheehy has no prior political experience and has avoided in-depth interviews. He faced backlash following disparaging remarks he made to supporters about Native Americans and questions about the gunshot wound to his arm, which he said came from a gunfight in Afghanistan.

Sheehy told a Glacier National Park ranger in 2015 that the wound was self-inflicted. Ranger Kim Peach, now retired, publicly accused Sheehy last week of lying when he claimed it was during a fight.

Peach later appeared in an ad by a pro-Tester PAC that he acknowledged was recorded weeks ago, although he told AP last week that he had no connection to democratic groups.

Republicans said Peach was not credible.

“He’s moving his story from left to right because he’s a liar and a Democratic partisan,” said Mike Berg of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

Tester said Sheehy should release his medical records to clarify the dispute, adding: “The stolen value is a huge problem. »