How a move to the right could hurt Montanans

Republicans swept Montana’s federal and state races in the Nov. 5 elections, setting up a public policy shift to the right. Those results could mean harm to the state’s public lands, the elimination of reproductive rights, and higher property taxes for working families.

Incumbent Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte defeated Democratic challenger Ryan Busse 59%-38% in a race that focused on property taxes. With out-of-state investors buying up Montana lands, many Montanans have seen their property tax bills increase by up to 74%. Busse ran on a proposal to restore tax rates to previous overall revenue levels, while a Gianforte-appointed commission instead proposed creating a smaller homestead exemption for primary residences valued at up to about $1 million, higher rates for short-term rental properties and second homes, and new impediments to local tax increases. 

“Your taxes really could jump up significantly, and you might have to pay more, and maybe you get a rebate. Maybe you don’t. Nobody really knows those details,” Mike Jopek, a Flathead farmer who served on the Montana House Committee on Taxation during his three terms as a Democratic state representative, told the Montana Independent in October.

Former President Donald Trump won the presidential election, carrying Montana; Republican challenger Tim Sheehy unseated incumbent Democratic U.S. Sen. Jon Tester and will join a new GOP Senate majority in January; and Republicans held on to both Montana seats and their narrow majority in the House of Representatives.

Full Republican control of the federal government will likely bring significant policy shifts that will directly impact Montana.

Montanans voted 58%-42% for a state constitutional amendment explicitly guaranteeing abortion rights. This could be nullified by a federal ban or an effort by the Trump administration to halt access to medication abortion under a 1873 law barring the interstate mailing or receiving of “any article or thing designed or intended for the prevention of conception or procuring an abortion.” Republican Montana Sen. Steve Daines, Vice President-elect J.D. Vance, and dozens of other congressional Republicans signed a January 2023 letter urging the U.S. Justice Department to enforce that law to halt the delivery of medication abortion.

Trump has promised new tariffs on imported goods, effectively a tax on consumers, which economists predict will significantly boost prices. A May 2024 policy brief published by the Peterson Institute for International Economics, a nonpartisan think tank, predicted that such a policy would cost a typical middle-income family about $1,700 a year; the progressive Center for American Progress estimates such a family would lose between $2,500 or $3,900 annually under Trump’s plan.

Trump and Sheehy have also criticized the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare. Trump said in a Sept. 10 presidential debate that he has “concepts of a plan” to repeal and replace it. Under the 2010 law, 117,000 Montanans receive health insurance coverage under a provision that expanded the Medicaid program and another 66,000 have purchased private plans through the law’s insurance exchange. 

Trump and Republicans in Congress have also backed a rollback of President Joe Biden’s infrastructure investments. They have provided funding that has been designated for public land restoration in Blackfoot–Clark Fork Valley, the Missouri Headwaters–Big Hole Valley, and on land north of the Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge.

Prior to the election, Sheehy was criticized by advocates for the protection of public lands for hiding his ties to the Property and Environment Research Center, a conservative tax-exempt group that advocates for the privatization of public lands. Both Sen. Daines and newly reelected Republican state Attorney General Austin Knudsen opposed the Biden administration’s attempts to conserve public lands through the Bureau of Land Management. Trump has vowed to repeal regulations that block fossil fuel drilling.

“No longer having balanced representation at the state and federal level is a real loss for Montana communities and our state,” Democratic Montana state Rep. Jonathan Karlen told the Montana Independent. “It puts the rights of women at risk, will lead to an erosion of our access to public lands, and means more giveaways to the wealthy while raising taxes on the middle class. I’m deeply concerned for what’s to come.”