While Republicans note that the two candidates are on similar terms when Montana voters were asked their favorability of both candidates in the Siena College survey (about half have positive views), the Montana State University polling, which was conducted by mail, found 52 percent of voters approve of Daines’ job performance, virtually unchanged from polling conducted with the Montana Television Network around the same time in 2018, while 41 percent disapprove, up 10 points from two years ago. Three in 5 Montanans approve of the governor’s job performance, up 6 points from 2018, while the share who disapprove, 37 percent, has risen just 2 points during that time.
Notably, Bullock’s standing has improved among independents and Democrats since 2018 -- but it’s weakened among Republican voters, a sign that GOP efforts to chip away at the sizable coalition of Big Sky voters who backed both Trump and their Democratic governor four years ago has borne fruit, likely a necessity for a Daines victory.
On average, 5 percent of the electorate is still undecided, including 7 percent of voters unaffiliated with a political party.
"There is a big swath of independents we need to be talking to and persuading until the last minute," said Olivia Bercow, the Bullock campaign's communications director. “It's now about getting out your people and who did a better job convincing people in the center that they'll be the better senator, and we argue that is Steve Bullock.”
David Parker, Montana State University’s political science department director who conducted the survey, said the state’s voters who eschew both major parties make up a large and meaningful share of Montana’s electorate, and that while they’re not happy with the direction the country is headed in, they feel better about how things are going under Bullock’s leadership. Parker, who authored a book on Democratic Sen. Jon Tester’s 2012 re-election campaign, said the 2020 contest is going to come down to which voters end up casting ballots -- alluding to the election cliché that “it all comes down to turnout.”
“In 2012 and 2018, largely speaking, Tester won because older voters backed him and younger overwhelmingly voted for him,” he noted. “There's evidence out there that older voters aren't necessarily excited about Sen. Daines, and younger voters support Bullock. All those factors suggest that if all the stars come into alignment, Democrats could win.”
ncG1vNJzZmiooqR7rrvRp6Cnn5Oku7TBy61lnKedZK6zwMico56rX6K8r8DAp5hmq5WjrrWxjKmmpaSZo7Ruv9OerZ5llJa2r7HSZqqtnaaaeqPBy6WmnKM%3D