Pols losing touch to the land

By John Clayton

Tim Sheehy, the Republican seeking to unseat Montana Democratic Senator Jon Tester, is a business executive born and raised out of state. That same description applies to Troy Downing, a Republican running for one of Montana’s two Congressional seats. Same for Montana’s Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte and his challenger, Democrat Ryan Busse.

I have nothing against out-of-staters moving to Montana or working at a business. I fit both categories myself years ago. But I think this change in politicians’ backgrounds reflects a change in how Montanans view their identity. 

Previous Montana politicians who weren’t government lawyers often came from farming and ranching or related businesses. Today’s business backgrounds are less intimate with Montana’s land. Gianforte started a software company. Sheehy founded imaging technology and aerial firefighting businesses. Downing, a real estate developer, has owned everything from self-storage units to vineyards.

Seeking business-friendly policies, Republicans have long favored candidates with business backgrounds. But today’s desire for political outsiders includes Democrats like Busse, a former firearms executive without experience in elected office. And recent high-profile Democratic candidates have included educators, managers, and a musician—in other words, people who have not worked daily with nature and its resources.

Montanans used to mistrust government officials who lacked intimacy with the land. But today, both parties elevate politicians who lack that intimacy, probably because Montanans care more about ideological issues such as immigration, abortion, inflation or gender identity. 

Political power used to flow from grazing stock and vast acreages. Now it flows from Wall Street stock and scenic mansions. For example, Sheehy and Downing own homes in the chichi resort of Big Sky; Gianforte comes from the expensive Bozeman area; Busse comes from the scenic and pricey Flathead region. 

Sure, those places are Montana. But Montana’s politicians once came from less-glamorous places, including bare-knuckle Butte, the faded mining metropolis; remote Libby, with its logging and mining economy; and dusty Billings, an oil and cow town. In the 2000 and 2004 gubernatorial elections, Democrat Brian Schweitzer owned a Flathead mint farm but bragged that he was raised on an eastern Montana cattle ranch.

In other words, politicians once claimed Montanan identity through shared experience. That often included in-state birth and always included land-based pastimes like hunting. Today it’s less “Are you a hunter?” than “Are you endorsed by the National Rifle Association?” 

The shift makes it hard to interpret politicians’ actions. For example, in 2021, Governor Gianforte a killed a mountain lion and trapped and killed a wolf. Because he’s not a rancher-politician, we can’t understand, much less endorse, such acts in the context of a lifelong working relationship with land and livestock. 

Similarly, Gianforte, Busse, and Downing have all been cited for various gradations of hunting violations. Should we judge them differently than we would a native-born hunter? And Sheehy’s company is deeply in debt. For a ranch, that wouldn’t be surprising. But for an aerospace company?

To the rest of the country, choosing leaders based on ideologies may sound familiar. But Montana, aka “Big Sky Country,” used to pride itself on being different. More place-based, more rural, more centered on the individual. 

Outsiders may have dismissed such philosophies as insular and backward—but that dismissal was what made them outsiders.

How should we react to this change? We might celebrate that Montana is leaving behind its tired frontier myths. Or we might mourn the shift, because Montana’s extraordinary landscapes—and people’s deep relationships to them—were what once made the state special. As Montana changes from bovines to business and from rural to resort, its politics can feel like yet another big-box store featuring all the latest national trends. 

Then there’s Senator Jon Tester, the lone elected Democrat who’s running for re-election. The third-generation farmer from the wide-open plains of Big Sandy represents the land-based tradition that Montanans once cherished. But do Montana voters still want a senator like that?

Regardless of outcomes this November, the act of choosing by ideology rather than deep roots in the land marks a huge change.

John Clayton is a contributor to Writers on the Range, writersontherange.org, an independent nonprofit dedicated to spurring lively conversation about the West. The author of books including Stories from Montana’s Enduring Frontier, his newsletter is naturalstories.substack.com.