Alme holds an 8-point lead over Bodnar in Senate race

Kurt Alme has an 8-point lead over Seth Bodnar in Montana’s four-candidate U.S. Senate race with Alani Bankhead and Kyle Austin trailing the leader by wide margins, according to a Montana Free Press-Rutgers Eagleton poll.

Alme’s 38% share of 845 registered Montana voters polled between Aug. 27 and Sept. 7 suggested a drop from MTFP-commissioned polling done in early May. 

Bodnar, an independent, appeared to be gaining support, with a 30% share, suggesting a seven-point gain from the spring.

The question put to voters in the latest snapshot was which U.S. Senate candidate they would choose if the election were held today. Polling was done by the Rutgers University Eagleton Center for Politics. The margin of error was 4.2%.

Democrat Bankhead’s polling share was 16%, down from 19% in earlier polling. Libertarian Austin’s polling share was 5%, down from 7% earlier. 

Another 6% of registered voters selected “someone else” as their candidate, while another 5% said they wouldn’t vote. There is a write-in candidate, Jami Woodman, the former campaign manager for Reilly Neill, the second-place finisher in the Democratic primary. Woodman wasn’t included in the poll. Asked which candidate they would vote for if they had to pick, roughly a third of the non-committed voters still chose someone else or no one.

Most Democrats, 53%, indicated they would vote for Bodnar, more evidence of the mid-summer tug-of-war, in which several high-profile Democrats pressured Bankhead to drop out early enough not to appear on the general election ballot. Both former U.S. Sens. Max Baucus and Jon Tester, as well as former Montana Democratic Party chair Nancy Keenan, insist the Democratic nominee has no chance of winning.

Bankhead, who won a crowded, five-way Democratic primary with 48,772 votes, was the second choice for Democratic voters at 41%. Shortly after the June 2 primary, the Democratic nominee held a press conference urging Bodnar to drop out.

Independent voters, Montana’s largest voting bloc at 44%, also broke for Bodnar 38% to 18% for Bankhead. Because the number of Montanans identifying as Democrats hovers around 20%, the party’s statewide candidates rely more on independent support than Republican candidates do. Bankhead also trailed Alme’s 25% polling share with independents.

Voters who chose Republican U.S. Sen. Tim Sheehy in 2024 weren’t a lock for Alme, who picked up 78% of Sheehy’s voters, while 7% preferred Bodnar and 5% Austin. Among Bodnar supporters, 37% said they didn’t vote in the 2024 Senate race between Sheehy and the then-Democratic incumbent Tester. Only a third of Bankhead’s supporters indicated they voted for Tester in 2024.

A majority of voters, 68%, who chose Donald Trump for president in 2024, said they intend to vote for Alme, while 10% said they would vote for Bodnar.

Older voters seemed to be Alme’s strong suit, with 51% of voters aged 65 and older indicating they would vote for the Republican, while voters aged 18 to 44 gave Alme 27%. 

Older voters are Montana’s most reliable, with 85% indicating they were almost certain to vote and 7% very likely to do so. 

Bodnar polled evenly across all age groups, with 27% of voters aged 18 to 34 supporting the independent and more than 30% of voters aged 35 to 65-plus supporting him. Seniors aged 65 and older gave Bodnar a 35% share.

Bankhead’s strongest age demographic is 18 to 34, with a 25% share. She was at 19% among voters aged 35 to 49 and 10% among voters aged 65 and older.

Both male and female voters favored Alme with 42% of men and 34% of women supporting the Republican. Bodnar’s support was 29% among men and 31% among women. Bankhead placed third among both men and women, at 10% and 23%, respectively. 

Libertarian Kyle Austin’s support was in single digits among voters sorted by age and gender.

Participants in the MTFP Eagleton poll were recruited using a probability-based method, meaning they were randomly drawn from the state’s registered voter file, so every voter had a known chance of being invited. The results were weighted during analysis to reflect the demographics of Montana’s registered voters. The margin of error is plus or minus 4.3 percentage points.