A former chair of the Republican National Committee and two-term GOP governor has thrown his support behind a Democratic House candidate in a battleground Montana district. According to MS NOW, "Marc Racicot, who won two terms as Montana's governor in the 1990s before leading the RNC during George W. Bush's first term, is set to endorse Sam Forstag's bid for the state's 1st Congressional District, currently held by a Republican."

"He cares about what he's doing. He's very well prepared. He has the right priorities in terms of character and virtues and values and belief in the Constitution," Racicot told MS NOW. "It's not even a close call for me to stand in Sam's corner."

The endorsement carries weight for Democrats with the midterms approaching. The party is aiming to reclaim the House majority, and winning in purple-leaning red states such as Montana depends on the backing of independents and Republicans who have grown disillusioned with President Donald Trump. Racicot, a longtime Trump critic, has supported several Democrats in recent years, including Joe Biden in 2020. As MS NOW explains, "The public embrace from Racicot could go toward helping the kind of crossover appeal Forstag likely needs to do what no Montana Democrat has been able to do since the 1990s: win a U.S. House seat in the state."

The seat is currently held by a retiring Republican, making it an open seat with no incumbent's name recognition or fundraising advantage on the ballot — a dynamic that historically gives challengers in the out-of-power party a better opening. Forstag faces Aaron Flint, a combat veteran and former conservative radio host who carries Trump's endorsement. According to MS NOW, "Forstag, who worked as a smokejumper after lobbying in Montana for the state's American Civil Liberties Union wing, won a divided primary despite warnings from some critics that he was too liberal for the district. Since then, he's built an unusual profile in a state where the national Democratic brand has proved corrosive. He is one of only a handful of congressional Democrats endorsed by both progressive Sen. Bernie Sanders and the centrist Blue Dog political outfit. Racicot's support on top of that offers some Bush Republican-era nostalgia for voters as Forstag tries to cut into the state's rightward drift."

Polling shows the race is razor thin. According to the latest survey, the two candidates are dead even at 44 percent each. That poses a problem for the Republican Party, which has worked to consolidate its hold on Montana but is expected to suffer significant losses in the midterms amid backlash from Trump's historically low approval ratings. In a dead-even race, relatively modest movements among independent and crossover voters — precisely the audience an endorsement like Racicot's targets — can be decisive, which is why both parties are watching Montana's 1st District as a barometer of whether Democrats can compete in states that have trended sharply Republican at the federal level.

"We're in a hole that both parties have been digging for us," Forstag said, urging voters to back a kind of Democrat "that could actually improve your life, and is actually going to prioritize doing so, because I know what it's like on a day-to-day basis."