Montana Poll Finds Voters Increasingly Unlikely to Split Tickets Between Parties
Why It Matters
Montana has long prided itself on a streak of political independence, regularly electing candidates from both major parties in the same election cycle. A new poll suggests that tradition may be fading, with significant implications for how competitive statewide races in Montana will be in future election cycles.
What Happened
A recent survey of Montana voters found that while roughly two-thirds of respondents said they have split their tickets in past elections, nearly the same share — 63% — said they are unlikely to vote for a candidate outside the party they typically support. The results point to a deepening partisan alignment among Montana’s electorate.
The shift is significant in a state that once produced split outcomes as a matter of routine. In 2016, Donald Trump carried Montana by 20 percentage points, yet voters in the same election chose a Democrat as governor. Two years later, Montanans sent a Democrat to the U.S. Senate while electing a Republican to the state’s single congressional seat. Those results were only possible because a meaningful portion of voters crossed party lines on the same ballot.
By 2024, that dynamic had largely collapsed. Republicans swept every statewide and federal office — the first time that had occurred in more than a century.
By the Numbers
- ~67% of poll respondents said they have split their ballot between parties in past elections
- 63% said they are unlikely to vote for a candidate from a party other than the one they usually support
- 20 points — Trump’s 2016 margin of victory in Montana, the same year a Democrat won the governorship
- 2024 — first year in more than 100 years that Republicans held every statewide and federal office in Montana
Zoom Out
Montana’s trend mirrors a broader national pattern of declining ticket-splitting. Across much of the country, voters have increasingly aligned their choices at every level of the ballot with their presidential preference, reducing the pool of truly swing voters that once allowed candidates with strong personal brands to outrun their party. States that were once reliably competitive at the statewide level have, over the past decade, sorted more firmly into red or blue columns.
For Montana Democrats, the shrinking share of ticket-splitters represents a structural challenge. Candidates who previously built winning coalitions by appealing to moderate Republicans and independents now face an electorate that is more resistant to crossing party lines regardless of individual candidate qualities.
What’s Next
The degree to which ticket-splitting continues to erode will likely shape candidate recruitment and campaign strategy heading into the next statewide election cycle. Democrats will need to assess whether a path to statewide victory remains viable without a significant recovery among voters willing to cross party lines. Republicans, meanwhile, have little immediate incentive to adjust a formula that delivered a clean sweep in 2024.
Broader shifts in Montana’s electorate — including demographic changes and migration patterns — will also factor into how durable the current partisan alignment proves to be.