Serving the Flathead Valley & Montana since 2006. A reality based independent journal of observation & analysis. © James Conner.

 

23 August 2014

With Lewis gaining on him, Zinke chickens out of Billings debate

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Updated to fix bad link. Republican U.S. House candidate Ryan Zinke (left) won’t be debating his opponents, Democrat John Lewis and Libertarian Mike Fellows, in Billings on 29 September. In a series of maneuvers worthy of a French farce, Zinke first agreed to the debate, withdrew from it three hours later, and finally said Lewis was to blame. Billings Gazette political reporter Tom Lutey has the story, and at Intelligent Discontent, Don Pogreba has a withering commentary.

What happened? Primarily, Zinke didn’t want Fellows onstage, obtaining exposure and news coverage in Montana’s biggest media market. Lewis is closing the range on Zinke, and Republicans are deeply worried that Fellows will take enough votes from Zinke that Lewis wins. A secondary factor: in pre-primary debates, Lewis was a little quicker on his feet than Zinke, so not debating removes the risk that Zinke will embarrass himself while discussing issues.

Chickening out, and in such a maladroit way, probably indicates that recent polls known to Zinke but not the public reveal he’s in serious trouble with both Fellows and Lewis. His about-face won’t improve his public image as a man who doesn’t fear politics because he’s seen war, but he and his campaign obviously believe the cost of ducking the debate is significantly lower than the cost of participating in it.

Closing the range on Zinke

Thus far I’ve found only two publicly available polls on the election for the Montana House. Both have Zinke under 50 percent; Vox Populi’s, conducted 3–4 August, has him under 45 percent. Take care not to read too much into these polls: they’re aging and because both major campaigns will kick into overdrive starting Labor Day. I’ll update this graph as new polls become available, and begin aggregating the polls once enough data become available.