Adams, Driscoll coming to Havre Dems fundraiser

Some federal-level candidates will join local candidates in Havre next week during a Democratic fundraiser.

U.S. Senate candidate Dirk Adams and U.S. House candidate John Driscoll are expected to attend the burger feed, which starts Tuesday at 6 p.m. at the Havre Eagles Club.

State-level candidates also expected to speak include state Rep. Clarena Brockie, D-Harlem, state Sen. Greg Jergeson, D-Havre, and state House candidates Rob Laas of Chester and Janet Trethewey of Havre. Candidates for Hill County offices also are expected to speak.

U.S. Sen. John Walsh, D-Mont., is sending a letter to be read at the fundraiser while his other opponent in the primary, John Bohlinger, had planned to attend but had to withdraw due to a conflicting event.

The federal and local races are high-profile this year, with Republicans hoping to take control of the U.S. Senate and Democrats hoping to stop that and to cut into their control of the U.S. House, while state Democrats are hoping to take back local legislative seats from the GOP.

Adams, a Park County rancher and former trial attorney and banker, faces two former lieutenant governors in the Democratic primary.

Bohlinger served as a Republican lieutenant governor under Gov. Brian Schweitzer, a Democrat. He said the GOP has moved too far to the right for him and filed as a Democrat for the Senate race.

Walsh left his term as lieutenant governor under Democratic Gov. Steve Bullock when Bullock appointed him to take the place of U.S. Sen. Max Baucus.

Baucus announced last year he would not run for a seventh term and President Barack Obama appointed him as U.S. ambassador to China in January.

The top Republican candidate is first-term U.S. Rep. Steve Daines, whose Senate candidacy opened the Montana race for the House. He faces state Rep. Champ Edmunds and political newcomer Susan Cundiff, both of Missoula, in the Republican Senate primary.

Libertarian Roger Roots of Livingston is unopposed in the Senate primary.

Driscoll, a former speaker of the Montana House of Representatives and former Montana Public Service Commissioner, faces former Baucus aide John Lewis in the Democratic U.S. House primary.

The winner of that race will face the winner of a massive slate of candidates in the Republican House primary: Drew Turiano of Helena and state Sens. Elsie Arntzen of Billings and Matt Rosendale of Glendive and former state Sens. Corey Stapleton of Billings and Ryan Zinke of Whitefish.

Havre native Mike Fellows of Missoula is unopposed in the Libertarian House primary.

In the local races, with new territory involved due to legislative redistricting, Democrats hope to continue making inroads in an area traditionally their stronghold.

Republicans swept all contested races in this region in 2010.

Jergeson, who ran for the Senate in 2012 after term limits took him from that office in the previous decade, regained one of those seats for Democrats but Reps. Kris Hansen of Havre and Wendy Warburton of Chinook kept their offices.

This election, Jergeson, Trethewey, Brockie, Laas and House District 33 Democratic candidate Floyd Russell Hopstead of Glasgow are unopposed in the primary, as are some of their Republican opponents while others face challengers.

Rep. Mike Lang, R-Malta, is unopposed in the primary for HD 33 that runs from Valley County to the edge of Havre. So is Republican Gilbert Bruce Myers of Box Elder, who is challenging Brockie in House District 32, and Stephanie Hess of Havre who faces Trethewey in the race for House District 28.

But Rep. Roy Hollandsworth, R-Brady, faces Hingham farmer and aviator Darrold Hutchinson in the Republican primary for House District 27, that stretches from the Canadian border in western Hill and Liberty counties to Cascade County.

Hansen faces Chester farmer Carl Mattson in the Republican primary for Senate District 14 that includes HD 27 and HD 29. The winner of that contest will face Jergeson in November’s general election.