U.S. Senate · Montana · 2026
General election · 4 on the November ballot · Open seat (no incumbent)
Result
CalledKurt Alme (R) won this race with 48.2% of the vote, 10.4 points ahead.
- Kurt AlmeRepublicanWinner48.2%235,549 votes
- Seth BodnarIndependent37.7%184,551 votes
- Alani BankheadDemocratic12.3%59,950 votes
- Kyle AustinL1.8%9,013 votes
- Margin
- 50,998 votes (10.4 points)
- Called
- Called by Wikipedia editors, Nov 4, 1:39 AM ET (revision)
- Last updated
- Nov 15, 6:05 AM ET
- Source
- Wikipedia · official results page
Called it: hit Our locked call before polls closed was R; the winner is R. See every locked call
Unofficial until the state certifies the result.
Before the election
Polls, ratings and the Vugol Tensor below were published before votes were counted. They are not results.
Model rating Leans Republican (Tilting) on the Vugol Vector model, a snapshot of today, not a probability.
17 polls on file, none verified yet (pollster not verified or no public source), shown below, not averaged. Model inputs: 3 of 7, updated today. Page updated 2026-11-15. Sources · What is validated
ExperimentalNews attention 64/100, how much coverage the race gets, not who is winning. Updated today. How it works
On the November ballot (4)
From reported primary results, checked 2026-11-15. Each state certifies its own ballot; see the source below.
Ran in the primary (3)
Lost a primary or runoff for this seat, not on the November ballot.
Other filers (1)
Registered with the FEC or listed in public records, but not on the November ballot as far as the results show.
Ballot source: https://electionresults.mt.gov/resultsSW.aspx?type=FED&map=CTY
Latest verified field polling
Verified = published by the pollster that conducted it, with a public source we link to.
No verified poll has been published for this race. The Vugol Vector call from our model is below, it is not a poll.
Polling average
17 polls on file for this race, none verified yet (pollster not verified or no public source), visible below, not averaged.
Campaign money (FEC)
Candidate committee totals for the cycle from the Federal Election Commission (public domain), as of each committee's latest report.
| Candidate | Raised | Spent | Cash on hand | Through |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alani Ines Bankhead | $190,565 | $167,745 | $22,820 | 2026-10-14 |
| Kurt Alme | $3,013,681 | $2,410,943 | $602,738 | 2026-10-14 |
| Kyle Austin | $261,825 | $259,691 | $2,684 | 2026-10-14 |
| Lee Calhoun | $8,325 | $8,325 | $0 | 2026-06-05 |
| Michael Hummert | $12,330 | $5,646 | $7,429 | 2026-09-30 |
| Michael James Blackwolf | $26,144 | $25,616 | $528 | 2026-03-31 |
| Reilly Neill | $310,977 | $310,664 | $313 | 2026-10-14 |
| Seth Bodnar | $4,918,341 | $4,337,420 | $580,921 | 2026-10-14 |
Ad spending (FEC)
What each campaign reported paying for ads, and what outside groups (super PACs, PACs and parties) reported spending for and against each candidate. Federal Election Commission filings, public domain.
| Candidate | Campaign's own ads | Outside groups for | Outside groups against |
|---|---|---|---|
| Seth Bodnar | $86K | $11.7M | $2M |
| Kurt Alme | $850 | $3.4M | $1M |
| Alani Ines Bankhead | $16K | $3.2M | $365K |
| Reilly Neill | $41K | $2,528 | $1.2M |
| Kyle Austin | $20K | ||
| Michael Hummert | $3,589 |
Biggest outside spenders
- Seth Bodnar. For: INDEPENDENT PAC $7.3M, MONTANA FREEDOM PAC $4.1M, Montanans for Public Lands $82K. Against: MORE JOBS, LESS GOVERNMENT $2M, Leadership in Action $10K
- Kurt Alme. For: Americans for Prosperity Action, Inc. (AFP Action) DBA CVA Action and DBA LIBRE Action $2.1M, HIGH PLAINS PAC $515K, AMERICAN MISSION $497K. Against: MONTANA FREEDOM PAC $1M, WILD MONTANA ACTION FUND $6,739
- Alani Ines Bankhead. For: PROGRESSIVE VET PAC $2.3M, MORE JOBS, LESS GOVERNMENT $901K. Against: MONTANA FREEDOM PAC $346K, WILD MONTANA ACTION FUND $12K, MORE JOBS, LESS GOVERNMENT $6,816
- Reilly Neill. For: PROGRESSIVE VET PAC $2,528. Against: MORE JOBS, LESS GOVERNMENT $1M, PROGRESSIVE VET PAC $192K
Outside groups: 24- and 48-hour independent expenditure reports for the 2026 primary and general, through 2026-10-30, each expenditure counted once after amendments; "ads" is TV, radio, digital and other media, and the rest is mail, phones, canvassing and similar. Campaign's own ads: TV, radio, digital, other media and ad production in the campaign committee's itemized payments, as the campaign described them, from the reports the FEC has processed (latest through 2026-10-13); newer reports appear as the FEC processes them. These are amounts committees reported paying, not airtime tracked by ad-monitoring firms, so very recent buys and future reservations may not show yet. Parser fec-ad-spend-1.0.0.
Results
Vote counts as reported by the state; transcribed from the Wikipedia election article (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites the state’s official results.
general election
| Kurt Alme won | 235,549 | 48.2% |
| Seth Bodnar | 184,551 | 37.7% |
| Alani Bankhead | 59,950 | 12.3% |
| Kyle Austin | 9,013 | 1.8% |
Democratic primary
| Alani Bankhead won | 48,772 | 43.6% |
| Reilly Neill | 36,880 | 33.0% |
| Michael Black Wolf | 14,678 | 13.1% |
| Christopher Kehoe | 7,108 | 6.4% |
| Michael Hummert | 4,305 | 3.9% |
Libertarian primary · official results
| Kyle Austin won | 1,819 | 53.3% |
| Tom Jandron | 1,592 | 46.7% |
Republican primary
| Kurt Alme won | 128,716 | 76.1% |
| Lee Calhoun | 23,872 | 14.1% |
| Charles WalkingChild | 16,474 | 9.7% |
Source: Wikipedia article revision (CC BY-SA 4.0), retrieved 2026-11-15 · parser wiki-race-1.0.0
Key dates
Official federal election dates for this state from the FEC. Registration deadlines and early voting: see the state election office.
- 2026-06-02, Primary election: U.S. Senate
- 2026-11-03, General election: U.S. Senate
Source: FEC election dates (public domain).
Primary and hypothetical polls (16)
Kept on file, never averaged into this race. Polls listed on the Wikipedia election article (CC BY-SA 4.0), each linked to that article revision and, where we know it, to the pollster's own site.
- Hypothetical matchup · Tavern Research (partisan) · 2026-07-23–2026-07-27 · n=517 · Kurt Alme (R) 59%,Alani Bankhead (D) 41% · release
- Hypothetical matchup · Tavern Research (partisan) · 2026-07-23–2026-07-27 · n=517 · Kurt Alme (R) 50%,Seth Bodnar (I) 45%,Kyle Austin (L) 5% · release
- Hypothetical matchup · GQR (partisan) · 2026-07-23–2026-07-26 · n=500 · Seth Bodnar (I) 44%,Kurt Alme (R) 40%,Kyle Austin (L) 11% · release
- Hypothetical matchup · GQR (partisan) · 2026-07-23–2026-07-26 · n=500 · Kurt Alme (R) 44%,Alani Bankhead (D) 40%,Kyle Austin (L) 13% · release
- Hypothetical matchup · Hart Research (partisan) · 2026-06-18–2026-06-24 · n=800 · Kurt Alme (R) 49%,Alani Bankhead (D) 43% · pollster's site · release
- Hypothetical matchup · Hart Research (partisan) · 2026-06-18–2026-06-24 · n=800 · Kurt Alme (R) 47%,Seth Bodnar (I) 45% · pollster's site · release
- Hypothetical matchup · Tavern Research (partisan) · 2026-06-16–2026-06-19 · n=400 · Kurt Alme (R) 56%,Alani Bankhead (D) 44% · release
- Hypothetical matchup · Tavern Research (partisan) · 2026-06-16–2026-06-19 · n=400 · Kurt Alme (R) 50%,Seth Bodnar (I) 50% · release
- Hypothetical matchup · Tavern Research (partisan) · 2026-06-16–2026-06-19 · n=400 · Kurt Alme (R) 56%,Generic Democrat 44% · release
- Hypothetical matchup · Tavern Research (partisan) · 2026-05-13–2026-05-18 · n=607 · Kurt Alme (R) 46%,Seth Bodnar (I) 26%,Reilly Neill (D) 24% · release
- Hypothetical matchup · Tavern Research (partisan) · 2026-05-13–2026-05-18 · n=607 · Kurt Alme (R) 56%,Generic Democrat 44% · release
- Hypothetical matchup · Tavern Research (partisan) · 2026-05-13–2026-05-18 · n=607 · Kurt Alme (R) 50%,Seth Bodnar (I) 50% · release
- Hypothetical matchup · Change Research (partisan) · 2026-03-17–2026-03-20 · n=616 · Kurt Alme (R) 37%,Seth Bodnar (I) 35% · pollster's site · release
- Hypothetical matchup · American Pulse Research & Polling · 2026-02-14–2026-02-18 · n=607 · Steve Daines (R) 54%,Seth Bodnar (D) 40% · release
- Hypothetical matchup · American Pulse Research & Polling · 2026-02-14–2026-02-18 · n=607 · Steve Daines (R) 52%,Reilly Neill (D) 25%,Seth Bodnar (I) 16% · release
- Hypothetical matchup · yes. every kid. · 2026-01-23–2026-01-26 · n=500 · Steve Daines (R) 43%,Reilly Neill (D) 19%,Seth Bodnar (I) 15% · release
Steve Daines (R) 54%,In the news
- At the Races: After the deluge
- An hour-by-hour guide to watching the 2026 midterms, and when we’ll know who controls Congress
- Buttigieg endorses independent Seth Bodnar in Montana Senate race
- Buttigieg endorses independent in Montana Senate race with a Democrat still on the ballot
- Trump announces Montana 'super range' at midterm rally for Pentagon to test advanced war technology
- Trump defends gifted Air Force One from Qatar and makes 2nd Amendment pitch as he campaigns for GOP
- DNC denies Bankhead's claim she was offered job to drop out of Montana Senate race
- Montana Democratic Party chair steps down, endorses independent candidate
- Montana Democratic Party chair resigns, endorses independent in Senate race
- Montana Democrat who refuses to drop out may spoil party’s Senate hopes
Headlines from outlets across the political spectrum, linked to the publisher. Vugol.me doesn’t write or endorse them. How we choose them · All election news
LabVugol Vector & Vugol Attention
Vugol Attention 64 Vugol Vector R · Tilting
Vugol Me model signals, not polls. Verified polling is in the Polls section above.
Vugol Me Attention (attention intensity)
Vugol Attention intensity index 0–100 · not a poll · normalized nightly
Vugol Vector
Proprietary ensemble model · a call, not a probability · model confidence: medium
The breakdown of this call (the model's multi-signal input matrix, input by input) is on Ultra Pro plans.
Vugol Tensor
How far this call can miss · a range, not a prediction · no verified poll here, so the range is wider and untested
Centre R+9.0. Four times in five the result lands between D+0.4 and R+18.4; nine in ten between D+3.0 and R+21.1. Chance the Democrat finishes ahead: 11%.
Polls have missed by about four points in a typical race and they miss together. How Tensor works →
Desk data: daily telemetry
Per-source daily series, CSV export and the Vugol Vector breakdown · paid plans
Sources
- Roster, official filings; fundraising from FEC datapoints where on file (https://api.open.fec.gov/).
- Vugol Attention inputs, Wikipedia pageviews (https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/) and GDELT news volume and tone (https://www.gdeltproject.org/).
- Polls and results, individual polls and primary results listed on the Wikipedia election article (CC BY-SA 4.0), each poll linked to the pollster's release; money and election dates from the FEC (public domain). How rows are checked.
- Models attention-1.0.0 · vector-1.1.0 · attention inputs SHA-256 2ffe43a8fd1c · methodology · license CC BY 4.0 (data license).
Vugol Vector band: R · Tilting. Have a say in the Vugol race poll; it is open to signed-in voters and never feeds these numbers.
The four Vugol signals, side by side
They answer different questions and are kept apart. Full method: Methodology.
- Vugol Vector
- Our call for every race if today’s polls hold. A snapshot, not a win probability or a vote share.
- Vugol Tensor
- How sure we are: ranges and chamber-control odds around the Vector, built from past polling error. An experiment about uncertainty, not a better guess.
- Vugol Attention
- How much news and online noise a race gets, 0 to 100. It measures noise, not support: a high score says nothing about who is ahead.
- Vugol Pulse
- Our daily thumbs-up or thumbs-down question for readers. Anyone can answer, so it describes our readers, not the public. It is not a vote and never enters a poll average or any other signal.