Former Montana Rep. Denny Rehberg announced Wednesday that he was joining the June 4 Republican primary for the 2nd District currently held by GOP incumbent Matt Rosendale, who still has not said if he'll run for reelection after pulling the plug on his very short-lived Senate bid. The congressman's team told the Montana Free Press he'll be making up his mind "soon," though there are only a few weeks left before the March 11 candidate filing deadline.
Even if Rosendale retires, though, Rehberg will still need to get through a busy primary that includes two statewide officeholders if he's to resurrect the political career that, at least temporarily, ended with his own 2012 loss against Tester. Rehberg represented the entire state in the years before Montana regained a second House seat following the 2020 census, a shift that led to the state getting divided in two. The more conservative 2nd District in Montana's eastern half favored Donald Trump 62-35 in 2020.
Among the candidates already running, state Auditor Troy Downing finished December with $294,000 in the bank, compared to $119,000 for Superintendent of Public Instruction Elsie Arntzen, who self-funded $250,000 last year. Former state Sen. Ed Walker was further back with $74,000 on hand, while none of the other candidates had so much as $30,000 available to spend.
Rehberg's long career in elected office began when he won a state House seat in 1984, and he entered statewide office in 1991 when he was appointed lieutenant governor after the post became vacant. Rehberg suffered a setback five years later when he lost a competitive 1996 Senate race to Democratic incumbent Max Baucus, but it would prove temporary. The Republican pulled off a comeback in 2000 when he claimed what at the time was Montana's only U.S. House seat, and he easily won reelection five times.
Senate Republicans identified Rehberg as a strong opponent for Tester well before the 2012 cycle was underway, with Politico reporting as early as 2009 that he was meeting with NRSC officials about such a campaign. The congressman did indeed seek a promotion, but Tester, as Rosendale would find out six years later, proved to be a tough foe with considerable crossover appeal.
During that campaign, Rehberg attracted unwanted attention over a 2009 boat crash in which he was one of four passengers injured in a vessel piloted by former state Sen. Greg Barkus, whose blood alcohol level was double the state limit. Rehberg was never accused of wrongdoing, but Tester's team argued that the congressman showed poor judgment. The Democrat ultimately prevailed 49-45 even as Mitt Romney was carrying Montana 53-42 over Barack Obama.
Rehberg considered returning to the House in 2014 after his successor, GOP Rep. Steve Daines, launched a successful bid for the state's other Senate seat, but he decided to stick with his new career as a Burger King franchise owner. The Billings Gazette writes that his family owned six fast-food restaurants as recently as two years ago (no word if any of them were a Denny's) but says they're all now closed.
That wasn't his only source of income, however. Rehberg, who infamously told the American League of Lobbyists in 2011, "I think lobbying is an honorable profession," also became a lobbyist.
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