Greetings! Here are the (midterm election) topics for today’s column:

• National – Blue Wave
• Montana Votes
• One More Thing

NATIONAL – BLUE WAVE:

It didn’t take long to see that a “Blue Wave” was sweeping the country when Republican after Republican lost their races.

As expected, Democrats are projected to win a majority in the U.S. House, with an estimated 235 to 255 seats. That is quite a large majority if true.

More surprisingly, Democrats are projected to win a majority in the U.S. Senate.

Here are some of the big wins:

• Texas will have a Democratic governor, and one of its senators will be a Democrat.
• Kansas will have a Democratic senator for the first time since 1932.
• Maine retired Republican U.S. Senator Susan Collins, who served for almost 30 years, and replaced her with a Democrat.
• In South Carolina, Democrat Annie Andrews won the seat previously held by Lindsey Graham (defeating interim Republican Senator Darline Graham), making her the first South Carolina Democrat elected to the Senate since 1998.
• In the Georgia Governor’s race, Democrat Keisha Lance Bottoms, the former mayor of Atlanta, defeated billionaire Republican Rick Jackson to become the first Black female governor in U.S. history.
• In the Ohio Governor’s race, Democrat Amy Acton won a highly publicised contest, defeating Republican Vivek Ramaswamy.

How crazy is that?

Many MAGA supporters will try to distance themselves from Trump after tonight’s results. But let’s be clear: we won’t forget who stood by and enabled the damage to this country.

That reminds me of a story, a modern-day political parable:

After the election, some MAGA loyalists found themselves in the courtyard.

When asked if they had supported Trump, the first said, “Trump? I barely knew the man.” The second said, “I never agreed with everything he did.” The third insisted, “I was never really MAGA.”

Then someone asked, “Weren’t you cheering for him just yesterday?” And suddenly, the rooster crowed. Just as Peter denied knowing Jesus three times, we will see how many Trump supporters deny they ever supported him.

MONTANA VOTES:

Results trickled in across Montana as this column headed to publication. Several races indicated precincts were only partially reporting, while others had a few precincts that were fully reporting.

The three initiatives (CI-132, CI-133, and I-194) were all winning with 67-70% of the vote around 11:00 p.m. Tuesday.

In the Montana Supreme Court Justice #4 race, Amy Eddy had a very large lead (59,000 votes) over Dan Wilson around 11:00 p.m. Tuesday. The Associated Press called the race for Eddy around 11:30 p.m.

The MT-01 race had Democrat Sam Forstag leading Republican Aaron Flint by about 11,700 votes. That count rose to about 20,000 votes around 11: 55 p.m. Around that time, I received a press release from the Forstag campaign declaring victory. The Decision Desk called the race for Forstag at 12:04 a.m.

The U.S. Senate race shows Republican Kurt Alme beating Independent Seth Bodnar by about 26,000 votes. Democrat Alani Bankhead was trailing Alme by 107,000 votes. Around 11:30 p.m., Alme made a victory speech. The Hill called the race for Alme around 11:35 p.m.

One state senate race I want to point out is that Republican Llew Jones is winning SD-9 with 74% of the vote. Jones was disliked by the MAGA Republicans.

There are several other state legislative races across the state that are too close to call. The results will probably be final sometime today (Wednesday).

You can review all the latest results by visiting the Montana Elections Results HERE. The New York Times has a Montana page HERE.

ONE MORE THING:

“Now, everybody is sad when their side loses an election, but the day after we have to remember that we’re actually all on one team… We are Americans first.” — Barack Obama

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