Sen. Steve Daines announces he will not seek reelection

Montana Sen. Steve Daines will not seek reelection, he announced Wednesday, adding to a wave of retirements in the GOP ranks.

Daines’ announcement makes him the sixth Republican senator to choose not to seek reelection in this fall’s midterm elections, joining a list that includes North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis, who announced his decision last year, and Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville, who is running for governor instead of seeking a second term. Sens. Joni Ernst, Cynthia Lummis, and Mitch McConnell, a former Senate majority leader, also announced they won’t seek reelection this cycle.

Daines, who was first elected to the Senate in 2014 and defeated then-incumbent Montana Gov. Steve Bullock in his 2020 reelection race, chaired the National Republican Senatorial Committee from 2023 to 2025.

"Serving the people of Montana in the U.S. House and the U.S. Senate the past 13 years has been the greatest honor of my professional career," Daines said in a video posted to social media Wednesday evening. "I'm grateful to God for allowing me to serve. But after much careful thought, I have decided not to seek reelection."

Republican Montana Sen. Tim Sheehy praised Daines in a social media post for "doing something we don’t often see in modern politics: stepping down at the height of his power to clear the way for a new generation of leaders."

U.S. Attorney for the District of Montana Kurt Alme filed to run for Daines’ Senate seat as a Republican after Daines withdrew from the race and just minutes before the deadline closed on Tuesday evening. Alme, who was appointed in March 2025, also served as Montana’s U.S. attorney under the first Trump administration from 2017 to 2020.

President Donald Trump swiftly endorsed Alme, writing in a Wednesday social media post that Daines "did a job like few others are capable of doing" but decided to "pass the torch" to Alme.

"In fact, if Kurt didn’t have the highest level of aptitude and talent, Steve would have remained exactly where he is but, Kurt is exceptional, and I will be giving him, based on Steve’s strongest recommendation, my Complete and Total Endorsement," he wrote on Truth Social.

Former University of Montana President Seth Bodnar also filed to run for the seat as an independent on Wednesday morning. Bodnar, who resigned from his role leading the university in January, served as an executive at General Electric and served in the U.S. Army.

“Montanans are an independent people, and we deserve an independent voice in Washington fighting to lower costs and protect our values. I'm running for Senate to take our government back,” he said in a Wednesday announcement on X.