08/06/2026
🚨 🚨🚨Veterans For Responsible Leadership Statement on the Montana U.S. Senate Race
Lieutenant Colonel Alani Bankhead has given more to this country than most ever will. Across twenty-one years in the United States Air Force, she served as a counterintelligence special agent, ran intelligence operations against Al Qaeda in Iraq, protected one of the most senior officials at the Pentagon, and later built multi-agency task forces to rescue children from exploitation. She was also, for a time, one of us — a member of Veterans for Responsible Leadership. We honor that service, and that shared commitment, without reservation.
Our organization was founded on five principles: civility, service, integrity, optimism, and strength. Above all, we believe America deserves leaders who put principle before ambition. It is in that spirit, and with deep respect, that we speak directly to Colonel Bankhead, honestly and directly.
The reality in Montana is sobering. Colonel Bankhead's polling has not moved. Her fundraising has not materialized at the level a Senate race requires. And having chosen Montana as her home only a few years ago, she has not built the grassroots foundation — the doors knocked and relationships earned — that carries a candidate across the finish line. As former Senator Jon Tester said of the work it takes to win here: "The progress we make as Democrats in Montana are hard fought. We have to earn them inch by inch." That groundwork is unfortunately not there.
Meanwhile, independent Seth Bodnar has out-raised both major-party candidates and consistently runs significantly ahead of Bankhead, standing as the strongest challenger to Republican control of this seat.
And make no mistake how the Republican got here. At 4:52 p.m. on the filing deadline, Senator Daines withdrew. Three minutes later, Kurt Alme filed to replace him. Within the hour, Daines and Donald Trump had both endorsed him. No primary. No contest. No voice for Montana voters. A Senate seat handed over in eight minutes through backroom coronation. That is the very opposite of principle before ambition, and exactly the kind of maneuver our principles exist to oppose.
Colonel Bankhead entered this race to serve Montana, not to divide the opposition and deliver Alme the outcome that coronation was designed to secure. Responsible leadership means knowing when to hold and when to fold, for the good of something larger than ourselves.
We thank Colonel Bankhead for her extraordinary service, and we trust her, as one of our own, to lead once more — this time by stepping aside so Montana's voters come first.
