It really doesn’t matter if you’re lost in a MAGA fog trying to be a warrior for a deluded president — when Montana’s senators are on national news, they represent all Montanans to the world. And this week, Montana’s freshman senator, Tim Sheehy, embarrassed all Montanans with his rude, evasive, and uninformed interview with CNN’s Kaitlin Collins, one of the most professional and respected reporters in the world.
It’s hard to figure out just what Sheehy was doing when given an opportunity to discuss the effects of the fiscal impacts of the Trump administration’s budget cuts. What he did instead was pull a bully act and repeatedly interrupt, talk over, and ignore Collins’ questions.
The zinger happened when Collin, who had done her homework, reminded Sheehy that a billion-dollar Pacific Northwest Hydrogen Hub project that included Montana had been cancelled by Trump’s Energy Department — and did not exist in the GOP’s short-term funding bill sitting in the Senate.
Apparently Sheehy, for all his bluster and macho man attempts at dominating Collins, did not do his homework — and had no idea the project’s funding had been cancelled. Instead, he sat in stunned silence for several seconds, then once again ignored the facts to falsely claim that’s why the government shutdown should end. You can see the interview Collins posted on X here.
Fact is, Sheehy’s lack of policy experience — and apparent lack of knowledge on what’s going on with the impacts of the administration’s budgets on Montana and Montanans — was on full display for the nation and world. Although his job is to understand where, how, and why the federal government spends or doesn’t spend money Congress has appropriated, Sheehy was too busy playing-acting as an important senator to actually do the job of being a senator.
Adding to Sheehy’s obvious ignorance of the issue, Collins pointed out that Montana’s Gov. Greg Gianforte had previously praised the hydrogen hub project as providing “good-paying Montana jobs.”
While it’s bad enough Sheehy didn’t know what he was talking about, the image he presented of how Montanans treat other people was downright disgusting. Maybe it’s because he’s not lived in Montana for very long and doesn’t appear to understand that mutual respect is not only cherished in this state, but essential in the political and policy arena. He also appears not to know that Montanans have a national and international reputation for being considerate and helpful to those who visit our state — we’re not a bunch of MAGA mad dogs.
Nor would Sheehy address the fact that the GOP’s funding bill leaves 67,000 Montanans on the hook for vast increases in the cost of health insurance — from $145 per month with the tax credits to a whopping $645 without. While those very real impacts are the reason the bill is not moving in the Senate, all he wanted to do was bash Democrats for the shutdown, despite the fact they are in the minority in both chambers of Congress.
Ironically, while Montana’s very junior senator was busy ignoring the impacts to his constituents, Washington’s Sen. Patty Murray did address that enormous impact in a video forum with the head of the Montana Nurses Association and state Sen. Cora Neuman. Succinctly, Murray noted that Republican senators are “dodging the issue.” Indeed, Sheehy’s embarrassing performance completely validates that point.
Apparently being a U.S. senator has gone to Sheehy’s young and inexperienced head. But he’d best remember he’s representing Montanans on the national and world stage — and that we treat others with respect and expect the same from our senators.
- George Ochenski is Montana's longest-running columnist and a longtime environmental activist, concerned with keeping Montana's natural beauty clean and safe. He writes from Helena and appears in the Daily Montanan weekly.
