Gary Marbut, President
Montana Shooting Sports Association

Primary Election, 2016
Legislative Candidate Endorsements

Dear MSSA Members,

It has become much more complicated for anyone to become involved in the process of selecting and recommending quality candidates for public office.  Given new laws, extensive new regulations implementing various laws, court decisions, and new legal theories about what is enforceable and needs enforcement, the path of conduct that is safe from enforcement action has become very narrow and twisting.

Therefore, I am being deliberately VERY careful about how I express my preferences for candidates in the 2016 Primary Election.

First, this is a communication to MSSA members, a First Amendment-protected exercise of Freedom of Association, Freedom of Expression, and Freedom of the Press, also protected from government regulation by various sections of Article II of the Montana Constitution.

Second, this is a private and personal effort of mine, with no support from any corporation.

Third, no funds are expended to send the email advising MSSA members of this page or to post this page (beyond a deminimis expenditure estimated on the order of 5/100ths of one cent [$.0005] - see Canyon Ferry Road Baptist Church of East Helena, Inc. v. Unsworth.)

Fourth, no candidates endorsed here have solicited an endorsement or promised anything in return for an endorsement.  Conversely, I have not asked anything specific of candidates in return for an endorsement or promised anything to any endorsed candidates.  I have only evaluated the level of interest of candidates in issues of interest to gun owners from the candidates' voting records, returned candidate questionnaires, and other available information.

Fifth, no copyright is asserted over the material contained here and anyone is welcome to accurately copy, reprint, repost, or recite any part or all of the information contained here, including candidates for public office, endorsed or not.  Although this information is intended primarily for MSSA members, it is considered to be in the public domain upon posting.

The candidate evaluations contained here are made from information available about candidates, including voting records for those who have served in office, candidate questionnaires returned by candidates, and other information available from various sources.

Candidates are evaluated solely upon how well they understand, how strongly they feel about, and how fervently they support the Right to Keep and Bear Arms.  Only candidates with a primary challenge are considered for the Primary Election, and there is not a favored candidate in every Primary-challenged race.  Some Primary-challenged candidates may have equal opponents, or I may have no voting record or returned candidate questionnaire from either candidate in a Primary race.

The candidates who are featured here are selected because I have solid information about them and in some cases none about their opponent(s), and because the favored candidate is known to be a strong and reliable advocate for our constitutionally-protected Right to Keep and Bear Arms.

I strongly urge all MSSA members and other concerned gun owners to favor and support these selected candidates who have a Primary challenge.  The Primary Election happens soon, in the first week of June, and absentee ballots are going out now.  Get active.  Seek out these candidates.  Send them much-needed money for their campaigns.  Work for these candidates.  Spread the word to all of your gun-owning friends.  Do it immediately!

Here are the preferred candidates for the Montana Senate:

District        Name
SD3          Keith Regier
SD7          Jennifer Fielder
SD10        J.C. Kantorowicz
SD15        Ryan Osmundson
SD18        Steve Hinebauch
SD26        Joshua Rich Kotter
SD28        Tom Richmond
SD36        Dale Stewart
SD38        Sam Kitzenberg
SD40        Carl Garcia


Here are the preferred candidates for the Montana House of Representatives:

District        Name
HD5          Chet Billi
HD10        Mark Ray Noland
HD11        Derek Skees
HD14        Charles Woolley
HD17        David Brownell
HD19        Randy Pinocci
HD20        Sheridan Buck
HD22        Lola Sheldon-Galloway
HD33        Casey Knudsen
HD35        Scott Staffanson
HD36        Alan Doane
HD37        Bill Harris
HD40        Barry Usher
HD44        Dale Mortensen
HD45        Daniel Zolnikov
HD68        Art Wittich
HD69        Phil Olson
HD71        Robert Wagner
HD72        Brooke Erb
HD80        Patrick N. Johnson
HD85        Theresa Manzella
HD92        Randy C. Vannoy


Gary Marbut, for the
Montana Shooting Sports Association Political Committee
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