Aaron Flint, a local radio host, won the Republican primary on Tuesday in a U.S. House district in western Montana, according to The Associated Press.
He defeated three other Republicans, including Christi Jacobsen, the Montana secretary of state. President Trump endorsed Mr. Flint early in the primary.
Mr. Flint will be seeking to replace Representative Ryan Zinke, a Republican who is not running for re-election, in a district that Mr. Trump won by 12 percentage points in 2024. Mr. Zinke has backed Mr. Flint as his successor.
Late Tuesday, the Democratic primary was too close to call, with a tight race between Ryan Busse, the party’s nominee for governor in 2024, and Sam Forstag, a union smoke jumper.
Montana voters have long been independent-minded, but the state has veered rightward in recent years. The cost of living has also gone up, fueled in part by an influx of wealthy new residents since the coronavirus pandemic.
An Army veteran, Mr. Flint is a first-time candidate. But many Montana voters were most likely familiar with him from his career as a host of statewide radio talk shows. He interviewed Republican politicians but, as he has noted on the campaign trail, he also often fielded calls from listeners across Montana about their views and concerns.
In his first primary campaign video, Mr. Flint denounced “radical politicians” including Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, both of whom campaigned for Sam Forstag, one of the candidates in the Democratic primary. On the campaign trail, Mr. Flint also frequently mentioned his combat deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.
Patricia Mazzei is the lead reporter for The Times in Miami, covering Florida and Puerto Rico.
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