The good news for Ryan Busse is that, as a full-fledged member of the gun control lobby, I’m sure there’s a consulting job or another “advisory” position in his future. If nothing else he can always go back to being a paid witness for states like Illinois and California to help defend their gun laws. 

The bad news for Busse (and the good news for Second Amendment supporters in Montana) is that his gubernatorial campaign has flamed out in epic fashion. DDHQ called the race for Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte shortly after 11 pm Eastern, with the returns showing Gianforte up 62-36 over Busse. 

The race for Senate is tighter, with Democrat Jon Tester trailing Republican Tim Sheehy by about 14 points (and just 6% of the vote tabulated), but Tester benefited from the advantages of incumbency. Busse’s never held political office before, while Gianforte represented Montana in Congress before he was elected governor four years ago. It doesn’t look like Tester will be able to hang on to his seat, but he’ll outperform Busse by a significant margin. 

Gianforte also has a long track record of support for the Second Amendment, while Busse, a former sales executive at Kimber who left the company in 2020 and next emerged as an advisor to Joe Biden’s campaign, has tried to downplay his recent support for gun control to the point of absurdity. 

Busse never brought up his work as a senior advisor to the gun control group Giffords on his campaign website. There was no acknowledgment that he’s raked in a substantial amount of money serving as an expert witness in defense of gun control laws in a number of states. Instead, Busse boasted of selling millions of guns, and cut the obligatory campaign ad showing him shooting a rifle (and blowing up a Tannerite-filled target). 

While Busse sought to hide his gun control activism, Montana voters seemed to have figured out his position pretty early. In both the first poll of the governor’s race conducted back in February and the last pre-election poll that took place in early October, Busse trailed Gianforte by a whopping 22 points. In comparison, Gianforte won the governorship four years ago by defeating then-Lt. Gov. Mike Cooney by about 13 points. 

When all the votes are tallied, it looks like Busse will have fallen well short of Cooney’s already lopsided margin of defeat, and his experiment in running away from his embrace of gun control will be a demonstrable failure. 

For Democrats to truly be competitive in rural America, they can’t run anti-2A wolves in sheep’s clothing or out-and-proud gun banners. They need candidates who don’t blame violent crime on lawful gun owners, and who treat the Second Amendment as something to be strengthened and preserved instead of a problem to be solved. That’s so far outside the mainstream of Democratic politics, however, that it’s unlikely such a candidate would get the financial support of the party or major donors even if they won their primary election. 

Though Busse was always the underdog in the Montana governor’s race, his duplicitousness on Second Amendment issues did nothing to help his campaign. I doubt Second Amendment supporters have heard the last of him, but at least he won’t be lobbying for gun control from the governor’s residence.