Montana senate race too close to call

Until the Abramoff scandal hit about a year ago, incumbent Conrad Burns (R-MT), was looking like a sure-thing for re-election in 2006. The race is too close to call, but like it's red-state neighbor to the east, North Dakota, Montana may have two Democratic senators in January, 2006.

From the Billings Gazette:

Democratic challenger Jon Tester and Republican Conrad Burns are now running about even in Montana's fiercely contested U.S. Senate race, a new statewide poll shows.

The latest poll shows Tester with 46 percent of the support of likely Montana voters to Burns' 43 percent, with 9 percent undecided. Libertarian Stan Jones had 2 percent.

Because Tester's 3 percentage point lead falls within the poll's margin of error of plus-or-minus 4 percentage points, that means Tester and Burns are considered to be running "about even," according to The Associated Press polling guidelines.

This poll of 625 likely Montana voters was taken Oct. 17-19 by Mason-Dixon Polling & Research of Washington, D.C., for McClatchy Newspapers and MSNBC.

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