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Dave Severson

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Dave Severson

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Prior offices
Montana House of Representatives District 89
Successor: Katie Sullivan

Elections and appointments
Last election

June 7, 2022

Education

Graduate

University of Montana, Missoula, 1981

Personal
Profession
Union organizer
Contact

Dave Severson (Democratic Party) was a member of the Montana House of Representatives, representing District 89. He assumed office in 2018. He left office on January 6, 2019.

Severson (Democratic Party) ran for election to the Montana House of Representatives to represent District 100. He lost in the Democratic primary on June 7, 2022.

Severson completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2022. Click here to read the survey answers.

Biography

Dave Severson earned a graduate degree from the University of Montana, Missoula in 1981. His career experience includes working as a union organizer. Previously, he was a high school journalism and government teacher.[1]

Elections

2022

See also: Montana House of Representatives elections, 2022

General election

General election for Montana House of Representatives District 100

Zooey Zephyr defeated Sean McCoy and Michael Vanecek in the general election for Montana House of Representatives District 100 on November 8, 2022.

Candidate
%
Votes
Image of Zooey Zephyr
Zooey Zephyr (D)
 
79.2
 
4,053
Sean McCoy (R)
 
16.7
 
853
Michael Vanecek (L)
 
4.1
 
211

Total votes: 5,117
Candidate Connection = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
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Democratic primary election

Democratic primary for Montana House of Representatives District 100

Zooey Zephyr defeated Dave Severson in the Democratic primary for Montana House of Representatives District 100 on June 7, 2022.

Candidate
%
Votes
Image of Zooey Zephyr
Zooey Zephyr
 
61.4
 
1,483
Dave Severson Candidate Connection
 
38.6
 
934

Total votes: 2,417
Candidate Connection = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey.

Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team.

Republican primary election

Republican primary for Montana House of Representatives District 100

Sean McCoy advanced from the Republican primary for Montana House of Representatives District 100 on June 7, 2022.

Candidate
%
Votes
Sean McCoy
 
100.0
 
335

Total votes: 335
Candidate Connection = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey.

Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team.

Libertarian primary election

The Libertarian primary election was canceled. Michael Vanecek advanced from the Libertarian primary for Montana House of Representatives District 100.

Endorsements

To view Severson's endorsements in the 2022 election, please click here.


2018

See also: Montana House of Representatives elections, 2018

Dave Severson did not file to run for re-election.

Campaign themes

2022

Ballotpedia survey responses

See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection

Candidate Connection

Dave Severson completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2022. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Severson's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.

Expand all | Collapse all

I taught high school for 22 years and then worked for the teacher's union for 16. I recently retired and want to use my experience and background to help defend our Democratic values and democracy, like voting rights and our state constitution. I want to use common sense and my experience to provide leadership that will make things better at the Montana legislature.

As a journalism and social studies teacher, union advocate, and long-time resident of my community, I show up, help out, solve problems and get things done.

My experiences includes a career in public education, labor, public employee pensions, student rights, human rights, voting rights, and standing by our American democracy, and our Democratic party principles. I was appointed as a Representative to MT Legislative HD 89 in 2018, and have served on Montana’s Labor Board and Public Employee Pension Board.

I’m optimistic that people really want to work together to HELP each other. We cannot have a legislature that causes division with hateful and harmful laws.

My experience and building bridges with diverse groups, including mediation and negotiations skills will help make a better Montana!
  • Public education needs to be strengthened and teachers need support, and deserve to not be attacked. Quality education for all can solve many problems.
  • Workers should have better pay, and a right to form a union.
  • All people deserve to be treated with respect, including human rights, and not be attacked or criticized, and especially not discriminated against for who they are .

Experience collaborating with diverse groups will improve Montana by protecting:

—women's rights, Native peoples, LGBTQ rights, students, reproductive rights including the right to an abortion, voting.
—schools, teachers, parents and students, unions and workers.
—families and workers to make communities livable/ affordable.

—Montanan’s freedoms enshrined in our constitution—environment, public lands, privacy, open government.
Core values:

Skill in collaboration with other people for a common goal
An essential belief that most people do want to help make things better for the common good
Ability to communicate kind intentions, in tone, word content and body language
A commitment to finding positive resolutions to difficult situations
Effective, non-accusatory ways to engage with others of opposing views

Distilled into three c’s
Collaboration—skill in finding good in people and bringing them together even with opposing views, to reach common ground.
Communication—lifetime of work learning and using effective communications with kindness and positive intent.

Commitment—dedication to education, inquiry and bringing folks together for the common good, even in difficult situations.
Yes, that is part of why I am running, since I have studied and worked at teaching government and politics most of my adult life.
Yes. That is how things get done, by building one-on-one relationships with other legislators.

Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.

Scorecards

See also: State legislative scorecards and State legislative scorecards in Montana

A scorecard evaluates a legislator’s voting record. Its purpose is to inform voters about the legislator’s political positions. Because scorecards have varying purposes and methodologies, each report should be considered on its own merits. For example, an advocacy group’s scorecard may assess a legislator’s voting record on one issue while a state newspaper’s scorecard may evaluate the voting record in its entirety.

Ballotpedia is in the process of developing an encyclopedic list of published scorecards. Some states have a limited number of available scorecards or scorecards produced only by select groups. It is Ballotpedia’s goal to incorporate all available scorecards regardless of ideology or number.

Click here for an overview of legislative scorecards in all 50 states.  To contribute to the list of Montana scorecards, email suggestions to editor@ballotpedia.org.








2018

In 2018, the Montana State Legislature did not hold a regular session.







See also



External links

Footnotes

  1. Information submitted to Ballotpedia through the Candidate Connection survey on May 4, 2022
Political offices
Preceded by
Nate McConnell (D)
Montana House of Representatives District 89
2018-2019
Succeeded by
Katie Sullivan


Current members of the Montana House of Representatives
Leadership
Speaker of the House:Brandon Ler
Majority Leader:Steve Fitzpatrick
Minority Leader:Katie Sullivan
Representatives
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Ed Byrne (R)
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Paul Tuss (D)
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Mike Fox (D)
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Marc Lee (D)
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District 100
SJ Howell (D)
Republican Party (58)
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