Industry groups spending millions fighting Montana tobacco and mining measures

Industry-funded opponents of Montana citizen’s initiatives to raise the state’s tobacco tax and add new mining regulations are vastly outspending the measures’ supporters to put their messages in front of voters about a month before Election Day, according to campaign finance reports.

One ballot initiative would raise taxes on cigarettes and snuff for the first time since 2005, and tax vaping products for the first time ever. One tobacco giant in particular, Altria, is spending millions of dollars to flood the state’s airwaves with ads to defeat the initiative after successfully lobbying against a similar measure killed by the Montana Legislature in 2017.

https://www.greatfallstribune.com/story/news/2018/10/03/industry-groups-spending-millions-fighting-montana-measures/1513439002/