To Denny Rehberg, a former member of Congress seeking the Republican primary nomination in Montana’s deep-red 2nd Congressional District, China isn’t just a competitor of the United States. “It is our enemy,” he said earlier this month.

“I am sure Montanans agree that national security should be at the forefront of our negotiations with China,” Rehberg, who upon leaving the U.S. House in 2013 scored a co-chairman role at the high-powered Washington, D.C., lobbying firm Mercury Public Affairs, told the Treasure State’s Billings Gazette newspaper in May.