Raymond Jon Tester was born on August 21, 1956, in Havre, Montana. He served as a United States Senator from Montana from 2007 to 2025. At age nine, he lost three fingers in a meat-grinding accident.

After receiving a bachelor's degree in music from the College of Great Falls in 1978, he returned to Big Sandy to teach music in elementary school while also operating a custom butcher shop and operating the family farm. For the last 48 years he and his wife Sharla farm the land that was homesteaded by his grandparents in 1910.

Tester began his political career on the Big Sandy Soil Conservation Board followed by 9 years on the Big Sandy school board before being first elected to the Montana Senate in 1998. He rose through Democratic leadership, becoming minority whip in 2001, minority leader in 2003, and president of the Montana Senate in 2005.

In 2006, Tester won the Democratic primary by more than 25 percentage points and went on to defeat Republican incumbent Conrad Burns in one of the closest Senate races that year. He won reelection in 2012 and 2018, with his 2018 victory marking the first time he crossed the 50% threshold. He lost his 2024 reelection bid.

During his Senate tenure, Tester established himself as a political moderate, and is most proud of his record on veterans, public education, production agriculture, defense and infrastructure funding. He currently works as a political analyst for MSNBC, host of the podcast Grounded with Jon Tester and Maritsa Georgiou, and a policy consultant.