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Author Archives: Jim Ellis
Pennsylvania’s Rep. Evans to Retire; Rep. Johnson Enters Governor’s Race
By Jim Ellis — Thursday, July 3, 2025
After a long period of stability regarding House open seats, three new member announcements occurred just this week.
We covered Rep. Don Bacon’s (R-NE) retirement decision yesterday, and now we see Rep. Dwight Evans (D-PA) also headed for retirement and South Dakota at-large Rep. Dusty Johnson (R) declaring his candidacy for Governor.
PA-3
Five-term Rep. Dwight Evans (D-Philadelphia)
Pennsylvania’s 3rd District is fully contained in Philadelphia County and splits Philadelphia city with Rep. Brendan Boyle’s (D) 2nd District. PA-3 is heavily Democratic, so Rep. Evans’ successor will be decided in the 2026 Democratic primary.
According to the Dave’s Redistricting App statisticians, the district’s partisan lean is 90.3D – 8.3R, obviously making it the safest Democratic district in the state. Not surprisingly, President Trump ran poorly here, losing to Kamala Harris in 2024 with an 88-11 percentage spread. In 2020, the gap was even larger as President Biden carried the district with a 90-9 percent margin.
The district is 51 percent Black, making it the only voting age population majority minority congressional seat in Pennsylvania. With a 3rd District voter registration of 77.8% Democratic and 10.0 percent Republican, a crowded Dem primary is expected and will decide which individual succeeds Rep. Evans. Next year’s Keystone State primary is scheduled for May 19.
SD-AL
On Monday, four-term at-large South Dakota Rep. Dusty Johnson (R-Mitchell) announced that he will enter the 2026 Governor’s race next year, a move that had been expected. In fact, Johnson’s move was so widely telegraphed that state Attorney General Marty Jackley (R) declared he would run to succeed the Congressman even before the official gubernatorial campaign announcement occurred.
The South Dakota Republican primary will be interesting in that Rep. Johnson is likely headed for a match against the now-sitting Republican Governor, Larry Rhoden. Once then-Gov. Kristi Noem resigned to become US Homeland Security Secretary, Rhoden, then the state’s Lieutenant Governor, ascended into the state’s chief executive position.
While he has not yet formally announced if he will run for Governor, it is expected that Rhoden will soon declare his official candidacy. Also in the race is state House Speaker Jon Hansen (R-Dell Rapids) and wealthy conservative businessman Toby Doeden.
The South Dakota Republican primary, scheduled for June 2 next year, will very likely decide the state’s next Governor. The last time Democrats claimed the Mt. Rushmore State Governorship was in the 1974 election.
Additionally, South Dakota is a runoff state. If no primary candidate receives at least 35 percent of the vote, a secondary election will be held. Next year, the runoff date, if necessary, will be July 28.
Johnson was first elected to the House in 2018 after serving as former Gov. Dennis Daugaard’s chief of staff. His first elected office, attained at age 28, was for a seat on the South Dakota Public Utilities Commission.
Considering the latest developments, the House open seat count now moves to 19, with 10 Democratic and 9 Republican seats in the category.
Three of the opens, because of Reps. Raul Grijalva (D-AZ), Sylvester Turner (D-TX), and Gerry Connolly (D-VA) passing away, will be filled in special elections later this year. Replacements for the remaining 16 seats will be decided during the regular election cycle.
Tennessee Rep. Mark Green (R-Clarksville) says he will resign from the House once the “One Big Beautiful Bill” is enacted. When he leaves Congress, the open seat count will rise to 20.
In those 16 regular election open seats, only three are coming because the incumbent is retiring from elective politics. Seven members are running for US Senate and six, like Rep. Johnson, are competing in their state’s respective gubernatorial election.
NE-2: Rep. Don Bacon to Retire
By Jim Ellis — Wednesday, July 2, 2025
House
Five-term Nebraska Rep. Don Bacon (R-Papillion/Omaha)
At his media event, according to Fox News’s reporting, Rep. Bacon said, “After 30 years in the Air Force and 10 years in Congress, it’s time to spend my future with the love of my life, our four kids, and our wonderful grandchildren. Thank you, Nebraska!”
The Cornhusker State’s 2nd District has attracted a great deal of attention in the last two presidential election years. Like Maine, Nebraska apportions its electoral votes meaning that each congressional district – the state has three – casts its own vote as opposed to the winner-take-all process that the other 48 states utilize.
In both 2020 and 2024, NE-2 voted for the Democratic nominee against President Trump, thus awarding one of Nebraska’s five electoral votes to the opposite party’s national candidate. Naturally, this history suggests the open 2nd District could become the House Democrats’ top national conversion target in the 2026 election.
In the 2024 election, Kamala Harris topped President Trump by 14,636 votes in the 2nd District, but Rep. Bacon rebounded from the Republican top of the ticket loss to win re-election with a 5,829 vote spread. Four years earlier in the 2020 election, President Biden captured the 2nd District with a 22,091-vote margin, yet Rep. Bacon again rebounded to win re-election, this time by almost reversing the presidential deficit. He defeated Democrat Kara Eastman with a 15,365-vote spread.
The 2nd District is comprised of Douglas (Omaha) and Saunders counties along with approximately 25 percent of Sarpy County. Douglas County, however, is becoming more Democratic as further evidenced when John Ewing Jr. (D) ousted three-term Omaha Mayor Jean Stothert (R) earlier this year.
For a different Republican to keep the 2nd District, he or she will have to emulate Rep. Bacon’s totals in Douglas County to secure victory. No Republican has recently carried Douglas, but the new GOP nominee will have to keep the deficit margin within the district’s largest county to the same level as did Rep. Bacon.
For example, in the 2024 election, President Trump lost the county by 27,814 votes, Sen. Deb Fischer (R) suffered a much larger Douglas County defeat (46,101 votes), and even Senator and former Gov. Pete Ricketts trailed in the county by 14,530 ballots while scoring a strong 63-37 percent victory statewide. In the 2022 election, Gov. Jim Pillen (R) also lost the county, down 9,492 votes yet won the statewide tally with a 59-36 percent margin.
In 2024, Rep. Bacon found himself down 10,314 votes in Douglas County, 4,692 in 2022, and 1,597 in 2020 yet repeatedly won the 2nd CD. Therefore, for the next Republican nominee to hold the seat, the vote deficit level coming from Douglas County must be aligned with Rep. Bacon’s performance and no other Republican candidate.
In the past two elections, then-state Sen. Tony Vargas (D-Omaha) unsuccessfully challenged Rep. Bacon. It was clear after him losing again in 2024, especially with Harris carrying the seat in the same vote, that the Democratic leadership would move to a new candidate in 2026.
At this point, and the list will now likely grow, four Democrats have announced their candidacies, led by state Sen. John J. Cavanaugh, IV (D-Omaha), whose father, John J. Cavanaugh III, (D) held the congressional seat for two terms during the 1977-81 period. The others are attorney John Argyrakis, surgeon Mark Johnston, and political consultant Denise Powell.
On the Republican side, two names are surfacing early as potential candidates, those of Douglas County Sheriff Aaron Hanson and former state Sen. Brett Lindstrom.
The 2nd District race will again be expensive. Counting all candidate and external spending in 2024, an aggregate $34 million-plus was spent. In an open seat contest, expect that total expenditure figure to grow.
Rep. Bacon’s announcement means there are 17 (8R; 9D) open US House seats headed into the next election, but his is only the second retirement. Three members have passed away and the other 12 are leaving the House to run for another office.
Turning to the Senate, two-term Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) announcing his retirement over the weekend means seven seats will be open in the 2026 election. In that body only one member, Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), is leaving to run for another office. The rest are retiring from politics.
Review: House Open Seats
By Jim Ellis — Tuesday, July 1, 2025
House
The next House election cycle will again conclude with few seats changing hands, and one party or the other controlling the chamber in 2027 with only a small margin.
To date, there are only 16 open House seats for the next election, and three of those are due to the incumbent member passing away. Therefore, the AZ-7 (Raul Grijalva), TX-18 (Sylvester Turner), and VA-11 (Gerry Connally) seats will be filled later this year in special elections.
Regarding the 13 announced open seats for the regular 2026 election (7R; 6D), only one, IL-9 (Rep. Jan Schakowsky-D), derives from a true retirement. The other dozen incumbents will leave the House to seek another elective office.
While the open seat number is sure to grow as candidate filing deadlines approach (beginning in December), we are still unlikely to see a plethora of House campaigns without an incumbent running in political prime time next year.
Therefore, the open count provides a further clue toward seeing a House election cycle that will again conclude with few seats changing hands, and one party or the other controlling the chamber in 2027 with only a small margin.
At this point, we see an additional five members who are soon to announce bids for other offices:
- MI-4: Michigan Rep. Bill Huizenga (R-Holland), against the wishes of the national and state Republican Party leadership, looks to soon announce that he will challenge former Representative and 2024 US Senate nominee Mike Rogers for the open Republican US Senate nomination.
Huizenga would begin a Senate campaign in an underdog position for the primary, and his open southwestern Michigan congressional seat would become hotly contested in the general election. - NJ-11: Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-Montclair) is the Democratic gubernatorial nominee for the 2025 New Jersey statewide election. If she wins, and the Congresswoman is rated as an early favorite for the November vote, her 11th CD will go to a 2026 special election. Should she lose the Governor’s race, Rep. Sherrill would be eligible to return and seek re-election.
- NY-21: Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY), who was nominated as US Ambassador to the United Nations only to see her appointment pulled back in fear of the GOP losing her congressional seat in a special election, now looks perched to announce a bid for Governor.
With incumbent Kathy Hochul (D) posting poor job approval numbers and facing at least one strong Democratic primary opponent, a credible Republican’s chance to win the Governorship, while still a reach, appears better than in most election cycles. Even if she runs and loses, Rep. Stefanik would likely then be in line for another Trump appointment. - SC-1: South Carolina Congresswoman Nancy Mace (R-Charleston) is close to making an official gubernatorial announcement.
The three-term House member has been confirming for months that she is considering the open statewide race and when Attorney General Alan Wilson declared his gubernatorial candidacy earlier this week, Rep. Mace came out swinging, publicly attacking him as being “soft on crime.” Her swift response and comments are a discernible clue that she will soon officially enter the statewide campaign. - SC-5: Another South Carolina Congressman, Rep. Ralph Norman (R-Rock Hill), is scheduling a “special announcement” for July 27, which is a clear signal that he, too, will run for Governor.
Assuming AG Wilson and the two House members all compete for the GOP nomination, a highly competitive Republican primary battle would transpire, culminating next June. Should no one obtain majority support in the June 11, 2026 primary, the top two finishers will participate in a runoff election two weeks later on June 25. The eventual GOP nominee will have the inside track to succeed retiring Gov. Henry McMaster (R).
There are several more members who have confirmed they are considering running for a different office but to date have yet to make any discernible move toward developing a statewide campaign. The Representatives in this category are:
- Barry Moore (R-AL-1) — Senate
- Rich McCormick (R-GA-7) — Senate
- Mike Collins (R-GA-10) — Senate
- Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA-14) — Governor
- Darin LaHood (R-IL-16) — Governor
- Ritchie Torres (D-NY-15) — Governor
- Dan Meuser (R-PA-9) — Governor
- Harriet Hageman (R-WY-AL) — Governor
In the past, the following members have been mentioned as possible statewide candidates but are now considered unlikely prospects:
- Cory Mills (R-FL-7) — Senate
- Jared Moskowitz (D-FL-23) — Governor
- Carlos Gimenez (R-FL-28) — Mayor of Miami-Dade County
- Mike Lawler (R-NY-17) — Governor
NC Sen. Thom Tillis to Retire;
VA-11 Special General Election Set
By Jim Ellis — Monday, June 30, 2025
North Carolina
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) / Photo by Gage Skidmore
North Carolina was already going to host one of the most competitive races in the country considering its history of often posting close election results. It was also clear that Sen. Tillis was the top incumbent Republican target.
While the state’s perennial competitiveness factor isn’t changing, the candidate list will now be very different than expected. To date, Sen. Tillis was drawing only minor Republican primary opposition, though, that would have changed with President Trump pledging to find a GOP candidate to oppose him, while Democrats are working to attract a big name nominee.
Democrats already have former Rep. Wiley Nickel as an announced candidate. Nickel passed on re-election to a second term in a restructured 13th District seat and instead declared in 2023 that he would run for the Senate. Irrespective of Nickel’s status, the Democratic leadership has been trying to recruit former Gov. Roy Cooper into the Senate race, and we will soon see if the Tillis retirement spurs a decision from the former state chief executive.
In addition to its two Republican Senators, North Carolina has 10 statewide elected offices and both parties each hold five offices. The more prominent state officials, i.e., Governor, Lieutenant Governor, and Attorney General, are all Democrats, however.
Sen. Tillis’s retirement will change the North Carolina and national political situation for both parties, and this open Senate race will be one of the 2026 election cycle’s key focal points.
VA-11
Local Northern Virginia Democratic and Republican parties hosted their “firehouse primaries” on Saturday that produced special general election candidates to replace the late Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Fairfax) who passed away in March.
For the Democrats, who dominate Virginia’s 11th Congressional District, Fairfax County Supervisor James Walkinshaw (who received the Connolly family’s endorsement and had served for 11 years as Rep. Connolly’s chief of staff) was easily nominated in Saturday’s primary, capturing 60 percent of the vote. State Delegate Irene Shin (D-Herndon) was a distant second with 14.3 percent while state Sen. Stella Pekarsky (D-Centreville) attracted 13.4 percent.
On the Republican side, former FBI agent and Iraq War veteran Stewart Whitson was the plurality “firehouse primary” winner, though GOP turnout, as expected within this overwhelmingly Democratic district, was only a fraction of their political rivals’. According to the Fairfax County local news site, Inside NOVA, 37,624 voters participated in the Democratic firehouse primary as opposed to the Republicans’ 2,601 ballots cast.
The “firehouse primary” is a creation of Virginia politics. In this system, all voters may participate but the polling place locations are very limited, making it more difficult to vote than the usual process of simply going to one’s regular precinct voting site.
Walkinshaw and Whitson now advance to the Sept. 9 special general election that will be held under regular logistics where voters cast their ballots at the precinct polling place. An early voting process will also be offered.
Clearly, in a district with a Dave’s Redistricting App partisan lean calculation of 67.2D – 30.7R (Trump ’24: 31.4 percent), Walkinshaw becomes the prohibitive favorite to replace Connolly.
The Virginia election is the first of the four special elections that we will see in the coming months.
The next special nomination contest will occur in Arizona when voters in the Tucson area will select general election candidates to replace the late Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Tucson) who also passed away in March.
The late Congressman’s daughter, former Pima County Supervisor Adelita Grijalva (D) is the clear favorite to win the special Democratic primary on July 15. The special general will be conducted on Sept. 23. As in VA-11, Arizona’s 7th CD is heavily Democratic (DRA partisan lean: 65.5D – 32.3R; (Trump ’24: 38.4 percent).
Houston voters will participate in a jungle primary concurrent with the Texas municipal elections on Nov. 4 to begin to select a replacement for the late Rep. Sylvester Turner (D-Houston), the third member to pass away in March.
In that election, voters will choose from a large developing field including candidates from all parties and those running as Independents. If no one receives majority support in the initial election, Gov. Greg Abbott (R) will then schedule a special runoff vote. The Dave’s Redistricting App partisan lean in this district is also overwhelmingly Democratic, 73.6D – 24.4R (Trump ’24: 29.4 percent), making TX-18 the Lone Star State’s second-safest Democratic seat.
The fourth special election will occur at some point in Tennessee. Rep. Mark Green (R-Clarksville) said he will resign from the House after the President’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” in fully enacted. Once the resignation is official, Gov. Bill Lee (R) will then schedule the replacement special election.
Unlike the other three vacant, or soon-to-be vacant, seats, TN-7 is safely Republican. The partisan lean in this western Tennessee district is 55.1R – 42.1D (Trump ’24: 60.4 percent).
Wisconsin Supreme Court Says No
Wisconsin Congressional Districts
By Jim Ellis — Friday, June 27, 2025
Redistricting
In a surprising turn of events, the Wisconsin state Supreme Court justices announced that the panel will not hear the Democratic cases that were petitioning for a re-drawing of the state’s congressional districts.
Before the 2024 election, the Badger State high court ordered changes for the state Assembly and Senate boundaries but simultaneously refused to alter the congressional map. Considering that at least two of the justices said during their respective campaigns that the congressional map should be re-drawn, the 2023 pronouncement was eyebrow raising. The same decision from a slightly different 4D-3R court came as a shock to most.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) has called his state legislature into a late July special session, and it is presumed he will add the congressional redistricting issue to the extraordinary session agenda. Ohio, as their state law mandates, also must re-draw its congressional map, and a US Supreme Court ruling before the end of this month may result in the Louisiana congressional map being reconstructed.
All of this judicial action likely favoring Republicans at least to a degree, seemed to bolster the chances of Wisconsin also reconfiguring its eight-district federal plan as the Democrats wished.
Seven-term Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Town of Vermont/Madison) summed up the feeling of many Democrats when he said to an Associated Press reporter in response to the court’s announcement that, “it’s good that Wisconsin has fair maps at the state level, but we deserve them at the federal level as well. Unfortunately, gerrymandered maps for members of Congress will remain in Wisconsin.”
Democrats such as Rep. Pocan believe the map is out of balance from a partisan perspective because a domain that typically returns very close statewide election results yields a 6R-2D congressional map. They proclaim, according to the AP story, that the congressional map “violates the state constitution’s requirement that all Wisconsin residents be treated equally.”
This partisan gerrymandering argument has rarely succeeded because the claimants suggest that people who voluntarily join a political party should be given the same civil rights protections that minority groups enjoy.
The rejoinder argument is that two of the six Wisconsin Republican seats are highly competitive. Rep. Bryan Steil’s (R-Janesville) southeastern 1st District carries a partisan lean of 49.4R – 48.3D according to the Dave’s Redistricting App statisticians, but the Congressman has won twice under this district configuration with a pair of 54 percent victories.
In the state’s western 3rd District that Democrat Ron Kind represented for 26 years before Republican Derrick Van Orden (R-Prairie du Chien/La Crosse) won the seat in a 2022 open contest, saw the new incumbent scoring successively tight 51.3 and 51.8 percent victories to flip the seat. Dave’s Redistricting App calculates the 3rd District partisan lean at 48.9D – 48.5R. Thus, the Democrats’ argument that these two districts are gerrymandered Republican seats has been hard to sell.
Despite the Wisconsin map not being re-drawn, we can expect to again see hard fought campaigns in Districts 1 and 3, and each could flip. Democrats may have a harder time finding a strong candidate to oppose Rep. Steil because he has already beaten some of the top Democrats in the region as was the case in November when he turned back former Rep. Peter Barca, but the district can still go either way.
The candidate story is different in District 3. In 2024, businesswoman Rebecca Cooke (D) came within 2.7 percentage points of upsetting Rep. Van Orden. She will face Democratic primary competition in 2026 from Eau Claire City Council President Emily Berge and Eau Claire City Councilwoman Laura Benjamin so her path to renomination must overcome partisan obstacles.
Cooke, however, now armed with such diverse ideological Democratic endorsements from the House Blue Dog PAC, which is the more moderate internal party organization, and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) from the far left faction, still must be considered the presumed favorite for the Democratic nomination.
Redistricting notwithstanding, Wisconsin will be an important US House battleground state in 2026. Republicans, however, are now breathing a sigh of relief while Democrats are expressing continued disappointment at the state Supreme Court’s most recent redistricting action.
An Early Redistricting Cycle
By Jim Ellis — Thursday, June 26, 2025
Redistricting
Putting together the redistricting puzzle
It has been long assumed that the Wisconsin state Supreme Court justices would re-draw the congressional boundaries before the 2026 election. After the Democrats secured their high court majority before the 2024 election, the members reconfigured the state Assembly and Senate as a way to “rectify the Republican majority’s partisan gerrymander.” Surprisingly, the court did not follow suit to simultaneously change the congressional district map. It is probable they will take such action soon.
It is believed that a majority of the court justices, as at least two publicly stated when campaigning for their position, see the current 6R-2D congressional map as constituting a partisan gerrymander. It is expected that the justices will assign a special master to draw districts that would bring the partisan ratio to 4-4, which could mean Reps. Bryan Steil (R-Janesville) and Derrick Van Orden (R-Prairie du Chien/La Crosse) might lose their seats while threatening the very tight US House Republican majority.
The state of Ohio is also preparing for a re-draw, but not because of a partisan gerrymandering. Under Ohio election law, plans must pass both houses of the legislature with three-fifths of the voting members. Because the 2021 congressional plan was adopted with only majority support, the map would only be in effect for two succeeding elections, 2022 and 2024. Therefore, in order to comply with state law, the Ohio redistricting commission, comprised of elected officials, and the legislature must again embark upon the redistricting process.
Republicans hold a 10-5 advantage in the congressional delegation with two of the Democratic seats, District 9 (Rep. Marcy Kaptur; 48.3 – 47.6 percent 2024 election result) and District 13 (Rep. Emilia Sykes; 51.1 – 48.9 percent), being very tight from a partisan perspective. The weakest Republican showing in the last election came from Rep. Max Miller (R-Rocky River; 51.1 – 36.1 percent). Excluding Rep. Miller’s 51 percent tally, the remaining nine Republicans averaged 65.2 percent of the vote.
With Republicans generally in charge of the redistricting process expect moves to make the Kaptur and Sykes’ districts more Republican.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) has called a special legislative session to begin July 21. Because Texas only has a short 140-day legislative session every other year, it has been commonplace after the last few sessions to bring the members back into an extra session to complete unfinished business.
Under Texas law, the Governor has sole authority to call a special session, but the legislative period can only consume 30 days. It is possible for the Governor to call additional sessions if more time is needed. Also importantly, it is only the Governor who sets the agenda for the legislative session. It is widely believed that Gov. Abbott will add congressional redistricting to this particular legislative special session.
Each of the three states has a unique reason for conducting a mid-decade redistricting session. In Texas’ case, it is because excessive growth has made several districts severely overpopulated.
Using the US Census Bureau’s mid-decade population estimates, Texas has grown in population by a 7.2 percent rate since the 2020 census was concluded. During this same time period, the national growth rate is 2.6 percent. The Texas number translates into over 1.2 million more people living in the state since the last Census. Should this trend continue, the Texas population will swell by over 4 million more people by 2030 when compared to 2020.
Therefore, the growth numbers account for the early estimated national reapportionment calculations that suggest Texas could gain an additional four congressional seats for the next decade. Hence, the Governor and legislative leaders will again redistrict to more equitably distribute the state’s major raw number growth figure throughout its current 38 congressional districts.
The Texas congressional delegation stands at 25R-13D; therefore, it would not be surprising to see the GOP dominated legislature attempt to expand the Republican position within the current congressional delegation through the redistricting session.