Republican Matt Van Epps has won a hotly contested special election for a deep-red congressional seat in Tennessee, NBC News projects, seeing off a Democratic challenge for the longtime GOP district.
Though Donald Trump carried the 7th Congressional District by 22 points in 2024, Republican super PACs poured millions into defending the seat as Van Epps faced off against Aftyn Behn, a Democratic state representative. Democrats spent almost as much trying to capture it, as Trump’s political standing has taken a hit this year and the Democratic Party made gains in November elections in New Jersey, Virginia and other states.
But Democrats did significantly cut the GOP margin in the district from just a year ago. With most of the expected vote counted, Van Epps had a 9-point districtwide lead. It continues a pattern of Democrats making big gains in elections this year compared to the 2024 results.
They were able to spread the district out to the sticks to get more Republicans and dilute democratic votes. It’s a recent district. They basically sliced Nashville into thirds and included more County Americans and white flight bedroom communities.
The formerly-blue district around Nashville, yes, that was butchered and extended out to the sticks to get R votes. But in doing so, you also put more blue voters into those red districts. If you push it too much, a big enough blue shift in those now-kinda purple districts can get multiple Dem districts - all when you tried to take away the one.