Democrats haven’t given up on a long-standing offensive aim in deeply red Nebraska even if they are currently playing defence in dozens of competitive districts in an effort to limit House losses on Tuesday.
Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb. ), one of the few deal-makers remaining in his more Trumpian party, is facing a tough campaign from state senator Tony Vargas in the Second District, which is focused on Omaha. The contest AWN rates as a toss-up has been swamped with outside expenditure, but it has mostly escaped the national limelight.
Since 2017, Bacon has held the district, which is always fiercely competitive. The historic split of Nebraska’s electoral college votes in 2020, with one going to President Joe Biden and the other four to former President Donald Trump, as well as the consequences of the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision, are cited by Democrats as two reasons they might succeed in flipping a seat that has eluded them.
In an interview, Vargas, a 38-year-old Latino who looks much more millennial than Bacon does, said that the Roe decision “engaged more people, but they’re also seeing a different sort of candidate in this area that we haven’t seen before.”
Though surveys indicate that voters’ concerns about the economy have not been overshadowed by Democrats’ focus on Roe, it is difficult to overlook a national environment that has trended as poorly as Biden’s first midterm has. In addition to Vargas’ track record in the state legislature, Bacon is essentially following the GOP playbook by emphasising crime and inflation while pledging to be a check on Biden following two years of a unified Democratic government.
Redistricting’s unpredictable effects, which have put Bacon in a new situation and left Omaha’s Douglas County intact despite Republican efforts to separate it and turn it into a safe GOP seat, may present Democrats with an opportunity. The district’s demographics as a whole, however, are essentially unaffected because Biden won it by more than 6 points in 2020, which is around the same margin as the seat’s new border boundaries.
“This will definitely be my hardest race to start with, in my opinion. With a race-related interview, Bacon stated, “I felt like I clicked well in Saunders County. Saunders County is a new rural, Republican county added to the district.
Although there hasn’t been a lot of public polling, national organisations and the candidates themselves have the race anywhere from neck-and-neck to Bacon having a slight lead.
“I believe it to be a one-point contest. And it does go back and forth every day. “Bacon-Vargas, bacon-vargas,” declared Jane Kleeb, chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party.
Democrats concede that there are easier GOP targets, such as the Ohio Rep. Steve Chabot, who supports Trump-backed challenges to the 2020 election, and the retiring Michigan Rep. Peter Meijer, whose seat was lost to a candidate to his right in the primary election.
Given anonymity to talk freely, a Democratic strategist active in House contests said that while she was “feel[ing] good]” about the numbers, “part of me is too terrified to get emotionally invested in them.”
Although they’re not sleeping on the race, national Republicans privately admit that their gut feeling is that he’ll win. They’ve sent in GOP muscle, including Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La. ), in an effort to hold the seat, while outside organisations have poured money into hostile TV ads targeting Vargas and Democrats.
Republicans in Nebraska are more overtly optimistic about winning. The race is close, but the district “leans Don Bacon’s way,” according to Nebraska Governor Pete Ricketts, who joined Bacon at a campaign rally for Rep. Mike Flood (R-Neb.) on Wednesday in the Omaha suburb of Papillion.
During an interview at the governor’s residence in Lincoln, Nebraska, Ricketts asserted that Republicans “are generally going to do better” in that district in a non-presidential year.
However, Bacon has experienced his own internal conflicts. GOP voters have criticised him, asking why he collaborated with Democrats to create the infrastructure package that Biden eventually signed. One of the 13 House Republicans who supported it, Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), summed up the importance of the Nebraska Republican by saying, “Infrastructure would not have gone through without Don Bacon.”
Then there is the former president Donald Trump, who criticised Bacon earlier this year at a rally in the region. Then he gave Bacon’s main rival a halfhearted nod and said, “Good luck, Steve, whoever the heck you are.”
With regard to Trump, Bacon is taking a well-worn path of distance from the former president’s language while supporting some of his policies. Both Democrats and Republicans agree that voters in Nebraska’s Second District dislike mean candidates, which, in Bacon’s opinion, discouraged some of them from supporting Trump in 2020.
“Our community has a right lean. They also enjoy consensus-builders because they want people to run the government. They desire some decency,” remarked Bacon.
When asked if he would back the party’s final nominee, even if it were the former president, the Republican legislator indicated he wouldn’t vote for Trump in the 2024 primary, but he paused when asked about the general: “People want to pin me down on the general. I won’t allow myself to be cornered.
Democrats have criticised Bacon’s balancing act on Trump because they see it as a perfect illustration of him pretending to be moderate as his party moves to the right while basically supporting Trump’s policy positions.
