A deep-red Tennessee district will host the last special election of 2025 today.
This race shouldn’t be competitive. Yet it has drawn millions of dollars in spending from both parties. A Democratic upset is unlikely, but House Republicans are desperate to juice the margins and allay fears that they’re heading toward defeat next November.
The candidates. GOP Army veteran Matt Van Epps and Democratic state Rep. Aftyn Behn. The seat is vacant because former Rep. Mark Green (R-Tenn.) resigned from Congress earlier this year.
Polls close at 8 p.m. ET. The district includes a slice of Nashville and rural areas spanning from Kentucky to Alabama. President Donald Trump won the district by 22 points in 2024, as did Green. But public and private surveys have shown the race to be much tighter.
Republicans are bracing for the morale hit that comes with a closer-than-expected special election. The timing, coming just days after Thanksgiving, also has them concerned; turnout could be extra hard to predict.
The GOP does have far more persuadable voters. So Democrats can only prevail if enough Republicans stay home.
The messaging. Republicans recognized the danger and brought out the cavalry. Trump backed Van Epps and held a virtual rally for him. Speaker Mike Johnson traveled to the district to campaign for Van Epps.
Van Epps and a constellation of outside groups spent $3.5 million on ads, compared to Democrats’ $2.4 million. Those ads have given a preview of midterm messaging.
Republican ads have cast Behn as a “radical” liberal who brags about attacking ICE agents and wants to offer “sex change operations for minors.”
Meanwhile, Behn has criticized House Republicans’ cuts to rural health care and their hesitance to vote to release the Jeffrey Epstein files.
Behn has tried to keep the focus on affordability. But Republicans have pointed to some of her campaign surrogates to portray her as “too liberal” for the red district.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) joined a virtual rally on Monday and Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) held a town hall with Behn last month. Former Vice President Kamala Harris also spoke at a GOTV event.
