Politics

Can Democrats actually flip this red Kentucky district?

Published

8 months ago

March 13, 2026

Rep. Andy Barr (R-Ky.) has locked down his House district for over a decade. Democrats think his Senate bid presents them an opening in a seat that has raced away from the party.

Kentucky’s 6th District — anchored by Lexington in the heart of the Bluegrass State — hasn’t elected a Democrat to Congress since Ben Chandler in 2010. Barr has held the seat since 2013 and has proven difficult to dislodge. The last time a Democrat came close was in 2018, when fundraising juggernaut Amy McGrath came within about 3 points of defeating him.

But Barr won his last reelection in 2024 by 26 points, outperforming President Donald Trump, who carried the district by 15 points according to calculations from The Downballot.

If Barr had sought another term, Democrats privately concede they stood little chance.

But with Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) retiring and Barr opting to run for his seat, a rare open seat is now in play — and firmly on Democrats’ target list.

In the Democratic primary, two candidates have emerged as frontrunners, according to national Democrats watching the race: Zach Dembo, a Navy veteran and former federal prosecutor, and Cherlynn Stevenson, a former Kentucky state representative. Each is offering a different theory for how to flip the deep-red district.

The question of how a Democrat could win the seat dominated a Democratic primary debate earlier this month, where candidates leaned on sharp criticisms of the Trump administration, ranging from its decision to strike Iran to affordability issues as a result of the president’s tariffs.

Stevenson has branded herself a “Mountain Democrat,” leaning into her Appalachian roots and pitching herself as someone who could mend the disconnect between the party and rural voters by focusing on cost-of-living pressures and access to affordable health care. She said her upbringing in a small mining town in eastern Kentucky and years living in Lexington allow her to bridge the district’s urban-rural divide.

“Winning right here in Kentucky requires cultural fluency and trust,” Stevenson said in an interview. “I know how to talk to working families, rural communities and independents because I am one of those people.”

She’s also got experience flipping seats. She was the first woman and first Democrat elected to represent Kentucky’s 88th state House district, where she also served as state House minority caucus chair.

Dembo, meanwhile, is pitching himself as a “Beshear Democrat” — a nod to Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear, who performed well in the 6th District during his 2023 reelection campaign.

“This is 100 percent a flippable district,” Dembo said in an interview, pointing to headwinds from “all of the terrible decisions of this Republican Congress.”

He has emphasized his experience as a Navy JAG officer and former federal prosecutor, arguing his resume gives him crossover appeal in a Republican-leaning district. Dembo resigned from his position at the Justice Department during Trump’s second term, saying he could no longer remain in his role amid what he described as corruption and the Trump administration’s “abuse of the criminal justice system.”

Both Dembo and Stevenson have posted solid fundraising numbers. And Republicans have a contested primary as well, in a race that includes state Rep. Ryan Dotson and former state Sen. Ralph Alvarado.

“We’re giving Republicans a run for their money in places that they never thought they would have to compete before, and now they do,” said DCCC spokesperson Madison Andrus.

But the race will still be incredibly challenging for Democrats, even though the DCCC has had the seat on its “Red to Blue” battleground list. Kentucky’s federal delegation remains overwhelmingly GOP. The seat also got nominally redder during the post-2022 redistricting process, making it even tougher terrain than during McGrath’s close call in the last Trump administration midterms eight years ago.

Most election watchers believe the seat is well outside the core House battleground as well, and it has not attracted notable outside spending, underscoring how steep the climb would be for Democrats to win even without an incumbent on the ballot.

Republicans dismissed the Democrats’ optimism outright.

“Democrats have been enjoying too much bourbon because their Kentucky 6 wishes are delusional,” said NRCC spokesperson Zach Bannon. “Republicans are poised to keep KY-06 red to retain and expand our majority.”

Politics

Josh Shapiro aims for a strong finish in a campaign with 2028 implications

Published

3 hours ago

October 30, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

POCONO RACEWAY, Pennsylvania — High up in the starting stand of a famed race track, Josh Shapiro waves a black-and-white checkered flag with an unmistakeable meaning: It’s over.

The metaphor isn’t entirely accurate.

“We may have a lead, but you’re coming down this home stretch. People are nipping at your heels,” the Pennsylvania governor told Blue Light News. “You’ve got to run hard.”

Shapiro, the potential 2028 contender and 2024 veepstakes short-lister, does have reasons to be optimistic — and careful.

He’s threatening a double-digit blowout over Stacy Garrity, a candidate backed by President Donald Trump, in the most important swing state in the nation.

He’s also putting his coattails to the test.

None of the other potential 2028 Democratic candidates has more at stake in their own backyard on Tuesday than Shapiro. He doesn’t have California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s map-breaking Proposition 50, designed to beat back the GOP redistricting, nor his platinum email list. He doesn’t have Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker’s billions or Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly’s deep bench of donors or former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg’s large map or the red-state credentials of Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear.

Shapiro is on the brink of flipping four hotly contested congressional seats — and guaranteeing Democrats the House. Pennsylvania Democrats could also take control of the state Senate, including some heavily gerrymandered seats, giving the party a governing trifecta for the first time since 1992.

“I’m not thinking about this as a victory for me,” he told Blue Light News during a swing through the state. “I’m thinking about this as a victory for our country.”

All of which paves the way for him to pass a $15 minimum wage and a raft of other measures that could buttress a 2028 presidential bid.

Shapiro is very much following the Ron DeSantis theory of a presidential primary campaign: demonstrate dominance at home before branching out nationally — a strategy, it should be noted, that didn’t pay off for the Florida governor.

“I think what really hurt DeSantis was that he decided he wasn’t going to announce until after his legislative session, and that was May,” political strategist David Axelrod said. “Time is at a premium. If that’s his plan, that would be a miscalculation.”

Will we see him venture beyond Pennsylvania’s boundaries before the end of the year?

“I don’t know what my plans are,” Shapiro said.

The day had the feeling of both an ending of one campaign and the beginning of another. Even as he urged a midday audience of about 100 people to vote for Paige Cognetti, the Scranton mayor running against Rep. Rob Bresnahan, and Brian Wrightson, the state Senate candidate challenging Sen. Rosemary Brown, he is nationalizing his rhetoric.

“Don’t let Trump take away your hopefulness,” he told people gathered at East Stroudsburg University. “Don’t let him make you feel pessimistic. Don’t let him feel like change can’t come or that we have to look in the rearview mirror for answers. The answers are always straight ahead.”

Then there’s his set piece about the “American dream slipping away.”

He’s broadening out his message beyond the commonwealth.

“I think the work I do here in Pennsylvania, the confidence I give them about their government here can hopefully restore some of their faith in democracy, and I want in our democracy, and I want them to feel like they’ve got power to be able to shape the future of that American dream,” Shapiro told us.

A few hours later, Shapiro materializes inside Salerno’s, a tavern in Old Forge known for its American cheese-topped pizza. He sets a room in which patrons already have had a few too many Rolling Rocks and pumpkin martinis.

On the televisions, his own ad for Wrightson is playing on TV. He grips and grins and backslaps his way through the room.

At the end of the bar, he picks up five pizzas for the road, ducks out the door and boards his bus for another Cognetti rally.

Shapiro’s gubernatorial reelect isn’t drawing the buzz of some of the more razor’s-edge, online Senate races in the waning days of election season. But his project is no less remarkable.

“If we can win enough seats here in Pennsylvania to change the balance of power in Washington and be a check on Donald Trump, then we can both hold the president accountable and get stuff done in Washington,” Shapiro says. “Likewise, here in Pennsylvania, if we can win a trifecta for the first time since Bill Clinton’s election, I can raise wages almost immediately for tens of thousands of Pennsylvanians who are at or below minimum wage and raise wages for others. That’s a concrete thing that we can accomplish.”

At the raceway, he has just finished cutting a video racing around the Pocono Raceway’s Tricky Triangle when he flashes a grin.

“I’ve got a surprise for you,” he says, inviting Blue Light News to the starting stand above the storied three-turn NASCAR track in the Pocono foothills.

Up the stairs, the burnt-orange fall foliage dances on the Pennsylvania horizon. It’s a vantage point Shapiro, as a NASCAR fan, has taken in many times.

Despite the apt setting, he deflects when asked if he’s ready to announce the launch of his campaign.

“If this is a metaphor,” he says, “it’s for finishing the race strong.”

There is just one wrinkle: Before he brandished the black-and-white flag, he picked up a green one, waving it vigorously.

“I think you mis-saw that,” Shapiro said with a smile. “I was waving a checkered flag to finish the governor’s race.”

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