Politics

Why so many incumbents lost primaries this year

Published

41 minutes ago

September 10, 2026

It’s been a bad year to be an incumbent.

Rhode Island Gov. Dan McKee’s ouster on Wednesday, the first primary defeat for an incumbent governor in eight years, caps off a primary season that’s seen longtime leaders fall across the map and politicians across both parties struggle to make the leap to higher office.

Thirteen members of Congress have lost their reelection bids: seven Democrats and six Republicans, including two GOP senators. At least 16 more who were trying to move from the House to the Senate or take on statewide office have lost primaries: nine Republicans and seven Democrats, including Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet who unsuccessfully ran for governor.

The upheaval has been driven by a confluence of factors that will continue to dog incumbents through November. Voters are frustrated with both parties’ leadership in Washington. President Donald Trump has targeted some GOP foes as he looks to cement his legacy; Democrats are in the midst of pitched generational and ideological battles. Some members in both parties faced daunting new district lines. Others faced scandals that sank them.

In some races, those factors converged. Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.) didn’t benefit much from her years in Washington in her Senate bid — and lost her primary to a left-flank rival who yoked her to the party establishment.

Caitlin Legacki, who advised Stevens’ bid, said incumbents’ losses this year show voters are simply fed up.

“It speaks to the high level of dissatisfaction that voters have with everyone,” said Legacki, who noted the anti-incumbent climate contributed to Stevens’ loss. “It’s a major ‘throw the bums out’ moment.”

DEMS KICK INCUMBENTS TO THE CURB

Democrats disillusioned with their leadership in Washington are taking it out on the party’s rank and file.

Progressives picked off more-moderate House members from New York to Colorado. Younger challengers ousted older incumbents from Texas to Connecticut. Local elected officials outran Washington incumbents. And voters have spurned lawmakers seeking higher office from Michigan to Minnesota.

Sometimes age was the biggest factor, sometimes it was ideology and sometimes both played a role. Democratic socialists defeated decades-older Reps. Diana DeGette of Colorado and Rep. Adriano Espaillat of New York. Former Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin relied on generational change to topple longtime Rep. John Larson in Connecticut.

THE TRUMP FACTOR

For Republicans, Trump played a major role in directing voters against his longstanding Washington foes.

Trump-backed challengers wiped MAGA irritants Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-Louisiana) and Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) off the map. And the president’s late-stage endorsement of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in the Senate runoff helped sink Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas).

REDISTRICTING RIPPLE EFFECTS

The unusual mid-decade gerrymandering war took out members of both parties, who lost competitive races in less favorable districts, ran for other offices or switched parties to avoid similar fates.

Texas Democratic Rep. Al Green was ousted by Rep. Christian Menefee in a member-on-member primary forced by gerrymandering that played on their generational divide.

Democratic Rep. Julie Johnson lost her redrawn Dallas-area district to former Rep. Colin Allred, while Rep. Dan Crenshaw’s right-flank challenger leveraged the redraw (as well as some of Crenshaw’s breaks with Trump) to oust the Republican.

Others chose to retire rather than keep fighting uphill battles. Democratic Reps. Steve Cohen of Tennessee (who had already been facing a generational primary challenge before the redraw), Lloyd Doggett of Texas and Cleo Fields of Louisiana hung it up after Republicans dismantled their districts. So did GOP Reps. Darrell Issa of California and Burgess Owens of Utah after their districts were redrawn. California Rep. Kevin Kiley, who opposed the mid-decade gerrymanders and switched from GOP to independent after his district was redrawn, said the new maps have unleashed “chaos” on the House and “reduced the quality of representation in Congress.”

SWEPT OUT BY SCANDAL

Call it the midterms of controversy: Incumbents in both parties have succumbed to the political pressures of their scandals this year.

Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell ended his run for California governor and exited Congress amid sexual assault and misconduct allegations. Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-Texas) dropped his reelection bid and resigned after admitting to having an affair with a staffer who later killed herself.

Tennessee GOP Rep. Andy Ogles, despite his Trump endorsement, couldn’t overcome his past controversies, a newly redrawn district and outside spending. Republican Florida Rep. Cory Mills faced attacks over probes of his conduct from primary winner Ryan Elijah. Elijah told Blue Light News this week that he believed Mills’ controversies collided with voters’ anti-incumbent angst.

“We ran on our merits, but trust was a factor,” Elijah said. “I think trust was the biggest factor.”

HIGHER OFFICE FLAMEOUTS

Several congressional Democrats struggled to outmatch opponents without Washington ties in Senate primaries. Bennet, Stevens and Reps. Angie Craig (D-Minn.), Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas), Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) and Robin Kelly (D-Ill.) all lost statewide primaries to rivals who hadn’t served in D.C.

Voters haven’t been kind to GOP representatives seeking higher office either. Reps. Randy Feenstra of Iowa, Dusty Johnson of South Dakota and Nancy Mace and Ralph Norman of South Carolina all lost their gubernatorial bids. Voters rejected Norman twice: He also lost the snap primary for Lindsey Graham’s seat to the late senator’s sister — a total political newcomer. Texas Rep. Chip Roy also lost a runoff for state attorney general.

Politics

Dan McKee becomes first governor in 8 years to lose primary

Published

10 hours ago

September 10, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Rhode Island Democratic Gov. Dan McKee became the first governor in eight years in the U.S. to lose a primary, falling on Wednesday to former CVS executive Helena Foulkes and becoming the latest victim of a rough year for incumbents.

McKee’s campaign was bogged down by the botched handling of a years-long project to rebuild the Washington Bridge, which transports more than 70,000 drivers through Providence each day. The project has suffered from delays, cost overruns and disputes between state officials and former contractors that have raised questions about transparency and accountability for the project.

Foulkes spent much of the primary hammering McKee over his handling of the bridge project — a strategy that ultimately proved successful.

McKee had partially closed the bridge in 2023, and estimated at the time that it would fully reopen this summer. But last year, he said the bridge likely won’t be completed until 2028. Construction began in June.

Throughout his campaign, McKee continued to insist that the bridge project was handled well. He told The New York Times in August that “people are going to realize we did the right thing.”

The last incumbent governor to lose a primary was Kansas Gov. Jeff Colyer in 2018. McKee’s loss Wednesday adds to the substantial list of Democratic incumbents ousted in primary challenges, though this race didn’t feature the same generational and ideological contrasts as other primaries that have felled Democrats this cycle. Foulkes and McKee, both baby boomers, both ran center-left campaigns.

Foulkes’ victory adds a chapter to her family’s long political lineage. Her grandfather, Thomas J. Dodd, and her uncle, Chris Dodd, were both senators from Connecticut. She worked as an executive at CVS for over 25 years before launching a 2022 run for governor.

McKee won that round, but she got the final word on Wednesday.

Politics

Republicans are partying in Dallas. Just don’t ask them about affordability.

Published

11 hours ago

September 9, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

DALLAS — Republicans are panicking that President Donald Trump’s policies are drowning out their cost-of-living message — and that it may be too close to the election to fix it.

GOP lawmakers and candidates woke up in Texas on Wednesday to an alarming reality: Trump deepening his trade war with Canada as oil hit $100 per barrel, following new military strikes against Iran.

Publicly, Republicans plan to downplay their latest woes — or blame the Democrats. But several of them at the midterm convention this week are privately strategizing with GOP leaders and Trump administration officials to shore up vulnerable candidates in battlegrounds and in states the president won by double digits in 2024.

Vice President JD Vance is scheduled to address a breakfast Thursday with the delegations from Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Wisconsin, where Republicans are eager to hear how he will navigate the party’s economic woes, according to three people with direct knowledge of the matter, granted anonymity to share private plans. Others are pushing to use the convention to reclaim the cost of living issue that’s haunting Republicans after it buoyed them two years ago, planning to argue in their speeches that their party can still be trusted to bring down prices.

In a closed-door meeting Wednesday, a group of top senators and candidates in tough races — including Sen. Jon Husted (R-Ohio), North Carolina Senate nominee Michael Whatley and Georgia Republican Senate nominee Rep. Mike Collins — huddled with leaders from the Senate GOP-aligned super PAC met to discuss a battleground map increasingly under pressure as the party tries to fend off voters’ ire around the economy.

“You can’t hide the fact of what the price of gasoline is, we know that,” Collins told Blue Light News in an interview after the closed-door meeting, as he reiterated his support for Trump’s efforts to neutralize Iran as a nuclear threat, arguing that the U.S. has long been at war with Iran but “we’re putting an end to it with this president.”

Many Republicans didn’t want to talk about economic concerns amid the party at the American Airlines Center in Dallas, where MAGA hats cost $47 (a discount from the $55 online) and water went for $8 a bottle.

“We are going the wrong direction,” said one GOP lawmaker attending the convention granted anonymity, like others in this story, to speak candidly of the spiraling economic indicators and the challenges they were creating. “We don’t have a lot of time left.”

Senior Republicans are quietly dismayed about the pileup of Trump economic moves that have rattled voters and key industries in their states — including the worsening trade war with Canada that threatens the auto and farm sectors in the Midwest, his step to import more foreign beef ahead of the midterms that’s infuriated ranchers and farmers from Texas to Iowa, along with spiking oil prices amid the war in Iran that are cutting across the map.

“We’re putting Iowa in play,” one frustrated senior House Republican said on the sidelines of the convention of the Senate map. “We’re putting Texas in play. They shouldn’t be.”

The one advantage they have: money. Battleground Republicans and GOP leaders have been itching for Trump to unleash his massive war chest to help them fend off Democratic attacks over voters’ concerns about gas and everyday costs among the ongoing war. Trump’s orbit started to make good on its promises Wednesday morning, doling out millions in spending for key Senate races through an affiliated Super PAC known as No Going Back PAC Inc., two people with direct knowledge of the matter confirmed.

But Republicans know that campaign funds can’t solve everything.

“We got to talk about the issues that people are dealing with. Families can’t afford their house, they can’t afford the food, they can’t afford health care, they can’t afford child care,” Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) said in an interview in the convention hall.

He placed most of the onus on Congress to tackle those issues and cut spending, but admitted Trump’s war with Iran had economic consequences.

“We have higher gas prices now as a result of the president trying to keep us safe as a result of what Iran wants to do,” Scott said. “So that’s hopefully a short-term problem that he’s going to deal with by destroying the regime.”

In a statement, White House spokesperson Olivia Wales argued that Democrats “created the affordability crisis.”

“President Trump has spent every day in office working to undo their mess and lower costs for working families by signing the largest middle class tax cuts in history, lowering the cost of prescription drugs, permanently expanding the child tax credit, fueling wage growth, and reshoring American manufacturing to create more high paying jobs,” Wales said.

Natalie Baldassarre, a spokesperson for the RNC, similarly blamed Democrats for surging prices, adding that “Republicans are cutting taxes, lowering drug prices, and putting money back in families’ pockets.”

Several Republicans plan to use their convention addresses to blame their Democratic opponents for voters’ price pains and argue it’s Republicans who are putting more money in Americans’ pockets — like Mike LiPetri, who’s running to unseat Democratic Rep. Tom Suozzi in New York. Others plan to paint a rosier picture of the economy than many voters say is the case right now.

That’s been a hard message for Republicans to sell. An August Blue Light News Poll shows that a 34% plurality of Americans hold Trump fully responsible for the state of the current U.S. economy, compared with just 17% who say the same for former President Joe Biden.

And the very real time crunch — with less than two months until the November election — was a tangible pressure throughout the day in Dallas, as Republican lawmakers, battleground candidates and party officials gathered for what was planned to be a grand event to celebrate GOP accomplishments and drive turnout.

“Look, I think obviously we want to continue to drive down costs, whether it’s energy, whether it is housing, whether it is groceries,” Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.), one of the most at-risk House Republicans in November, said in an interview. “We’re seeing, you know, obviously continued volatility in the oil markets, and we want to bring that down.”

Lawler, who is speaking at the convention Thursday night, touted Trump’s deal over Venezuela oil and largely blamed policy moves by New York Democrats for his state’s higher energy costs.

Trump told reporters Wednesday that oil prices are set to drop amid the ongoing U.S. conflict with Iran — but not until after the midterms, which is much later than those anxious Republicans would hope.

Some GOP hopefuls point to the overall goal to dismantle Iran’s nuclear capabilities as a necessary national security posture. The uptick in oil prices, therefore, is a short-term consequence for a greater long-term foreign policy success.

“We [have] to be patient with the fluctuations, especially with oil and what’s happening in the Gulf now,” said Marty O’Donnell, the Republican looking to unseat Democratic Rep. Susie Lee from her Las Vegas seat.

And the Republicans assembled in Dallas were the ones most likely to support the president — plenty of other lawmakers, including members running in tough races, stayed away, as did some rank-and-file Republicans.

“We have to hope that in six weeks the price per barrel goes down because it’s a big deal,” said one Georgia-based Republican strategist who is not attending the Dallas convention. “The Dems have been beating the daylights out of us on that for a while now.”

A GOP county chair in a region with House races that have been made more competitive by Trump’s unpopularity echoed those concerns.

“There’s no other commodity that when you drive down the street, you see the price,” said the county chair who also wasn’t in Dallas. “I know what gas costs because it’s on a fucking billboard on every intersection, and I’m forced to see it. It’s the most visible indicator of the economy, where we stand.”

And while Republicans are hoping that Trump can get his party’s economic messaging on track in his convention keynote address Thursday, some aren’t holding their breath for a major breakthrough.

“Maybe, maybe, maybe, maybe, maybe the president delivers a coherent speech that is clear, that is direct, that is policy oriented, that is forward-looking, and they can cut that up in social media and post that up all over the place,” said the GOP county chair. “Will he do that? Absolutely not.”

Mia McCarthy contributed to this report.