President Trump’s Obamacare subsidy plan on hold due to Republican opposition
President Donald Trump’s Obamacare subsidy plan has been delayed after Republican opposition.
Tennessee’s state election, fresh off a year-end election that gave Democrats an edge, is an unlikely test of whether a national blue wave is building that could cause seismic shifts in next year’s midterm elections.
The special election scheduled for Tuesday, Dec. 2, to fill the seat of retiring Republican Rep. Mark Greene received little national attention a month ago.
The current race between Democrat Aftin Behn, a 36-year-old liberal state lawmaker, and Republican Matt Van Epps, a veteran, has Democrats dreaming of an unexpected House pickup. Meanwhile, top Republicans, including President Donald Trump, are circling the wagons and sending in millions of people to thwart disaster.
Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District was not supposed to be competitive. This is the creation of Tennessee’s Republican-led Legislature, which in 2022 split the Democratic stronghold of Nashville into three districts, each bound by conservative rural counties and various middle Tennessee suburbs. One is District 7, which includes parts of Nashville’s Davidson County and 13 other countries.
In the 2024 election, Trump defeated Kamala Harris in Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District by 22 points. But both Democrats and Republicans are bracing for a close election next week. The Emerson College Poll/The Hill poll had Van Epps leading by just two points, 48% to 46%, within the poll’s margin of error.
Even if Mr. Behn doesn’t win the race, which would have been unthinkable just a few weeks ago, a single-digit loss could create big problems for Republicans in the 2026 midterm elections.
“It shows how far down the Republican Party is and how badly they’re in trouble, not just in this election, but going into next year’s midterm elections,” said Democratic campaign strategist Simon Rosenberg. “This is a weakened and struggling party.”
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The NPR/PBS New Marist poll, conducted Nov. 10-13, asked voters which party they intended to support in the midterm elections and found that Democrats had a wide 14-point lead nationally, 55% to 41%, with Democrats hopeful in reliably red Tennessee. This is the largest Democratic lead in the so-called “popular vote” of public opinion polls since 2017, during President Trump’s first term.
The November 4 year-end election, in which Democrats won overwhelming victories in states such as Virginia, New Jersey and New York, was widely interpreted as a repudiation of President Trump and his response to inflation and the economy. According to a Gallup poll released on November 28, President Trump’s approval rating has since fallen to 36%, the lowest of his second term.
Following a tighter-than-expected race, MAGA Inc., a major political action committee associated with Trump, has spent more than $1 million backing Van Epps, with millions more coming from PACs tied to the Club for Growth and other conservative groups. The Democratic-backed House Majority PAC canceled a $1 million ad buy in the campaign last week.
In recent weeks, Republicans have gone on a rampage to paint Mr. Behn as a “far-left lunatic” whom they have dubbed “Tennessee’s AOC.” That includes highlighting Behn’s past social media posts questioning whether police should be disbanded, saying the visibility of religion in the state Capitol “makes her uncomfortable” and commenting that “both men and women” can give birth.
Mr. Trump held two teletown halls for Mr. Van Epps, using his X account and its 109 million followers to urge Tennesseans to vote for the Republican candidate. House Speaker Mike Johnson plans to campaign with Van Epps in the district on Dec. 1, the day before Election Day.
Republicans fear voters will sleepwalk through the election, which is held right after the Thanksgiving holiday, when Americans often don’t pay attention to politics.
“The RNC has made targeted investments to ensure Republican votes and keep this Trump district red,” Republican National Committee spokeswoman Kirsten Pels said in a statement. “Given Aftin Behn is a radical candidate with no ties to TN-07, and his field staff, active GOTV programming, and nearly $500,000 in funding for this race, we are confident that Matt Van Epps will retain his seat and the Democrats will not gain an inch of momentum heading into 2026.”
On the Democratic side, former Vice President Kamala Harris attended a November 18 rally in Nashville and urged supporters to vote for Mr. Bohn to mark the return of the 2024 Democratic presidential candidate to the race.
Jane Cleave, vice chair of the Democratic National Committee, called the Tennessee race an “uphill battle” for Democrats during a recent knock on Behn’s door in Nashville. But she noted that in recent off-year elections, Democrats outscored Republicans among independent voters and won some down-ballot votes by a landslide.
“If this trend continues, we’ll be able to say that not only have we outperformed for Democrats, not only have we kicked Democrats who are dissatisfied with us and didn’t vote in 2024 off their couches, but we’re now converting the hearts of independents and Republicans to our side,” Cleave said. “So this is an important race for our party.”
Democrats aim to be unabashed progressives to win in red districts
Behn, a former community organizer and social worker, does not fit the same centrist profile as Abigail Spanberger of Virginia or Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey. They won a lopsided double-digit victory in the Nov. 4 gubernatorial election, contributing to the Democratic Party’s strong performance.
Mr. Behn also doesn’t fit the typical Southern Democrat trying to win conservative seats.
Before being elected to the Nashville State Assembly in 2023, Behn burst onto the political scene as a progressive activist. She was forcibly removed from Tennessee Republican Gov. Bill Lee’s office in 2019 when she staged a sit-in demanding the resignation of a Republican lawmaker accused of sexual assault. She was also expelled from the House for filibustering.
In his campaign for Congress, Mr. Behn leans on the same affordability themes that supported Democrats in the year-end election, emphasizing his support for repealing the state’s grocery tax and calling for lower health care costs. She has a pragmatic slogan: “Feed our kids, fix our roads, fund our hospitals.”
Mr. Behn has a passionate base of young progressive voters and a strong social media presence, frequently posting videos from the front seat of his Jeep Wrangler.
“We’re so close to winning this race, and that’s why these rumors are getting even more intense. So I can’t wait to see what they come up with next,” Behn said in a recent video shot from his Jeep of some of the recent attacks.
Van Epps, who is backed by Trump, is a West Point graduate, former lieutenant colonel in the Tennessee Army National Guard, and former director of the Tennessee Department of General Services.
Van Epps touted his support from President Trump and promised to work to “advance President Trump’s America First philosophy.” It’s a strategy that typically works in districts that overwhelmingly voted for Trump. However, according to an Emerson College poll, approval ratings for Trump’s job performance have suddenly declined in the same district, with voters disapproving of Trump’s job performance outnumbering voters by a margin of 49% to 47%.
Mike Duhaime, former RNC political director and Republican political consultant, said Trump’s low approval ratings are a major concern for Republicans in battleground states. Many Republicans have strong ties to the president and “will do well in red states, will do well in red Congressional districts,” Duhaime said.
“But when you go into these battlegrounds, you have to look at where President Trump’s approval ratings are,” Duhaime said, adding, “All politics is national, and if the president’s popularity goes down, that’s going to be very difficult in the battlegrounds.”
Nathan Gonzalez, who runs the nonpartisan election handicapping service Inside Elections, said Mr. Behn is likely to outperform, but unlikely to win, given Democrats’ performance in other elections this year and the margin by which Mr. Trump has led in the district.
But even a narrow loss could embolden Democrats and provide further evidence that Republicans are struggling to match Trump’s lead without him.
“The ingredients are in place for a virtuous cycle for Democrats,” Gonzalez said, adding, “When you look at what’s happened over the last 11 months, it’s hard to see what’s good news for Republicans.”
Rosenberg said a 10-point shift in the national electoral landscape in Democrats’ favor could not only give Democrats a majority in the House of Representatives, but also pave the way for Democrats to regain the Senate majority, which had previously seemed remote. Republicans currently hold a 53-47 majority in the Senate.
“The competitive nature of Tennessee’s race confirms that Republicans are playing a defensive role while we are on the offensive,” Rosenberg said. “We’re playing on their side in a way that makes it much more likely that the House will flip next year and the Senate will be competitive.”
Contributor: Vivian Jones of The Tennessean
