STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Republican Matt Van Epps has won a special election for a U.S. House seat in Tennessee. That means the Republican edge in the House of Representatives doesn't get any narrower. But Democrats are also claiming victory after Tuesday night's results.
A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
That's because last year, President Trump won Tennessee's 7th congressional district by about 22 percentage points. Yesterday, Van Epps won by nine. Both parties spent millions of dollars in the final weeks of this race to try and test their campaign message ahead of the 2026 midterms.
INSKEEP: NPR's Stephen Fowler has been following the campaign. Stephen, good morning.
STEPHEN FOWLER, BYLINE: Good morning.
INSKEEP: Why did this race receive so much attention?
FOWLER: Well, it's math. Republicans have a narrow House majority and fractious coalitions. This gives them one more vote until Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene resigns in a few weeks. Here's more math. In 60 state legislative and congressional special elections this year, Democrats have improved from their 2024 margins by an average of 13%. Those elections were typically low-turnout, low-profile contests where Democrats were more likely to vote. So given Trump's margins in this Tennessee district, super PACs from both parties poured more than $6.5 million in recent weeks into making this a high-turnout, high-profile contest where Democrats still ended up improving their margins by 13%.
INSKEEP: Oh, really interesting result then. And it seems that Democrats turned out a lot of voters. Who's right in declaring victory then?
FOWLER: Well, the final margin of the race means both parties can, with a straight face, declare a victory moving forward. That's because Republicans motivated their base without Trump being on the ballot. Van Epps said in victory remarks that, quote, "running from Trump is how you lose. Running with Trump is how you win." But he actually didn't campaign much using the president's name or accomplishments. And Democrats are putting 2024's losses behind them and have also motivated their base, who've been pretty sour on the party as a whole. And they seem to also have persuaded independents that Republican governance won't solve key issues.
INSKEEP: So in last month's elections, we heard a lot about affordability. I'm thinking about that as a political slogan. Six syllables, lots of syllables. But anyway, the economy is what that was about. How did it factor in?
FOWLER: Well, Steve, one candidate decried career politicians and promised to bring down prices, create good-paying jobs and lower health care costs for working families. The other candidate promised to shake up Washington by making health care more affordable, bringing down the cost of living and protect workers and small businesses. If you're wondering which one was a Republican and which was the Democrat, you're not alone. It was pretty hard to tell them apart on this issue, which was also notable for the candidates' lack of talking about Trump.
INSKEEP: Oh, this is really interesting. The Democrat maybe didn't talk about Trump so much 'cause she wanted the votes of former Trump voters, and the Republican didn't talk about Trump so much because he's not so popular at this moment. But with all of this said, I mean, we're reading all of this to look at 2026 and trying to find how we can forecast the future. Is there anything about Tuesday's result that truly matters when thinking about the midterms, where things will be different?
FOWLER: Well, clearly, the economy is top of mind. Republicans are figuring out how to address those concerns about costs without explicitly crossing Trump, and Democrats are also workshopping ways to win back key parts of their coalition. Looking at the election results, the drop-off and turnout in deep blue areas that we saw last year is nowhere to be found, and the rightward leap of young voters and nonwhite voters has snapped back towards Democrats. In a midterm year, the dynamics typically see the party out of power do well, so this is another data point in favor of that trend continuing.
INSKEEP: NPR's Stephen Fowler. Thanks so much.
FOWLER: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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