OMAHA — Political action committee co-founder Denise Powell has won the Democratic nomination in Nebraska’s 2nd Congressional District U.S. House race.
The math changed Wednesday afternoon, after Douglas County election officials confirmed that the partisan makeup of early voting ballots still to be counted Friday limits State Sen. John Cavanaugh’s ability to come back.
Of the 9,712 early ballots to count yet this week, 2,682 were returned by Republicans, 184 from Libertarians, 21 from members of the Legal Marijuana NOW Party and 1,745 nonpartisans, of which a smaller slice will have requested a Democratic ballot. Only 5,032 were Democrats.
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Powell, in a statement from her campaign, said she is “so proud of this history-making campaign.” She said she took pride in being the first Latina to file for federal office in Nebrasska and proud to have earned support from so many people and groups.
“Today marks the end of one chapter and the start of the next,” she said. “This moment isn’t about Democrats vs. Republicans. It’s about fighting for the notion that if you work hard and follow the rules, you should be able to get ahead. That is the American Dream.”
Powell led Cavanaugh at the end of counting on Tuesday night by 1,080 votes. Without bogging people down with math, that means Cavanaugh would have to win a statistically odd if not impossible number of the remaining ballots to keep Powell from holding on.
During the race, Powell overcame Cavanaugh and his family’s local political dynasty. On Tuesday, she chipped away at his lead from the first wave of early voting returns through the end of election night.
She also beat Douglas County District Court Clerk Crystal Rhoades, a former member of the Nebraska Public Service Commission, the state’s catch-all regulator.
Powell, at last count, had secured 39% of the vote. Cavanaugh received 37%, and Rhoades finished third with 14%, with three other candidates in single digits.
Cavanaugh and Rhoades were the race’s best-known names, having been on local ballots for years. For much of the race, public polling showed them in the top slots, with Cavanaugh in a commanding lead, Rhoades in second and Powell a distant third.
But Powell, who has raised money for other candidates and causes, had the fundraising advantage for most of the race and the endorsement of The Congressional Hispanic Caucus’s BOLD PAC, Women Vote and Elect Democratic Women. This was her first time running for office.
She and State Sen. Machaela Cavanaugh, John’s sister, co-founded the Women Who Run PAC, which aimed to elect more women by training candidates on how to run. She also helped with recent Nebraska ballot initiatives seeking to codify the right to an abortion, which failed, and to repeal a publicly funded voucher program for private K-12 schools, an effort that succeeded.
Powell overcame the name-recognition hurdle facing most first-time candidates with brute force. She and outside groups aligned with her spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on advertising introducing herself as a fighter and emphasizing the risk to Democratic priorities that primary-election voters choosing Cavanaugh posed, because a Republican governor would pick his replacement in the Legislature.
Cavanaugh tried to push back against those attacks by pointing out Republicans in the Legislature already had a supermajority, and that Democrats could gain seats this year. Some legislative results from Tuesday’s primary show that some Republicans could have trouble in an environment in which Democrats, the party out of power, will be energized.
Cavanaugh eventually attacked Powell and criticized her fundraising, labeling her “Dark Money Denise.” He also faced a barrage of outside advertising from outside groups aligned with national Republicans, including House Speaker Mike Johnson.
The National Republican Congressional Committee picked up on the name for Powell from Cavanaugh’s team and released a digital ad emphasizing the help she has received from outside groups moments after the Associated Press called the race Wednesday evening.
Some local and national Republican operatives said during the primary that they believe Powell, as a newcomer, would be easier to define as an outsider than Cavanaugh. They want to elect GOP nominee Brinker Harding, an Omaha City Council member, to replace retiring Republican U.S. Rep. Don Bacon.
Harding campaign spokesman Matthew Zacher said Powell has more ties to Los Angeles and Miami than Nebraska. He said Powell has spent the past several months filling 2nd District mailboxes “with fear, negativity and division.”
“Brinker Harding is actually from Nebraska,” Zacher said. “We look forward to building a broad coalition of Nebraskans — Republicans, Democrats and independents.”
At the Nebraska Republican watch party at the University of Nebraska at Omaha on Tuesday, the Republican nominee and Omaha city member, Brinker Harding said, “Whoever the Democrats put up from their circus primary, we will beat them come November.”
Pillen, in an interview after his speech at the party, said Harding is someone who more accurately “represents Nebraska” than his Democratic opponent and downplayed the impact of running as a conservative candidate in the state’s most politically divided and diverse district.
“Doesn’t matter if we’re a red vest or a blue vest,” Pillen said. “Harding is great people … He loves this place, and I think it’s really vital that we have a man of integrity.”
Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chair Suzan DelBene celebrated Powell’s victory and called Harding “another empty suit that Donald Trump and his MAGA extremists would control in Congress.”
“Unlike Harding, Denise Powell is a business and community leader who has fought for Nebraska’s working families for years,” DelBene said. “Now she’s ready to stand up to them in Congress.”
Nebraska Democrats hope this is the year the party can win the Omaha area’s slightly right-leaning but swing 2nd District.
Cavanaugh campaign manager Katie Bartizal said, “They are letting all the votes be counted and letting the process play out.”
Powell, emerging from a tough, six-person primary is tasked with uniting Omaha Democrats behind her vision of making life better for working people at a time when President Donald Trump “makes life harder.” She has said Trump’s actions contribute to rising prices.
Cavanaugh has said he plans to support the winner of the primary.
Powell now moves on to the Nov. 3 general election, where Harding and Libertarian Eric Michael Foreman await.
Examiner Editor-in-chief Aaron Sanderford contributed to this report.
- 7:45 pmEditor's note: This story has been revised to include comment from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
This story is provided by States Newsroom, a nonprofit state news network and Blox Digital content partner.
