Nebraska's 2nd Congressional District election, 2026
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← 2024
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| Nebraska's 2nd Congressional District |
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| Democratic primary Republican primary General election |
| Election details |
| Filing deadline: February 17, 2026 (incumbent) March 2, 2026 (non-incumbent) |
| Primary: May 12, 2026 General: November 3, 2026 |
| How to vote |
| Poll times:
8 a.m. to 8 p.m. (Central time zone); 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. (Mountain time zone) |
| Race ratings |
DDHQ and The Hill: Pending Inside Elections: Tilt Democratic Sabato's Crystal Ball: Lean Democratic |
| Ballotpedia analysis |
| U.S. Senate battlegrounds U.S. House battlegrounds Federal and state primary competitiveness Ballotpedia's Election Analysis Hub, 2026 |
| See also |
U.S. Senate • 1st • 2nd • 3rd Nebraska elections, 2026 U.S. Congress elections, 2026 U.S. Senate elections, 2026 U.S. House elections, 2026 |
All U.S. House districts, including the 2nd Congressional District of Nebraska, are holding elections in 2026. The general election is November 3, 2026. The primary is May 12, 2026. The filing deadline for incumbents is February 17, 2026. The filing deadline for non-incumbents is March 2, 2026. For more information about the primaries in this election, click on the links below:
- Nebraska's 2nd Congressional District election, 2026 (May 12 Democratic primary)
- Nebraska's 2nd Congressional District election, 2026 (May 12 Republican primary)
Candidates and election results
Note: The following list includes official candidates only. Ballotpedia defines official candidates as people who:
- Register with a federal or state campaign finance agency before the candidate filing deadline
- Appear on candidate lists released by government election agencies
General election
The primary will occur on May 12, 2026. The general election will occur on November 3, 2026. General election candidates will be added here following the primary.
Democratic primary election
Democratic primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2
The following candidates are running in the Democratic primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on May 12, 2026.
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Withdrawn or disqualified candidates
- Mark Johnston (D)
Republican primary election
Republican primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2
Brinker Harding is running in the Republican primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on May 12, 2026.
Candidate | ||
| Brinker Harding | ||
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Withdrawn or disqualified candidates
- Brett Lindstrom (R)
- Don Bacon (R)
Candidate profiles
There are currently no candidate profiles created for this race. Candidate profiles will appear here as they are created. Encourage the candidates in this race to complete Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey so that their profile will appear here.
Voting information
- See also: Voting in Nebraska
Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey responses
Ballotpedia asks all federal, state, and local candidates to complete a survey and share what motivates them on political and personal levels. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
No candidate in this race has completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey. Ballotpedia is seeking 100 percent participation so voters can learn more about all the candidates on their ballots.
Polls
- See also: Ballotpedia's approach to covering polls
Polls are conducted with a variety of methodologies and have margins of error or credibility intervals.[1] The Pew Research Center wrote, "A margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points at the 95% confidence level means that if we fielded the same survey 100 times, we would expect the result to be within 3 percentage points of the true population value 95 of those times."[2] For tips on reading polls from FiveThirtyEight, click here. For tips from Pew, click here.
Below we provide results for polls from a wide variety of sources, including media outlets, social media, campaigns, and aggregation websites, when available. We only report polls for which we can find a margin of error or credibility interval. Know of something we're missing? Click here to let us know.
| Poll | Dates | Askins | Cavanaugh | Leuschen | Powell | Rhoades | Undecided | Sample size | Margin of error | Sponsor |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
– | 4 | 43 | 3 | 10 | 15 | 24 | 600 LV | ± 4.0% | N/A | |
| Note: LV is likely voters, RV is registered voters, and EV is eligible voters. | ||||||||||
Campaign finance
| Name | Party | Receipts* | Disbursements** | Cash on hand | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Evangelos Argyrakis | Democratic Party | $0 | $0 | $0 | Data not available*** |
| Kishla Askins | Democratic Party | $475,577 | $207,610 | $267,967 | As of December 31, 2025 |
| John Cavanaugh | Democratic Party | $674,114 | $263,115 | $410,998 | As of December 31, 2025 |
| James Leuschen | Democratic Party | $323,513 | $97,585 | $225,928 | As of December 31, 2025 |
| Denise Powell | Democratic Party | $1,046,543 | $421,783 | $624,761 | As of December 31, 2025 |
| Crystal Rhoades | Democratic Party | $112,611 | $77,478 | $35,133 | As of December 31, 2025 |
| Brinker Harding | Republican Party | $876,929 | $332,932 | $543,996 | As of December 31, 2025 |
|
Source: Federal Elections Commission, "Campaign finance data," 2026. This product uses the openFEC API but is not endorsed or certified by the Federal Election Commission (FEC).
* According to the FEC, "Receipts are anything of value (money, goods, services or property) received by a political committee." |
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General election race ratings
- See also: Race rating definitions and methods
Ballotpedia provides race ratings from four outlets: The Cook Political Report, Inside Elections, Sabato's Crystal Ball, and DDHQ/The Hill. Each race rating indicates if one party is perceived to have an advantage in the race and, if so, the degree of advantage:
- Safe and Solid ratings indicate that one party has a clear edge and the race is not competitive.
- Likely ratings indicate that one party has a clear edge, but an upset is possible.
- Lean ratings indicate that one party has a small edge, but the race is competitive.[3]
- Toss-up ratings indicate that neither party has an advantage.
Race ratings are informed by a number of factors, including polling, candidate quality, and election result history in the race's district or state.[4][5][6]
| Race ratings: Nebraska's 2nd Congressional District election, 2026 | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Race tracker | Race ratings | ||||||||
| 2/3/2026 | 1/27/2026 | 1/20/2026 | 1/13/2026 | ||||||
| The Cook Political Report with Amy Walter | Lean Democratic | Lean Democratic | Lean Democratic | Lean Democratic | |||||
| Decision Desk HQ and The Hill | Pending | Pending | Pending | Pending | |||||
| Inside Elections with Nathan L. Gonzales | Tilt Democratic | Tilt Democratic | Tilt Democratic | Tilt Democratic | |||||
| Larry J. Sabato's Crystal Ball | Lean Democratic | Lean Democratic | Lean Democratic | Lean Democratic | |||||
| Note: Ballotpedia reviews external race ratings every week throughout the election season and posts weekly updates even if the media outlets have not revised their ratings during that week. | |||||||||
Ballot access
The table below details filing requirements for U.S. House candidates in Nebraska in the 2026 election cycle. For additional information on candidate ballot access requirements in Nebraska, click here.
| Filing requirements for U.S. House candidates, 2026 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| State | Office | Party | Signatures required | Filing fee | Filing deadline | Source |
| Nebraska | U.S. House | Ballot-qualified party | N/A | $1,740 | Incumbents: 2/17/2026, Non-incumbents: 3/2/2026 | Source |
| Nebraska | U.S. House | Unaffiliated | 20% of registered voters in the district who voted for president in 2020, or 2,000, whichever is less | $1,740 | Incumbents: 2/17/2026, Non-incumbents: 3/2/2026 | Source |
Republican-held U.S. House district that Harris won
This is one of nine U.S. House districts Republicans are defending that Kamala Harris (D) won in 2024. The map below highlights those districts. Hover over or click a district to see information such as the incumbent and the presidential vote counts.
District history
The section below details election results for this office in elections dating back to 2020.
General election
General election for U.S. House Nebraska District 2
Incumbent Don Bacon (R) defeated Tony Vargas (D) in the general election for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on November 5, 2024.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Don Bacon (R) | 50.9 | 160,198 |
| | Tony Vargas (D) | 49.1 | 154,369 | |
| Total votes: 314,567 | ||||
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Democratic primary
Democratic primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2
Tony Vargas (D) advanced from the Democratic primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on May 14, 2024.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Tony Vargas | 100.0 | 39,038 |
| Total votes: 39,038 | ||||
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Republican primary
Republican primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2
Incumbent Don Bacon (R) defeated Dan Frei (R) in the Republican primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on May 14, 2024.
| Total votes: 57,694 | ||||
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
General election
General election for U.S. House Nebraska District 2
Incumbent Don Bacon (R) defeated Tony Vargas (D) in the general election for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on November 8, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Don Bacon (R) | 51.3 | 112,663 |
| | Tony Vargas (D) | 48.7 | 106,807 | |
| Total votes: 219,470 | ||||
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Democratic primary
Democratic primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2
Tony Vargas (D) defeated Alisha Shelton (D) in the Democratic primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on May 10, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Tony Vargas | 68.6 | 31,930 |
| | Alisha Shelton | 31.4 | 14,585 | |
| Total votes: 46,515 | ||||
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Withdrawn or disqualified candidates
Republican primary
Republican primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2
Incumbent Don Bacon (R) defeated Steve Kuehl (R) in the Republican primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on May 10, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Don Bacon | 77.1 | 53,824 |
| | Steve Kuehl ![]() | 22.9 | 15,945 | |
| Total votes: 69,769 | ||||
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
General election
General election for U.S. House Nebraska District 2
Incumbent Don Bacon (R) defeated Kara Eastman (D) and Tyler Schaeffer (L) in the general election for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on November 3, 2020.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Don Bacon (R) | 50.8 | 171,071 |
| | Kara Eastman (D) | 46.2 | 155,706 | |
| Tyler Schaeffer (L) | 3.0 | 10,185 | ||
| Total votes: 336,962 | ||||
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Democratic primary
Democratic primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2
Kara Eastman (D) defeated Ann Ashford (D) and Gladys Harrison (D) in the Democratic primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on May 12, 2020.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Kara Eastman | 62.2 | 45,953 |
| | Ann Ashford | 31.2 | 23,059 | |
| Gladys Harrison | 6.7 | 4,920 | ||
| Total votes: 73,932 | ||||
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Withdrawn or disqualified candidates
- Morgann Freeman (D)
Republican primary
Republican primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2
Incumbent Don Bacon (R) defeated Paul Anderson (R) in the Republican primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on May 12, 2020.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Don Bacon | 90.6 | 68,531 |
| Paul Anderson | 9.4 | 7,106 | ||
| Total votes: 75,637 | ||||
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Libertarian Party primary
Libertarian primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2
Tyler Schaeffer (L) advanced from the Libertarian Party primary for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on May 12, 2020.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | Tyler Schaeffer | 100.0 | 964 | |
| Total votes: 964 | ||||
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
District analysis
Click the tabs below to view information about voter composition, past elections, and demographics in both the district and the state.
- District map - A map of the district in place for the election.
- Competitiveness - Information about the competitiveness of 2026 U.S. House elections in the state.
- Presidential elections - Information about presidential elections in the district and the state.
- State party control - The partisan makeup of the state's congressional delegation and state government.
Below is the district map in place for this election. Click the map below to enlarge it.

Partisan Voter Index
Heading into the 2026 elections, based on results from the 2024 and 2020 presidential elections, the Cook Partisan Voter Index for this district is D+3. This meant that in those two presidential elections, this district's results were 3 percentage points more Democratic than the national average. This made Nebraska's 2nd the 189th most Democratic district nationally.[7]
2020 presidential election results
The table below shows what the vote in the 2024 presidential election was in this district. The presidential election data was compiled by The Downballot.
| Kamala Harris | Donald Trump |
|---|---|
| 52.0% | 47.0% |
Presidential voting history
- See also: Presidential election in Nebraska, 2024
Nebraska presidential election results (1900-2024)
- 6 Democratic wins
- 27 Republican wins
| Year | 1900 | 1904 | 1908 | 1912 | 1916 | 1920 | 1924 | 1928 | 1932 | 1936 | 1940 | 1944 | 1948 | 1952 | 1956 | 1960 | 1964 | 1968 | 1972 | 1976 | 1980 | 1984 | 1988 | 1992 | 1996 | 2000 | 2004 | 2008 | 2012 | 2016 | 2020 | 2024 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Winning Party | R | R | D | D | D | R | R | R | D | D | R | R | R | R | R | R | D | R | R | R | R | R | R | R | R | R | R | R | R | R | R | R |
Congressional delegation
The table below displays the partisan composition of Nebraska's congressional delegation as of October 2025.
| Congressional Partisan Breakdown from Nebraska | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Party | U.S. Senate | U.S. House | Total |
| Democratic | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Republican | 2 | 3 | 5 |
| Independent | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Vacancies | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Total | 2 | 3 | 5 |
State executive
The table below displays the officeholders in Nebraska's top four state executive offices as of October 2025.
| Office | Officeholder |
|---|---|
| Governor | |
| Lieutenant Governor | |
| Secretary of State | |
| Attorney General |
State legislature
Nebraska State Senate
| Party | As of October 2025 | |
|---|---|---|
| Democratic Party | 14 | |
| Republican Party | 33 | |
| Other | 2 | |
| Vacancies | 0 | |
| Total | 49 | |
Trifecta control
Nebraska Party Control: 1992-2025
Seven years of Democratic trifectas • Twenty-seven years of Republican trifectas
Scroll left and right on the table below to view more years.
See also
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ For more information on the difference between margins of error and credibility intervals, see explanations from the American Association for Public Opinion Research and Ipsos.
- ↑ Pew Research Center, "5 key things to know about the margin of error in election polls," September 8, 2016
- ↑ Inside Elections also uses Tilt ratings to indicate an even smaller advantage and greater competitiveness.
- ↑ Amee LaTour, "Email correspondence with Nathan Gonzalez," April 19, 2018
- ↑ Amee LaTour, "Email correspondence with Kyle Kondik," April 19, 2018
- ↑ Amee LaTour, "Email correspondence with Charlie Cook," April 22, 2018
- ↑ Cook Political Report, "2025 Cook PVI℠: District Map and List (119th Congress)," accessed July 1, 2025
