John Cavanaugh

John Cavanaugh

Democratic Party

Candidate, U.S. House Nebraska District 2

Nebraska State Senate District 9

Tenure

2021 - Present

Term ends

2029

Years in position

4

Predecessor

Sara Howard

Compensation

Base salary

$12,000/year

Per diem

$151/day for those living 50+ miles from capitol, otherwise $55/day

Elections and appointments

Last elected

November 5, 2024

Next election

November 3, 2026

Education

Bachelor's

Catholic University of America

Graduate

Vermont Law School

Law

Vermont Law School

Personal

Birthplace

Omaha, Neb.

Religion

Catholic

Profession

Attorney

Contact

Official website

Official Facebook

Official Twitter

Campaign website

Campaign Facebook

Campaign Twitter

Campaign Instagram

Personal Facebook

Personal LinkedIn

Personal TikTok

John Cavanaugh (Democratic Party) is a member of the Nebraska State Senate, representing District 9. He assumed office on January 6, 2021. His current term ends on January 3, 2029.

Cavanaugh (Democratic Party) is running for election to the U.S. House to represent Nebraska's 2nd Congressional District. He declared candidacy for the 2026 election.^[source]

Biography

John Cavanaugh was born in Omaha, Nebraska. Cavanaugh graduated from Creighton Preparatory School in 1999. He earned a B.A. from Catholic University of America in 2003 and an M.A. in environmental policy and J.D. from Vermont Law School in 2011. Cavanaugh's career experience includes working as an attorney and assistant public defender with Douglas County.

Committee assignments

Note: This membership information was last updated in September 2023. Ballotpedia completes biannual updates of committee membership. If you would like to send us an update, email us at: editor@ballotpedia.org.

2023-2024

Cavanaugh was assigned to the following committees:

• General Affairs Committee
• Natural Resources Committee
• Urban Affairs Committee

2021-2022

Cavanaugh was assigned to the following committees:

• Agriculture Committee
• General Affairs Committee
• Natural Resources Committee

Sponsored legislation

The following table lists bills this person sponsored as a legislator, according to BillTrack50 and sorted by action history. Bills are sorted by the date of their last action. The following list may not be comprehensive. To see all bills this legislator sponsored, click on the legislator's name in the title of the table.

Elections

2026

See also: Nebraska's 2nd Congressional District election, 2026

Note: At this time, Ballotpedia is combining all declared candidates for this election into one list under a general election heading. As primary election dates are published, this information will be updated to separate general election candidates from primary candidates as appropriate.

General election

The general election will occur on November 3, 2026.

General election for U.S. House Nebraska District 2

The following candidates are running in the general election for U.S. House Nebraska District 2 on November 3, 2026.

		Candidate
	Submit photo	Evangelos Argyrakis (D)
		Kishla Askins (D)
		John Cavanaugh (D)
		Mark Johnston (D)
		Denise Powell (D)
		Brinker Harding (R)
		Brett Lindstrom (R)

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	Incumbents are bolded and underlined.
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
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Withdrawn or disqualified candidates

• Don Bacon (R)

Endorsements

Ballotpedia is gathering information about candidate endorsements. To send us an endorsement, click here.

2024

See also: Nebraska State Senate elections, 2024

General election

General election for Nebraska State Senate District 9

Incumbent John Cavanaugh defeated Julia Palzer in the general election for Nebraska State Senate District 9 on November 5, 2024.

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		John Cavanaugh (Nonpartisan)	70.1	10,070
		Julia Palzer (Nonpartisan)	29.9	4,287

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	Incumbents are bolded and underlined. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 14,357
= 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.
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Nonpartisan primary election

Nonpartisan primary for Nebraska State Senate District 9

Incumbent John Cavanaugh and Julia Palzer advanced from the primary for Nebraska State Senate District 9 on May 14, 2024.

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		John Cavanaugh (Nonpartisan)	71.8	4,041
✔		Julia Palzer (Nonpartisan)	28.2	1,590

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	Incumbents are bolded and underlined. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 5,631
= 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.
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Endorsements

Ballotpedia did not identify endorsements for Cavanaugh in this election.

2020

See also: Nebraska State Senate elections, 2020

General election

General election for Nebraska State Senate District 9

John Cavanaugh defeated Marque A. Snow in the general election for Nebraska State Senate District 9 on November 3, 2020.

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		John Cavanaugh (Nonpartisan)	54.1	8,461
		Marque A. Snow (Nonpartisan)	45.9	7,170

---

	There were no incumbents in this race. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 15,631
= 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.

Nonpartisan primary election

Nonpartisan primary for Nebraska State Senate District 9

John Cavanaugh and Marque A. Snow defeated Mark Vondrasek in the primary for Nebraska State Senate District 9 on May 12, 2020.

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		John Cavanaugh (Nonpartisan)	46.0	3,911
✔		Marque A. Snow (Nonpartisan)	40.4	3,435
	Submit photo	Mark Vondrasek (Nonpartisan)	13.6	1,152

---

	There were no incumbents in this race. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 8,498
= 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.

Endorsements

To view Cavanaugh's endorsements in the 2020 election, please click here.

Campaign themes

2026

Ballotpedia survey responses

See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection

John Cavanaugh has not yet completed Ballotpedia's 2026 Candidate Connection survey. Send a message to John Cavanaugh asking him to fill out the survey. If you are John Cavanaugh, click here to fill out Ballotpedia's 2026 Candidate Connection survey.

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You can ask John Cavanaugh to fill out this survey by using the buttons below or emailing john@cavanaughfornebraska.com.

2024

John Cavanaugh did not complete Ballotpedia's 2024 Candidate Connection survey.

2020

John Cavanaugh completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2020. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Cavanaugh's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.

Expand all | Collapse all

Who are you? Tell us about yourself.

I am a lifelong Nebraskan, and I have worked as a public defender for the last seven years in Omaha, protecting the constitutional rights of all of our neighbors. I received a J.D. and a Masters in environmental policy from Vermont Law School. I live in the Aksarben/Elmwood Park neighborhood with my wife Kakie and our four children. I am running for Legislature because I have seen what happens when we fail to support our community through quality education, access to healthcare, and job opportunities. I believe our laws should reflect our shared values of community, opportunity, and equality for all. That means full legal protections for LGBTQ+ Nebraskans and fighting to end systemic racism in our institutions. I will work to ensure that all Nebraskans get the help they need to recover from the coronavirus pandemic.

Please list below 3 key messages of your campaign. What are the main points you want voters to remember about your goals for your time in office?

• In the Legislature I will work to stop mass incarceration and decrease crime through investments in access to stable housing, access to healthcare, and access to educational and job opportunities.
• Climate change is real, and we must act now to head off a catastrophe. In the Legislature, I will protect our environment.
• I support quality public education, affordable health care, paid family leave, increasing the minimum wage, and tax reform that benefits the working and middle class, not the wealthy and powerful.

What areas of public policy are you personally passionate about?

From an early age I have always been passionate about the environment. In law school I studied environmental policy, and I currently sit on the board of a transportation advocacy organization, ModeShift Omaha. We need more lawmakers who not only acknowledge the reality of climate change but are actually willing to take action. Just this past year the Legislature filibustered a bill that would have created a state climate action plan, as climate deniers ridiculed the need for it. I will fight to protect our environment in the Legislature.

As a public defender, I know the impact that criminal laws have on the people of our state, and I worry greatly when I see lawmakers who base their knowledge of criminal justice on what they see on television shows. I will be a voice for criminal justice reform in the Legislature.

I serve those who cannot afford to hire an attorney, and I see the need for that in civil matters as well, particularly those who are at risk of losing their homes due to eviction. That's why I support and will introduce legislation to guarantee a right to counsel in eviction cases.

Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.

Campaign finance summary

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Note: The finance data shown here comes from the disclosures required of candidates and parties. Depending on the election or state, this may represent only a portion of all the funds spent on their behalf. Satellite spending groups may or may not have expended funds related to the candidate or politician on whose page you are reading this disclaimer. Campaign finance data from elections may be incomplete. For elections to federal offices, complete data can be found at the FEC website. Click here for more on federal campaign finance law and here for more on state campaign finance law.

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John Cavanaugh campaign contribution history

Year	Office	Status	Contributions	Expenditures
2026*	U.S. House Nebraska District 2	Candidacy Declared general	$130,341	$3,218
2024*	Nebraska State Senate District 9	Won general	$101,861	$41,864
2020	Nebraska State Senate District 9	Won general	$141,916	N/A**
Grand total			$374,118	$45,082
Sources: OpenSecrets,  Federal Elections Commission ***This product uses the openFEC API but is not endorsed or certified by the Federal Election Commission (FEC).
* Data from this year may not be complete
** Data on expenditures is not available for this election cycle
Note: Totals above reflect only available data.

Scorecards

See also: State legislative scorecards and State legislative scorecards in Nebraska

A scorecard evaluates a legislator’s voting record. Its purpose is to inform voters about the legislator’s political positions. Because scorecards have varying purposes and methodologies, each report should be considered on its own merits. For example, an advocacy group’s scorecard may assess a legislator’s voting record on one issue while a state newspaper’s scorecard may evaluate the voting record in its entirety.

Ballotpedia is in the process of developing an encyclopedic list of published scorecards. Some states have a limited number of available scorecards or scorecards produced only by select groups. It is Ballotpedia’s goal to incorporate all available scorecards regardless of ideology or number.

Click here for an overview of legislative scorecards in all 50 states.  To contribute to the list of Nebraska scorecards, email suggestions to editor@ballotpedia.org.

2024

To view all the scorecards we found for this legislator in 2024, click [show].
In 2024, the Nebraska State Legislature was in session from January 3 to April 18. A special session took place from July 25, 2024 to August 14, 2024. Holland Children's Movement Legislators are scored on children's issues. National Federation of Independent Business Legislators are scored on their votes on bills related to business issues.

2023

To view all the scorecards we found for this legislator in 2023, click [show].
In 2023, the Nebraska State Legislature was in session from January 4 to June 1. Holland Children's Movement Legislators are scored on children's issues. The American Conservative Union Legislators are scored on their votes on conservative issues.

2022

To view all the scorecards we found for this legislator in 2022, click [show].
In 2022, the Nebraska State Legislature was in session from January 5 to April 20. Americans for Prosperity Nebraska Legislators are scored on their stances on conservative fiscal policy. Holland Children's Movement Legislators are scored on children's issues. National Federation of Independent Business Legislators are scored on their votes on bills related to business issues.

2021

To view all the scorecards we found for this legislator in 2021, click [show].
In 2021, the Nebraska State Legislature was in session from January 6 to May 27. Holland Children's Movement Legislators are scored on children's issues. Club for Growth Foundation Legislators are scored on their votes on bills related to economic issues. The American Conservative Union Legislators are scored on their votes on conservative issues.

See also

2026 Elections

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Candidate

U.S. House Nebraska District 2

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Officeholder

Nebraska State Senate District 9

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Footnotes

Political offices
Preceded by Sara Howard (D)	Nebraska State Senate District 9 2021-Present	Succeeded by -

[show]

Nebraska's current delegation to the United States Congress

Senators

Deb Fischer (R)

Pete Ricketts (R)

Representatives

District 1

Mike Flood (R)

District 2

Don Bacon (R)

District 3

Adrian Smith (R)

Republican Party (5)