Kansas’s 4th Congressional District House Race 2026

Missouri's congressional redistricting fight has returned to the U.S. Supreme Court for a third time this month. Challengers of the Republican-drawn 2025 map, including the group People Not Politicians, asked the Court to block a ruling by the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that had ordered the new map's revival for November's election. The Supreme Court had twice blocked use of that map, most recently in an unsigned, unexplained order on September 10 with no public dissent, after Justice Brett Kavanaugh earlier rejected an appeal from Missouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins and sided with the Missouri Supreme Court. Despite that, an 8th Circuit panel—including two Trump appointees—upheld a federal judge's temporary order requiring use of the 2025 map, since it had already governed the August 4 primary. The Supreme Court gave the map's supporters until midday Wednesday to respond.

The dispute follows a Missouri Supreme Court ruling that a referendum challenging the 2025 map was valid, keeping the 2022 map in place pending a statewide vote. The new map, backed by President Trump and designed to help Republicans flip Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver's Kansas City-based seat and win seven of Missouri's eight House seats, has left over a million voters uncertain which district they belong to. Absentee and overseas ballots are already going out under the 2022 map, as the case continues to be the most protracted and complex of this cycle's mid-decade redistricting battles nationwide.

Kansas, which has not elected a Democrat to the Senate since 1932, has become an unexpected midterm battleground. Republican Sen. Roger Marshall faces a tighter-than-anticipated race against megachurch pastor Adam Hamilton, with recent polls, including a YouGov survey, showing Hamilton narrowly ahead. The Cook Political Report has moved the contest from "Likely Republican" to "Toss Up," prompting the GOP's Senate Leadership Fund to pour millions into a seat once considered safe. Hamilton, pastor of the country's largest Methodist congregation, draws support across party lines and is campaigning heavily in red, agriculture-heavy counties.

Analysts attribute the shift to voter frustration over the economy, rising diesel and fertilizer costs during harvest season, tariff disputes affecting farmers and ranchers angered by eased beef-import tariffs, and immigration enforcement actions. Marshall, a close Trump ally endorsed by the president, retains a fundraising edge but faces scrutiny over lawsuits against patients with unpaid bills, some of whom were arrested. Trump's declining approval in the state has complicated Marshall's path, with Republicans outnumbering Democrats nearly two to one statewide, making Hamilton's bid for unaffiliated and crossover voters pivotal to national Senate control.

Missouri's 4th Congressional District race pits two-term Republican incumbent Mark Alford, a former TV anchor serving on House Armed Services and Appropriations committees, against Democrat Jordan Herrera, an Air Force veteran and Missouri assistant attorney general, and Libertarian Thomas Holbrook. Alford campaigns on an America First platform, border enforcement and reduced federal spending, while Herrera emphasizes economic security, healthcare access and limiting government regulation of personal life. Holbrook opposes gerrymandering and tariffs. The district's boundaries remain contested: the 2022 map, used for this election, covers west-central Missouri, while a newer 2025 map used for the primary would shift Kansas City into the district instead of District 5.

Former U.S. Rep. Melissa Bean, a centrist Democrat, is seeking a political comeback in Illinois' 8th Congressional District, facing Republican newcomer Jennifer Davis in the Nov. 3 general election. The seat is open after Democratic Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, who has endorsed Bean, left to run unsuccessfully for U.S. Senate. An independent write-in candidate, Christopher Krumpac, is also running.

The district, which stretches from the northwest Chicago suburbs to Elgin and the Fox River Valley, leans solidly Democratic. Bean, who first won the seat in 2004 and served until 2011, has outraised Davis, aided in part by a super PAC tied to AIPAC that drew progressive criticism during the primary. Davis, a tech entrepreneur making her first run for office, has loaned her own campaign $1 million to stay competitive.

The candidates diverge sharply on abortion, immigration, and Trump-era policies, with Bean casting the race as a check on the administration and Davis positioning herself as a political outsider focused on small business and economic concerns.

Austin city leaders and other elected officials are calling for an independent investigation after an ICE agent shot a Venezuelan man Sunday afternoon during a vehicle pursuit while he was making a DoorDash delivery. The man, identified by his attorney Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch as 28-year-old Wilber Rafael Garces Perez, says ICE officers sideswiped his car twice without warning before he was shot in the back of the neck. He was released from a hospital into ICE custody with the bullet still lodged near his spine, held at the Pearsall detention center without pain medication, and briefly returned to the hospital Monday night after complaints of untreated pain. DHS says he had a final order of removal after entering under a Biden-era asylum program later ended by Trump; his attorneys say the order stemmed from a missed hearing notice sent to an old address. Federal sources say ICE had been conducting targeted enforcement using license plate checks when they identified his vehicle.

Austin officials say the city's own EMS was requested by Austin Police, not ICE, though bystander video shows an ICE agent also asking whether an ambulance was en route; federal sources say the agent has been placed on administrative leave, standard practice in such incidents. Homeland Security Investigations and the FBI are leading the probe, with Austin Police and Texas Rangers investigating separately. Mayor Kirk Watson, Police Chief Lisa Davis, DA Jose Garza, and Congressman Greg Casar are demanding transparency and local involvement, noting this is one of at least 28 such shootings by federal immigration agents since 2024.

Florida's 19th Congressional District, a reliably Republican Southwest Florida seat being vacated by Byron Donalds as he runs for governor, holds its primary Tuesday with an unusually crowded field of ten Republicans. Several contenders arrived after political careers elsewhere: Madison Cawthorn (North Carolina), Chris Collins (New York, pardoned by Trump after an insider-trading conviction), Catalina Lauf and Jim Oberweis (both from Illinois), and Ola Hawatmeh (New York). Local media figure Jim Schwartzel and Jan. 6 defendant John Strand, also pardoned by Trump, are among the other candidates. Much of the race has centered on questions of "Florida authenticity," with candidates accusing rivals of being carpetbaggers despite many having shallow ties to the district themselves.

Trump endorsed Lauf in the campaign's final days, citing her prior role as a Commerce Department adviser during his first term. She has framed herself as an outsider best positioned to represent Trump-aligned voters, while rivals like Oberweis point to decades of Florida residency as their claim to legitimacy. The winner will be heavily favored in the general election given the district's strong Republican lean.

Missouri's 5th Congressional District, anchored in the Kansas City metro, will use the 2022 map rather than the 2025 redistricting plan for the November 2026 election, after the state Supreme Court ruled on the matter following legal challenges. The district, traditionally Democratic-leaning, pits longtime incumbent Rep. Emanuel Cleaver against Republican state Sen. Rick Brattin, who sued over primary disruptions caused by the map dispute, and Libertarian Randy Langkraehr. Cleaver, in office since 2005, has won previous races by wide margins, while Brattin is campaigning as a Trump ally focused on border security and spending cuts. The redistricting fight had aimed to dilute Kansas City's Democratic base across neighboring districts.

A November 3 legislative race in Minnesota's largest House district, 3A, is drawing attention as a test of rural populist politics amid worsening economic conditions. Republican incumbent Rep. Dave Skraba, who narrowly won the seat in 2022 before a comfortable 2024 victory, faces DFL challenger Kania, who has been outworking the campaign trail despite trailing badly in fundraising. Kania is betting that door-knocking and a focus on mining, health care, and forest management can recreate the kind of cross-coalition appeal once shown by Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party figures like Gov. Rudy Perpich and Sen. Paul Wellstone, who dominated the region decades earlier. The race remains a long shot for Democrats but reflects broader questions about rural voters' patience with economic decline.

A billing glitch overcharged roughly 87,000 San Diego households for trash collection fees on their property tax bills, with some errors exceeding $1,000 above what's actually owed. The mistake, tied to technical issues in data sent from the city to the county, has drawn sharp criticism from council members and renewed a debate over Mayor Todd Gloria's dual role as chief operating officer, a position he took on after firing the city's previous COO.

Councilmembers Raul Campillo and Henry Foster called the error unacceptable, with Foster threatening a ballot measure to repeal the city's strong-mayor system if changes aren't made. Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera asked how refunds would be handled for residents who already paid and what the city might owe the county for reprinting and remailing corrected bills. Gloria acknowledged the error, directed the Environmental Services Department to identify affected properties and correct the data, and said the city expects all impacted accounts fixed shortly. A mayoral spokesperson pushed back on the criticism as "political theater," saying the city has already corrected the issue.

A new analysis of survey data finds that Kansas voters' decisive rejection of an August 2022 ballot measure to make state Supreme Court justices stand for election was driven primarily by abortion politics rather than views on judicial independence.

Researchers surveyed Kansans before and after the campaign. In April, 71% of respondents said they backed the measure, with support driven mainly by a desire for courts to be representative of the public rather than partisanship, which showed little effect. By August, after a campaign framed the referendum as a Republican effort to reshape the state Supreme Court and clear the way for an abortion ban, support had fallen to 40%. Backing among strong Democrats dropped from 72% to 24%, and among those with the strongest pro-abortion-rights views, from 66% to 22%. The researchers conclude the shift reflects awareness that the measure was really about abortion policy and partisan control of the court, not a considered judgment on how judges should be chosen.