Analyzing every major Democratic Congressional primary challenge

There are a lot this year!

Welcome to a Tuesday night edition of Progress Report.

Democratic leaders are historically deferential to their incumbents and very reverent of seniority, an institutionalism that traditionally loyal base voters have long respected. But the party’s disastrous defeat last November exposed just how out-of-touch the deeply geriatric Democratic power structure had grown, and paired with the anemic resistance mounted against Donald Trump’s rampaging fascism, the desperate need for new blood has become apparent to even the most fervent partisan.

No longer willing to sit on the sidelines or wait their turn, a growing number of young (and youngish) Democrats have been filing to run for office up and down the ballot, including in Congressional races against some of the most entrenched incumbents in the nation. Many of these challengers are more progressive than the sitting lawmaker, almost all of them want to take a more aggressive posture against the GOP, and quite a few of them actually have a good chance of winning their races next year.

At this point in the cycle, deciding which races are going to be truly competitive is a largely subjective exercise, but to keep tonight’s piece within Substack’s very substantial word limit and ensure that it’s actually a useful political resource, I’ve gone deep into the long list of declared primaries and pulled out every single challenge that feels even half-viable at the moment. With your support, I’ll be reporting on many of these races going forward.

Note: The far-right’s fascist takeover of this country is being aided by the media’s total capitulation to Trump’s extortion. It’s never been more critical to have a bold independent media willing to speak up against the powerful. That’s what I’m trying to do here at Progress Report.

You can help keep Progress Report afloat and build our network for just $5 a month — every subscription helps!

---

---

Mike Thompson (CA-04)

Age on Election Day: 75
Terms Served: 14
The Situation: Thompson, who recently announced that he’ll be running for a 15th term, has never faced a competitive primary in his nearly 30 years in Congress — borderline tragic for a Blue Dog who represents a +31 Democratic district. Gavin Newsom’s redistricting proposal would shift this northern California district by 17 points to the right, but a +14 blue district should still be more than inviting enough for a challenge from the left.

Challenger(s):

Eric Jones
Age on Election Day: 35
Fundraising: FEC profile
The Basics: A former venture capitalist who made a killing during a brief career on Wall Street, Jones is nonetheless running as an economic populist critical of the Democratic Party’s close ties to corporate donors. That orientation is based on a challenging childhood often spent on food stamps, an experience that drove both his “socially conscious” investing and decision to start several nonprofits once he and his wife moved to the northern Bay Area. His stump speech rails against corporate corruption and calls for taxing billionaires and creating a public healthcare option.

It seems as if Jones has more than enough capacity to self-fund a campaign, and willingness to plow his own money into the effort will be critical in a district that sits in an expensive media market but isn’t dense enough to mitigate costs with mass boots on the ground.

---

Doris Matsui (CA-07)

Age on Election Day: 81
Terms Served: Ten
The Situation: This Sacramento-based seat has been in the Matsui family since 1979, when Bob Matsui was first elected to Congress. Doris, his widow, was elected to complete his term when the Congressman passed away in 2005, and she’s held on to the job ever since, with little in the way of intraparty opposition. She’s already sewn up endorsements from much of the local party establishment, but Matsui has also come in for criticism for a perceived lack of urgency and availability during Trump’s second term.

Challenger(s):

Mai Vang
Age on Election Day: 36
Fundraising: FEC profile
The Basics: The Sacramento City Council member has a pretty incredible backstory: She’s the oldest of 16 children born to Hmong refugees from Laos, grew up in poverty, and and won a city council seat with little outside help. Vang has put together a progressive record in city government and is hoping to ride grassroots support and the demand for new leaders to an upset victory.

“As a daughter from a Hmong family, we're taught to respect our elders and I have deep gratitude for the Matsui family,” she said on Monday. “They have served this region, but in this moment, status quo politics isn't going to protect and serve our families and our communities. I believe that the establishment has been very comfortable. They have created the conditions that we see today and so we need new leaders to step up and to speak up.”

---

Jimmy Gomez (CA-34)

Age on Election Day: 50
Terms Served: Five
The Situation: Rep. Jimmy Gomez won reelection by just 11 points last year, but unlike many of his colleagues during a disastrous 2024, the close margin of victory had nothing to do the electorate shifting to the right: Gomez was nearly upset by a fellow Democrat who ran to his left in California’s jungle primary system. David Kim, in his third attempt, took over 44% of the vote in November despite being massively outspent by both Gomez’s campaign and outside groups, including AIPAC and crypto PACs that each dropped half a million dollars to boost the incumbent.

Gomez is a former union organizer who grew up in a working class Latino neighborhood, but he’s strayed from those roots in Congress. For critic he has been worth the investment, as he’s been a champion for lax regulation, which has done little for his very working class district. California’s proposed redistricting won’t change the partisan makeup of his district, either, keeping Gomez vulnerable from the left.

Challenger(s):

Angela Gonzales-Torres
Age on Election Day: 31
Fundraising: FEC profile
The Basics: After defeating the low-profile and underfunded Kim three cycles in a row, Gomez now faces an opponent with far more institutional backing. Gonzales-Torres, the former president of the Highland Park Neighborhood Council, is being backed by Justice Democrats, which shed staffers after the 2024 election but remains a prominent player in progressive politics.

Like Gomez, Gonzales-Torres grew up working class — she was raised by a single mother after her father was deported to Mexico — and she’s thus far run an economically populist campaign. The 30-year-old community organizer has also been outspoken in opposition to the genocide in Gaza, hitting Gomez, who has called for the resignation of Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, for not being more forceful on the issue.

She’ll have to rely on small donors and foot soldiers in a dense urban district, and in this climate, especially in an LA riven by military occupation and ICE raids, she has a real chance of making it work.

---

John Larson (CT-01)

Age on Election Day: 78
Terms Served: 14
The Situation: With questions about his health and a long list of qualified potential replacements lined up for a competitive open primary, this would have been a perfect moment for the long-time legislator to end a distinguished career in Congress. He probably could have tipped the scales in a crowded open primary and essentially chosen his successor. Instead, Larson decided that despite closing in on 80-years-old and experiencing two medical episodes in public this year, he remains the best man for the job.

"I'll let the people decide whether or not they think age is a factor," Larson told reporters last week. "I think people do think experience matters. It isn't the time you're there, it's what you do while you're there, and what you produce for the district."

The voters will have plenty of choices.

Challenger(s):

Ruth Fortune
Age on Election Day: 38
Fundraising: FEC profile
The Basics: The first challenger to declare their candidacy, Fortune is an attorney and member of the Hartford Board of Education. She was born in Haiti, brought to the US as a small child, and finally gained citizenship in 2017. Like many Democratic challengers, she’s framing her run as a response to the party’s weak pushback against the Trump administration.

“I’m not seeing, particularly on our Democratic side, the fight as aggressively as it should be happening,” she told the CT Examiner. So much is at stake right now that we just have to be more bold. We have to be more audacious with how we not only push back against the Trump administration and fascism, but also advocate for the values we hold dear.”

State Rep. Jillian Gilchrest
Age on Election Day: 44
Fundraising: FEC profile
The Basics: Having entered elected office in 2018 by unseating a more conservative Democrat, Gilchrest is not hesitant to demand more from her party. She’s the head of the Reproductive Rights Caucus in the legislature and former director of the group Pro-Choice Connecticut, but she’s leaning on economic populism in the early going.

“Unfortunately, the Republicans aren’t the only ones to blame for where we are as a country,” she said during her campaign kickoff speech in August. “We’ve lived through a generation of politics where donors came first and working people came last. I’m asking you to believe in a different kind of politics and a different kind of campaign. We can’t bring the change we need by doing the exact same things the exact same way.”

Mayor Luke Bronin
Age on Election Day: 48
Fundraising: FEC profile
The Basics: A former two-term mayor of Hartford, Bronin mused about running for governor before setting his sights on Congress. Before declaring his candidacy, he met with Larson and suggested that he step aside, to no avail. Now, Bronin is trying to craft an argument that incorporates the need for generational change, the urgency of the moment, and the importance of economic truth-telling.

“I think where it started is we weren't listening to people,” he told the Hartford NBC affiliate, speaking about Democrats’ failures last year. “And people were saying loud and clear, getting crushed by housing and healthcare and child care and electricity, and go down the line. And we weren't listening. We were telling people, no, look at the data. It's fine. But they're right. And the thing is, people feel like our economic system isn't working because it's not.”

Jack Perry
Age on Election Day: 36
Fundraising: FEC profile
The Basics: A city councilor in Southington, Perry is pitching himself as the blue collar candidate in this race, having spent his career building a garbage-collecting business that he sold last year. Some of the haul will be invested into this campaign, as Perry has poured half a million dollars into the race in order to keep up with his better-known competitors.

---

Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (FL-20)

Age in 2026: 47
Terms Served: Two
The Situation: This one is an absolute mess… and par for the course for Florida Democrats. The saga began when longtime Rep. Alcee Hastings died in 2021, leading to a tight special primary election that Cherfilus-McCormick won by just five votes. In hindsight, she was almost certainly put over the top by the nearly $6 million that the state of Florida accidentally overpaid her company for medical services during the pandemic, which helped fund the $6.2 million that she lent her campaign.

Cherfilus-McCormick was investigated for pocketing instead of reporting the overpayment — Florida was supposed to pay her family’s healthcare company $50,000 — and agreed to pay back the state over the next 15 years. But she is far from out of the woods, having wracked up a dizzying array of other ethics investigations and allegations of corruption during her two and a half years in Congress.

Over the summer, the House Ethics Committee found probable cause for further investigation of allegations that she sought money for a nonprofit and steered it to a for-profit entity, as well as an allegation that she accepted campaign donations for an official action.

Challenger(s):

Elijah Manley
Age on Election Day: 27
Fundraising: FEC profile ($99,669.27 cash on hand)
The Basics: Manley has run for office before, back in 2020 when he got his clock cleaned in a special election for state legislature. Ambitious beyond his years, he’s hung around and worked as a community organizer, building up experience and becoming something of a prolific fundraiser; Manley has raised $474,000 for this race thus far, though he only has about a fifth of that still in his account.

The race has already turned nasty, as Cherfilus-McCormick recently filed a $1 million lawsuit against Manley for what she calls defamation. It’s a pretty specious case, I think, and seems like a desperate maneuver. But the main battle for these two may be with Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is looking to further gerrymander Florida and redraw the 20th district into red territory.

---

David Scott (GA-13)

Age in 2026: 81
Terms Served: 12
The Situation: Scott made headlines when he snapped at a photographer and called him an “asshole” for taking his photo while he was being pushed in his wheelchair outside the Capitol. More than a temper tantrum, it was another affirmation of Scott’s steep cognitive decline; in February, Politico reported that he was reading from scripts during private conversations and losing track of party policy.

He won re-election in his heavily Democratic district last year after triumphing in an overly crowded primary, but he was forced to give up his role as the ranking member of the Agriculture Committee. With the focus on the gerontocracy and questions about his health, Scott may not get off so easy this time.

Challenger(s):

State Sen. Emanuel Jones
Age on Election Day: 67
Fundraising: FEC profile ($85,981.11 cash on hand)
The Basics: Jones can’t make the generational change argument, considering his age, but he’s still contrasting himself with the octogenarian incumbent.

"I don't think it's a secret to anyone that Congressman Scott has had some medical issues," he told a local TV news channel earlier this year. "You don't get removed as a ranking member from a committee unless the leadership deems you unfit to serve.”

Everton Blair
Age on Election Day: 34
Fundraising: FEC profile ($151,902.52 cash on hand)
The Basics: Blair was a public school teacher in Atlanta before being elected the youngest chairman of the Gwinnett County Board of Education. He decided to run after attending a town hall hosted by Scott at the beginning of the year and coming away disappointed.

“With so much falling apart under this administration, we need more representatives who are in touch with reality and have the courage to fight for our future,” he told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “The leaders who got us into this mess are not the ones that are going to get us out of it.”

State Rep. Jasmine Clark
Age on Election Day: 43
Fundraising: FEC profile ($148,288.93 cash on hand)
The Basics: Clark has perhaps the most interesting profile in this race, as a state lawmaker, microbiologist, and a podcast host on the Red, Wine & Blue network (which is a real thing). She too is making the generational argument against Scott, though she’s also focused on public health and home ownership as two key issues animating her campaign.

“We have corporate landlords that are basically these investment groups that buy up all the properties basically boxing out any regular individual family that just wants to go and buy their first home or maybe buy their second home,” she said in an interview this summer. “They are not able to compete with these investment groups. They end up being boxed out of that process to where homes are unaffordable."

---

Ed Case (HI-01)

Age in 2026: 74
Terms Served: Six
The Situation: A conservative Democrat in one of the country’s bluest seats, Case regularly angers progressives with his votes; this year, he’s voted with Republicans to require proof of citizenship to vote and to censure Rep. Al Green for his protest during Donald Trump’s quasi-State of the Union speech. He’s nonetheless a solid fundraiser and has worn down fellow Democrats into supporting his campaigns, though the emergence of a prominent challenger will test the power of his incumbency and growing seniority.

Challenger(s):

State Sen. Jarrett Keohokalole
Age on Election Day: 43
Fundraising: FEC profile
The Basics: A longtime state legislator, Keohokalole is challenging Case from the left. He’s a reputation as a populist opponent of price-gouging corporations and powerful political entities during his time as the chair of the state Senate’s Commerce and Consumer Protection Committee, where he’s gone to war with energy companies and property insurers, among other special interests. Keohokalole also has a powerful ally in former Gov. Neil Abercrombie, who absolutely hates Case.

---

André Carson (IN-07)

Age in 2026: 52
Terms Served: Nine
The Situation: This Indianapolis-based seat has been in the Carson family since 1996, when André’s grandmother was elected to Congress. Her death in 2007 led to a special election the next year, which Carson won with a slim 53% of the vote. Carson has largely been a progressive in office, but has not exactly distinguished himself legislatively, ranking near the bottom of most effective members of the caucus.

Only the second Muslim to serve in Congress, he has been critical of Israel’s illegal settler movement, supported BDS, and spoken out forcefully against the genocide in Gaza.

Challenger(s):

George Hornedo
Age on Election Day: 36
Fundraising: FEC profile ($66,497.87 cash on hand)
The Basics: Former Obama DOJ staffer is challenging Carson less on the basis of ideology than what he perceives to be the incumbent’s inadequately aggressive in his opposition to Trump and the GOP. But buyer beware: Hornado is actually far more moderate than Carson; his website trashes the left and details a policy platform that embraces crypto.

---

Steny Hoyer (MD-5)

Age in 2026: 87
Terms Served: 22
The Situation: The former House Majority Leader gave up his position in the official Democratic hierarchy in 2023 but seems committed to holding on to his seat until the very end; he suffered a stroke last August and would be 89-years-old at the end of his next term.

Hoyer easily survived several primary challenges from a community organizer named Mckayla Wilkes, who got as high as 26.7% of the vote in 2020. But that was before the long-overdue reckoning with the Democratic gerontocracy that’s currently transpiring, and Hoyer is no longer the party’s second in command. He hasn’t given any indication that he’s packing it in; he raised $232,000 in the previous quarter.

Challenger(s):

Harry Jarin
Age in 2026: 36
Fundraising: FEC Profile ($105,730.92 cash on hand)
The Basics: Jarin, 35, is a volunteer firefighter and emergency services consultant who says it’s time to reckon with the gerontocracy and its direct impact on Democrats’ electoral fate.

But he has told interviewers that there isn’t much ideological distance between himself and the moderate Hoyer, and his website blurbs something called “Universal Preventative Healthcare” as one of the three issues that he would address in Congress. The other two are the constitutional crisis and commute times in Maryland.

---

Stephen Lynch (MA-08)

Age in 2026: 71
Terms Served: 14
The Situation: The most blue collar of the Boston delegation, Lynch was the head of his local ironworkers union before jumping into politics in the ‘90s. While very pro-labor and working families, he’s also been more conservative on “social” issues; when he entered Congress, he considered himself anti-abortion and was opposed to same-sex marriage for a long time. He also voted against stiffening hate crime laws and recently voted for the Laken Reilly Act.

Lynch is not all that receptive to criticism: during a rally at a VA hospital in February, he shouted down a constituent who had urged him to more forcefully oppose Donald Trump. “I get to decide that. I get to decide that,” Lynch pushed back. “I get to decide that. I’m elected. You want to decide that, you need to run for Congress.”

Unfortunately for Lynch, somebody took him up on it.

Challenger(s):

Patrick Roath
Age on Election Day: 39
Fundraising: FEC profile ($223,605.33 cash on hand)
The Basics: Former Obama DOJ staffer is challenging Lynch less on the basis of ideology than what he perceives to be the incumbent’s inadequately aggressive in his opposition to Trump and the GOP.

There are some have key differences, with Roath hitting Lynch for his vote for the Laken Riley Act and long-ago vote against the Affordable Care Act. But Roath isn’t jumping into progressive positions right away. He doesn’t necessarily support Medicare for All, which seems like a layup in Boston, and Lynch still enjoys support from major labor unions.

If nothing else, Roath has proven a capable fundraiser, having taken in $280,00 to out-raise Lynch last quarter.

---

Shri Thanedar (MI-13)

Age in 2026: 71
Terms Served: Two

The Situation: Born and raised in India, Thanedar moved to the United States to pursue a doctorate at the University of Akron and made his fortune in chemicals and pharmaceuticals (his record on animal care is far spottier).

His political ambitions came later in life: Thanedar was a John McCain donor who waffled on his party before running for governor in 2018, only to come in third place after spending millions on his campaign in the Democratic primary. Then it was on to the Michigan legislature for a term before shrewdly picking up an open Congressional seat representing Detroit in 2022. Each of his races has largely been paid for out of his own personal wealth.

Thanedar was once a member of DSA but renounced it in 2023 in protest of the group’s early objections to Israel’s war in Gaza; he may have been booted soon anyway over his support for right-wing Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Challenger(s):

State Rep. Donavan McKinney
Age on Election Day: 32
Fundraising: FEC profile ($216,678.33 cash on hand)
The Basics: McKinney grew up in poverty and represents one of the poorest legislative districts in Michigan

McKinney came out hard against the Democrats’ decision to scale back the state’s minimum wage increase over the winter and had some pretty pointed words for Thanedar — who he called “Detroit’s own Elon Musk” — when he announced his candidacy.

“I’m not running because I’m a millionaire. I’m running because I’m not. I’m running because our community deserves to be able to sleep at night knowing they have a Representative in Congress who truly knows their struggles and truly fights for them every single day,” McKinney told the Michigan Advance.

---

Wait, Before You Leave!

Progress Report has raised over $7 million dollars for progressive candidates and causes, breaks national stories about corrupt politicians, and delivers incisive analysis, and goes deep into the grassroots.

None of the money we’ve raised for candidates and causes goes to producing this newsletter or all of the related projects we put out. In fact, it costs me money to do this. So, I need your help.

For just $5 a month, you can buy a premium subscription that includes:

• Premium member-only newsletters with original reporting

• Financing new projects and paying new reporters

• Access to upcoming chats and live notes

You can also make a one-time donation to Progress Report’s GoFundMe campaign!