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- [00:04]
A
Hey there. It's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Miles Parks. I cover voting.
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B
And I'm Mara Liasson, senior national political Correspondent.
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A
And Minnesota Public Radio's Clay Masters is also here with us. Hi, Clay.
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C
Hey. Good to be here.
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A
Yeah, great to have you. And we're recording this podcast at 1:36pm Eastern Time on Wednesday, May 13, 2026. And we're going to talk about Nebraska today. This is a state that had a primary election yesterday, and it's also home to Washington, one of the few competitive districts in the U.S. house, Nebraska's 2nd district, which is sometimes known as the Blue dot in Nebraska. And it also is a state that has a Senate race with some pretty funky political dynamics. But I do wanna start with that House race, this competitive House race. Clay, walk us through the candidates.
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C
Yeah. And I guess I should first declare my bona fides for Nebraska. I'm a Nebraska native and I graduated from the University of Nebraska, Lincoln and started my career there. So I just needed to to put that cred out there to begin with. So the second Congressional district in Nebraska, it's home to the largest city, the most populated city in the state, Omaha. And the dynamics in this Democratic primary were so competitive because this state has not been a winner take all when it comes to electoral politics. So the way that there's only two states that do this, it's Nebraska and Maine. And in Nebraska, not all the delegates go to the candidate who wins the state. Right. So we've seen this history where Nebraska's 2nd congressional district, a lot of times called the Blue dot, has gone to Democratic presidential nominees, while the rest of the state and the other two congressional districts have gone to the Republicans. So there's this been this dynamic that's taking place in this race where the two main candidates. And it's still too close to be called right now, the two candidates are fighting over whether or not this would have harm on Nebraska's blue dot. Senator John Kavanaugh serves in the unicameral legislature. And there's concern that if he is not in the unicameral, then there would be this opportunity for Republicans to push a winner take all in the state of Nebraska.
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A
Got it. So these are the two Democrats who are fighting and where this race has not been called yet. But is there any actual policy differences between these two Democrats or is it just the issue of if this one guy leaves the state legislature, that it could put the state in a more vulnerable position to change their election policy?
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C
Yeah, the two candidates, John Kavanaugh He's a Democrat in the officially nonpartisan unicameral. Nebraska is the only state with a unicameral. And then Denise Powell is the, the other candidate. And a lot of the oxygen has just been about whether or not John Kavanaugh would harm the blue dot in Nebraska. But as far as policy differences, we haven't seen a whole lot that would differentiate the two.
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B
By winning the primary for the House, he would harm Democrats prospects to eke out one electoral vote from Nebraska in presidential elections.
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C
That has been, that has been the elbowing that has been taking place in the Democratic primary in the lead up to last night's election.
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A
I mean, Mara, this is so complicated in the weeds to talk about the potential of one electoral vote, but I do think it's pretty interesting, especially considering President Trump has been pretty vocal, Right. In terms of pushing for this idea of Nebraska to move back towards a winner take all system. Do you think this is a likely scenario or what do you make of this?
- [03:29]
B
Sure. I mean, Donald Trump has made it very clear that he wants to push the rules as far as possible to help Republicans. This is the cousin to partisan gerrymandering. In other words, right now Nebraska is the only state in the union other than Maine that gives out electoral college votes based on congressional districts. Now, of course, congressional districts can be gerrymandered, but, but awarding electors on the basis of each congressional district is a lot closer to the overall state popular vote than a winner take all system. When it comes to presidential electors, it doesn't matter if the other party gets some percentage of the popular vote for president. Whoever gets the majority gets every single electoral vote except for Maine and Nebraska. And this is one of the ways that, that Democrats have been able to win the White House because they can get an electoral college vote from Nebraska in this very blue Omaha based district. So it's part of this race to the bottom, I think, where no good deed goes unpunished. Nebraska was what you could call a good government state. They have a unicameral, nonpartisan legislature. They, they give out their electors and presidential elections as close as possible to the popular vote as they can get. But Donald Trump doesn like that and he's kind of pushing for this. The Democrats have had to respond. It's pretty wild to try to figure out, wrap your brain around what's happening in Nebraska. It is a microcosm of the bigger trend that we're seeing in US Elections, which is to make them as partisan as possible and as unresponsive to the popular vote.
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C
I would note too, that as recent as last year, the Nebraska legislature killed a bill that sought to alter how the state awards Electoral College votes for president. This after Republicans failed to secure enough votes to overcome a really long filibuster. And to this point, if, if the state Senator, John Kavanaugh heads to Washington, then Nebraska's Republican Governor, Jim Pillin, would get to appoint a replacement to finish out that term, which ends in 2028. So that's where the concern is, is they'd know that the state senator has a lock on securing the so called blue dot.
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B
Has John Kavanaugh been asked about why he's willing to leave the state legislature, go to Washington when his leaving might cause more problems for his party back home?
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C
Good question. I mean, even though Republicans already have a super majority in this officially nonpartisan legislature, Kavanaugh and his supporters have said that they're confident in the ability of Democratic legislative candidates to flip at least one seat to offset the potential loss down the road.
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B
So he's saying that the Democratic Party would not be endangered if he left?
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C
He is saying that, yeah. And then also pointing out the fact that Republicans in the, again, officially nonpartisan, unicameral have a super majority.
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A
Okay, so that's the dynamics in this Democratic primary for this competitive House seat. What about the Republican side, Clay?
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C
On the Republican side, Brinker Harding, who was endorsed by President Trump, ran unopposed in the primary. And Donald Trump has said that he has his full endorsement. And the retiring Congressman Don Bacon has been seen as more of a, I don't know, moderate in Washington in that he talked to a local TV station when he was doing his retirement, that he, that he had voted for the bipartisan infrastructure bill in 2021. He talked about some support for Ukraine. The first thing he brought up when he was talking about why he is seen as a more moderate candidate is that he certified the 2020 presidential election of Joe Biden. And so while Donald Trump has endorsed Don Bacon in the past, in the run up to his elections in 2022, he did a primary opponent against him there. On the Republican side, this is a much more full throated endorsement from the president of the Republican who is seeking to replace Bacon in Washington.
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B
Clay, does that mean that moderate for this purposes means somebody willing to criticize or break with Trump?
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C
That is why Don Bacon said that he was, why he thinks that he's been able to pick up support from voters in Nebraska's second congressional district despite, you know, Kamala Harris winning in 2024 in that second congressional district, is that
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A
why Democrats feel like this is a seat they can potentially win in 2026, even though it's currently held by a Republican. Is it the fact that Harris won it in 2024 what gives them that hope?
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C
Yeah. And while Republicans there have the most registered voters, Democrats and independent voters combined outnumber them according to the Nebraska secretary of state's recent data. And so they see a lane there. And yes, the history of, of Harris winning Joe Biden has won the district. Also, back in 2008, it was a big news story that Barack Obama won CD2 despite John McCain winning the rest of the state.
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A
All right. Well, let's take a quick break, but more on Nebraska's election wonkiness right after this. Welcome back. So let's talk about the Senate race in Nebraska. Clay, who are the candidates who are running for this Senate seat?
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C
Yeah, Republican incumbent U.S. senator Pete Ricketts is running on the Republican side. He had no problem securing the nomination. On the Democratic side, it gets a little complicated. Bill Forbes, he's a pastor from western Nebraska. And all indications would be that he is a supporter of President Donald Trump. He disputes that. But we've seen Nebraska's Democratic Party chair said a couple of months ago that Forbes was not running to serve Nebraskans. He was running to trick voters. The Nebraska Democratic Party made a deliberate, principled decision not to field a candidate in the U.S. senate race. This person lost to a Democratic candidate, Cindy Burbank. She has suggested that she might drop out of the race, which wouldn't leave Pete Ricketts not running against anybody. There is actually an independent candidate who ran in 2024 by the name of Dan Osborne. He came within seven points of beating Republican U.S. senator Deb Fisher in 2024. And he's hoping to go one on one with another sitting U.S. senator in Nebraska in 2026.
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A
Okay. A lot to unpack there.
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C
Clear as mud.
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A
Exactly. I'm going to start, I want to start with Ricketts because that is a name that people outside of Nebraska, I personally doesn't mean a whole lot to me, but I know that is a big name in Nebraska. Right. Can you just lay out exactly what it means to be a Ricketts in Nebraska?
- [10:16]
C
Yeah. Pete Ricketts comes from a wealthy family from Chicago, actually, and he has been involved in Nebraska politics since 2006. Side note, doesn't really mean anything much anymore, but he's the last Republican to lose a statewide race back in 2006 to former U.S. senator Ben Nelson. But I digress. Pete Ricketts was the governor then of Nebraska and he was the person who took the place of Senator Ben Sasse when he left that seat and then won a special election to represent it. So he's a well known name in Nebraska.
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A
Okay. And then thinking about Osborne, do you guys think that this is a realistic chance considering this is somebody who lost by seven points the last time he lost?
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Seven points means something different in Nebraska. Seven points is pretty close for a candidate who's not a Republican. Do you agree with that, Clay?
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C
Oh, absolutely. I mean, gone are the days where you had a Ben Nelson in the U.S. senate or a Chuck Hagel who was seen as a, you know, much more left leaning Republican. The fact that he came within seven points was, was a big deal. And you take in consideration too that it's President Donald Trump's approval ratings are down right now and Dan Osborne now has name identification in the state. So this could be interesting if he's able to go one on one against him.
- [11:39]
A
Well, I wonder if this gets at this broader idea that we've touched on the podcast a lot this year, that there are a lot of voters who aren't super into the idea of either major political party right now. And I wonder if that is something about this current moment that makes an independent candidate more viable now than maybe five or 10 years ago.
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B
Absolutely, yeah.
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C
And Dan Osborne, I sat down with him recently for an interview and he was talking a lot about how he doesn't put a lot of stock into colors and R's and D's next to names. And he was talking about campaigning at, I believe at a fair where he was talking to somebody wearing I would rather vote for a felon T shirt and then talking to a guy in a T shirt with Harrison Walls. And he said we would agree on 90% of the issues. It was just these wedge issues that they used to try to keep us divided. So in a time when candidates are looking at ways to try to bring in new voters, especially in a place like Nebraska, Dan Osborne could do a lot. It's a big could. But he wants to go up against
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B
Ricketts and he won't have a D next to his name. And that's really important. The Democratic brand is bad all over the country, but especially in red states. And if Democrats are going to have any hope of appealing to non college, white rural voters in red states, they're going to have to start with candidates like Dan Osborne. And this is something that's pretty existential for them as electoral college votes and congressional districts start Moving out of the blue wall states of the northern Midwest and into the south, Texas, Florida, Georgia. That's what's going to happen after the 20 census.
- [13:19]
A
I think this gets at this broader idea though, too. I'm curious for your perspective on Clay, which is when I hear you talk about the way Dan Osborne talks about people and this kind of Kumbaya message that we agree on 90% of things and it's just these things that the politicians want us to focus on, that to me sounds like a moderate. That is kind of like, and I, I, I don't know, I've been covering politics for quite a few years now, and it feels like voters, they say they want moderates, but then they don't vote for them. And I guess I wonder how you feel about that idea. Like, is, is that really a viable message in a deeply, pretty deeply Republican state?
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C
Yeah, that's a really good question. And I mean, there are a lot of races that are coming up in this midterm that will kind of test this idea of, of moderate candidates and moderate voters. And what does moderate even mean anymore when the goalposts seem to have, have moved so much? I mean, earlier Mara was pointing out the fact that does moderate mean that you're willing to vote against Donald Trump now in the Republican Party? So this is going to be a test as well as there are some other tests in other states like in Iowa and in Minnesota, to see if, if there is still legs for, for what a moderate candidate or a moderate voters or moderate positions have been in the past and if, if it still means the same thing that it once did.
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A
Mara, what messages does the Democratic Party need to focus on if they're hoping to win over moderate voters?
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B
Well, when you say moderate, I would translate that into white working class, non college voters in rural places, in red states. That's what they have to do. I think they have to focus on economic issues, not cultural issues. And what you hear a lot of Democrats say is they also just need to show up. Democrats made a very fateful decision, you know, 10 or 12 years ago where they thought the future was with college educated voters mostly clustered around metro areas and on the coasts. It didn't work out so well for them, especially because of the way the population has moved over time and also the way that we elect our representatives and presidents, which gives an advantage to real estate over people. You know, there are a lot of wasted votes around metro areas and in coastal places. So I think Democrats have to learn how to be the party of the working class, which they used to be not long ago.
- [15:41]
C
And I mean, from covering two Iowa caucus cycles, in spending a lot of time in rural Iowa watching candidates connect with voters, I think a lot about Senator Bernie Sanders and the message that especially in 2016, where first time I saw him it was in a small kind of backyard gathering and watching that campaign growing, certainly Bernie Sanders not seen as a moderate candidate. So this is kind of a test in 2026, I think, to see if, if that's still the case.
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A
All right. Well, we can leave it there for today. As I mentioned, some of the results from yesterday's primaries have not yet been called. So if you want the most up to date information, head to npr.org Clay, thank you so much as always for joining us. It's always great to have your perspective.
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C
Always great to be here. Thanks.
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A
I'm Miles Parks. I cover voting.
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B
And I'm Mara Liasson, senior national political correspondent.
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A
And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics podcast.