The 2024 downballot primary season continues Tuesday in four states, including one that will use a new congressional map for the first time.
Republicans in Georgia dramatically reshaped congressional and legislative districts in the Atlanta area after a federal judge ruled the 2022 boundaries illegally discriminated against Black voters. To the frustration of voting rights advocates, though, the new maps maintained the GOP's lopsided advantages.
Nomination contests aren't the only races we have to watch this week. Voters in Georgia will be deciding the winner in a state Supreme Court race where Democrats are focusing on abortion rights, while the district attorney in Oregon's largest county is battling a well-funded subordinate who is attacking him from the right. And voters in California's Central Valley will finally choose the person who will replace Kevin McCarthy in Congress—just not in the speaker's chair.
Below you'll find our guide to the top contests to watch. There has been little reliable polling released in any of these elections, which adds some extra suspense to the night. To help you follow along with all of the House races, you can access interactive maps from Dave's Redistricting App for California, Georgia, Idaho, Kentucky, and Oregon.
You also can find Daily Kos Elections' calculations of the 2020 presidential results for each district here, as well as our geographic descriptions for each seat. And you'll want to bookmark our primary calendar, which includes the dates for primaries in all 50 states.
Kentucky
Polls close at 6 PM ET in the part of Kentucky located in the Eastern time zone, which is home to over three-quarters of the state's population, while polls close an hour later in the remainder of the Bluegrass State.
All six members of the state's House delegation are seeking reelection, and none of them—five Republicans and one Democrat appear—to be in any danger of losing their primaries. Neither of the state's U.S. senators are up this cycle.
Georgia
Polls close at 7 PM ET. A June 18 runoff will take place in any primaries where no candidate earns a majority of the vote.
• GA-03 (R) (64-34 Trump): Five Republicans are running to succeed retiring GOP Rep. Drew Ferguson in a constituency based in Atlanta's southwestern exurbs that was not altered by the new map. As it so often has, though, Donald Trump's intervention has made one of these contenders the frontrunner.
Trump endorsed his former aide, Brian Jack, hours before Jack even announced he was running. Jack has not only outraised all of his opponents, he's also benefited from $1.5 million in spending from super PACs.
None of the other hopefuls have received much outside support or major endorsements, but they're each hoping they can at least advance to a runoff. The contest includes two former state senators, Mike Crane, who lost the 2016 runoff to Ferguson, and Mike Dugan, who resigned from the legislature in January to focus on his bid.
Also in the running is former state Rep. Philip Singleton, who spent his brief time in office antagonizing GOP leaders. The final contender is Jim Bennett, an underfunded conservative activist who was waging a little-noticed campaign against Ferguson before the incumbent announced his departure.
• GA-06 (D) (74-25 Biden): Democratic Rep. Lucy McBath faces two local elected officials in her primary to represent the revamped 6th District, which has no territory in common with the 7th District she currently serves. McBath, though, lives in Cobb County, which makes up 38% of the new-look 6th. (The congresswoman would trade district numbers with GOP Rep. Rich McCormick, who has no intra-party opposition in the new 7th.)
However, neither of those two Democrats, Cobb County Commissioner Jerica Richardson and state Rep. Mandisha Thomas, have raised serious sums in their campaign against the well-funded McBath. And while most voters in Atlanta's western suburbs have never had the chance to vote for McBath, she's been one of the state's most prominent Democrats ever since her 2018 victory against GOP Rep. Karen Handel.
• GA-13 (D) (70-29 Biden): Democratic Rep. David Scott is running again despite serious concerns about his health, prompting six primary foes to hope they can at least force the 11-term moderate into a runoff. But while Scott only represents about 30% of the new 13th District, none of his intra-party opponents have raised much money to get their own names out.
Scott's most prominent opponent is arguably Army veteran Marcus Flowers, who took in an enormous $16 million in 2022 for his bid against far-right Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene in the dark-red 14th District. Flowers, though, is campaigning in a suburban Atlanta constituency that shares nothing in common with the rural district he sought last cycle, and his past fundraising success has not carried over into this new race.
The field includes two local politicians, former South Fulton City Councilman Mark Baker, who lost the 2022 primary to Scott 66-13 in the prior version of the 13th, and former East Point City Councilwoman Karen Rene. Both of the communities where they last held office, though, are located in other congressional districts.
• GA Supreme Court (49.5-49.3 Biden): Conservative Supreme Court Justice Andrew Pinson faces former Democratic Rep. John Barrow in an officially nonpartisan race that, because only two candidates are running, will serve as the general election. (A November runoff would have been possible in a multi-way contest.)
Conservatives will still control the nine-member body no matter how the contest for this six-year term goes, but a victory would be another strong sign that the Peach State's shift to the left during the last few years isn't over.
No incumbent justice has been unseated in Georgia since 1922, but Barrow is hoping that his ardent opposition to the state's six-week abortion ban will help him make history. Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, who appointed Pinson in 2022, is trying to counter that message by starring in ads touting his pick as "the conservative voice we can trust."
Idaho
Polls close at 10 PM ET / 8 PM local time in the part of Idaho located in the Mountain time zone, which contains about 80% of the state's residents, with the rest of the state following an hour later.
There isn't much to watch in this dark red state, though. Rep. Mike Simpson faces only a pair of underfunded primary foes in the 2nd District, while fellow GOP Rep. Russ Fulcher is unopposed for renomination. Neither of the state's U.S. senators is up this year.
California
Polls close at 11 PM ET / 8 PM local time.
• CA-20 (special) (61-36 Trump): Assemblyman Vince Fong and Tulare County Sheriff Mike Boudreaux are competing in an all-Republican special election to succeed Kevin McCarthy, who resigned in December after he was evicted from the speaker's chair a few months earlier.
This will be the third time in less than three months that Boudreaux and Fong, a former McCarthy district director, have faced off in this Central Valley seat. Fong, who has the support of Trump, McCarthy, and Speaker Mike Johnson, led 42-24 in the March 5 top-two primary for a full term. He also outpaced Boudreaux by a similar 42-26 spread two weeks later in the first round of this special election.
No matter what happens Tuesday, the two rivals will compete one more time on Nov. 5 for a seat in the new Congress.
Oregon
Polls close in almost all of the state at 11 PM ET / 8 PM local time. The tiny portion of Oregon located in the Mountain time zone closes one hour earlier, but this area (made up of just Malheur County) is home to fewer than 1% of the state's residents.
• OR-03 (D) (73-25 Biden): The primary to succeed retiring Democratic Rep. Earl Blumenauer in the eastern Portland area has attracted nearly $6 million in spending from outside groups, with almost most of it aimed at boosting one candidate and eviscerating another.
State Rep. Maxine Dexter has benefited from more than $2 million in support from 314 Action, a group that promotes Democratic candidates with backgrounds in science. (Dexter is a pulmonologist.) She also decisively outraised her opponents late in the race thanks in part to a large infusion from donors with a history of also giving to the hawkish pro-Israel group AIPAC.
Former Multnomah County Commissioner Susheela Jayapal, who is the sister of Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal, faces a very different situation. A new super PAC called Voters for Responsive Government has spent more than $3 million on commercials arguing she did a poor job addressing homelessness and other issues while in office. Despite her national connections, progressive groups have not spent much to push back.
The third notable contender is Gresham City Councilor Eddy Morales, a former state party treasurer who has not attracted any notable support or opposition from outside outfits. Four other Democrats are also on the ballot, but none of them have generated much attention.
• OR-05 (D) (53-44 Biden): 2022 Democratic nominee Jamie McLeod-Skinner and state Rep. Janelle Bynum are competing to face freshman Republican Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer in a swingy seat based in Portland's southern suburbs and central Oregon.
While McLeod-Skinner lost to Chavez-DeRemer by a close 52-48 margin in what was a dicey year for Oregon Democrats, both national parties seem to agree that Bynum would be the stronger nominee. Opponents of McLeod-Skinner have highlighted allegations that she mistreated her staff as a candidate and as a municipal official, with multiple former staffers saying her driver feared for his safety.
Those allegations have been at the center of a $750,000 ad campaign against McLeod-Skinner by Mainstream Democrats PAC, a group funded by LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman. As for Bynum, who beat Chavez-DeRemer in back-to-back legislative races in 2016 and 2018, she has the support of the DCCC and Gov. Tina Kotek, and 314 Action has spent almost $500,000 to promote her. (Bynum has a background in electrical engineering.)
McLeod-Skinner hadn't received any meaningful outside support until the final week of the race when a mysterious group launched a $500,000 buy praising her as an ardent progressive. That organization, Health Equity Now, has ties to Republicans, who apparently want to meddle in the primary in the hopes of picking their preferred opponent.
The only poll we've seen here all year was a late April Bynum internal that showed her leading McLeod-Skinner 37-34.
• OR-SoS (D) (57-41 Biden): State Treasurer Tobias Read and state Sen. James Manning are the main candidates in the five-person Democratic primary to succeed Secretary of State LaVonne Griffin-Valade, whose office is first in line to succeed the governor in case of a vacancy.
Griffin-Valade assumed the role of chief elections officer last year after her fellow Democrat, Shemia Fagan resigned amid a scandal, and she is not seeking a full term. (Oregon has no lieutenant governor, but because Griffin-Valade was appointed to her role, Read is currently first in line.)
The two frontrunners agree on most issues, though Bolts Magazine notes that Manning has shown considerably more interest in changing state law to allow incarcerated people to vote. The winner is likely to take on state Sen. Dennis Linthicum, who is the most prominent candidate in the GOP's three-way primary.
• Multnomah County District Attorney (79-18 Biden): District Attorney Mike Schmidt's decisive 2020 victory represented a big win for criminal justice reformers, but he now faces an expensive challenge from the right on Tuesday in the form of longtime prosecutor Nathan Vasquez.
Schmidt identifies as a Democrat, while Vasquez left the Republican Party in 2017 to enroll with the Independent Party of Oregon. There are no other candidates in this officially nonpartisan race in the Portland area, so it's all but certain that one of them will win the majority needed to avert a second round of voting on Nov. 5.
Vasquez has run ads arguing that under Schmidt, crime and homelessness have gotten out of control in Portland. The incumbent has pushed back by defending his record and highlighting that Vasquez originally expressed support for the policies he's now attacking him over.
Correction: This story misidentified the Georgia Supreme Court justice on the ballot on Tuesday. The justice is Andrew Pinson, not John Ellington.
