By The Epoch Times | Created at 2026-10-05 22:16:58 | Updated at 2026-10-05 23:27:20
1 hour ago
The House Democrats’ campaign arm is giving six more candidates a boost to try to win Republican-favored seats, with the Nov. 3 midterm elections less than a month away.
The six were added to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s “Red to Blue” program, which gives candidates money, staff, and training, its Oct. 5 announcement said. The program now has 46 candidates nationwide, according to the DCCC’s list.
Head of the committee Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-Wash.) said the new candidates are focusing on lowering costs for gas, groceries, health care, and housing.
“At a time when so many families are struggling to pay the bills, Americans deserve representatives who will actually fight to make their lives better,” DelBene said in the announcement. “Voters are ready to turn the page on House Republicans’ broken promises and elect Democrats to the House Majority.”
The House Republicans’ campaign arm dismissed the move.
“The DCCC is stretching its map a mile wide and an inch deep, pretending every district in America is suddenly a battleground,” Mike Marinella, spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee, told The Epoch Times. “Democrats can put as many names on a list as they want, but they’re still begging for resources just to match Republicans’ air superiority while bailing out their radical socialist nominees.”
Three of the six are running against Republicans who are already in Congress.
Chris Jones, a physicist and ordained minister who ran for Arkansas governor in 2022, is running against Rep. French Hill (R-Ark.) in Arkansas’s 2nd District.
Army veteran Dwayne Romero, who led economic development under then-Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, is challenging Rep. Jeff Hurd (R-Colo.) in Colorado’s 3rd District.
Eliott Rodriguez, a CBS Miami news anchor of 25 years, is going against Rep. María Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.) in Florida’s 27th District.
The other three are running for seats where the current members are not seeking reelection. In Nevada’s 2nd District, former state Assembly Majority Leader Teresa Benitez-Thompson faces Republican David Flippo for the seat held by retiring Rep. Mark Amodei (R-Nev.).
In New York’s 21st District, dairy farmer Blake Gendebien faces Republican Anthony Constantino to fill the seat being vacated by Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.).
In Tennessee’s 9th District, state Rep. Justin J. Pearson faces Republican state Sen. Brent Taylor for the seat held by retiring Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) Tennessee’s Republican-led legislature redrew the 9th District’s boundaries in May, splitting the city of Memphis among three districts and turning a Democratic-held seat into one that favors Republicans.
The DCCC said Democrats have “a clear path” there, noting that former Democratic Gov. Phil Bredesen won the area in his 2018 Senate race.
Pearson drew national attention in 2023 as one of the “Tennessee Three,” Democratic lawmakers who
facedexpulsion votes after joining a gun control protest on the state House floor. The House expelled Pearson and Rep. Justin Jones, although both were later reinstated.
He is the second Tennessee candidate in the program, joining Chaz Molder, who is running in the state’s 5th District in the Nashville area.
The Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan forecaster that rates races, gives Republicans the edge in all six races. It rates Arkansas’s 2nd and Tennessee’s 9th as solidly Republican; Colorado’s 3rd, Nevada’s 2nd, and New York’s 21st as likely Republican, and Florida’s 27th as leaning Republican.
The DCCC added eight districts last week to a separate list of races it is targeting, bringing the total number to 66.
The NRCC noted that most of the candidates added late by the DCCC in past elections lost. In 2024, the committee added three candidates in September, and one won: April McClain Delaney in Maryland, in a seat Democrats already held.
In 2022, it added six candidates in July, and only Eric Sorensen of Illinois won, also in a seat Democrats already held. In 2020, both candidates it added in August lost, and only one of its 33 candidates won.
