Democrats have never won Nevada’s 2nd Congressional District, which Rep. Mark Amodei (R-NV) recently announced he will vacate after 15 years in the office. But in 2026, they are likely to get the best chance they’ve ever had, and candidates are already positioning themselves to do it.

Registered Republicans outnumber Democrats in the district, which spans Reno, Carson City and several of Northern Nevada’s rural counties. The Cook Political Report rates it solidly Republican. Amodei has not lost a single county in the district since he was first elected — not even Washoe, which has voted against Republicans in other races. According to data from OpenSecrets, liberal outside groups have rarely spent more than $50,000 on the seat each cycle. 

But Democrats say they have a shot in 2026, though they’ll need a wave election and a nominee who can transcend party lines.  

“I don’t think it is a foregone conclusion in the way that some people do,” Assm. Selena La Rue Hatch (D-Reno), a fourth-generation Northern Nevadan who is not interested in the seat, told The Nevada Independent. 

As The Cook Political Report’s Erin Covey previously told The Indy, Democrats would likely need a particularly weak Republican nominee to help them win the district. It’s too early to tell whether they will get one, as 2024 Senate nominee Sam Brown (R) continues to weigh a bid. 

A source close to the Nevada Democratic Party said the party recognizes the significance of Washoe County and is invested ahead of the midterms. Meanwhile, the primary field is growing.

“If there’s any year to flip this district, it’s probably going to be this year,” UNR political science student Morgan Wadsworth (D), one of the candidates who was already in the race, told The Nevada Independent. “This is definitely the chance. So the primaries are probably going to be the really important, bloody part.”

The former top Assembly Democrat 

The newest entrant into the race is former Nevada Assembly Majority Leader Teresa Benitez-Thompson (D), 47, now chief of staff to Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford. 

“It’s a midterm election, and I think that we’ve got a lot of people out there who are disillusioned with what they’re seeing at the federal level right now and are willing to vote for a candidate who’s more about their community than about a political party,” she said in an earlier interview. 

Her Tuesday announcement earned praise from other Democratic lawmakers. 

“Northern Nevada’s Latino families have long been part of the story, even when politics overlooked them,” state Sen. Fabian Doñate (D-Las Vegas) wrote on social media. 

Read More: Former Dem Assembly leader Teresa Benitez-Thompson to run for Congress

Before Benitez-Thompson’s announcement, multiple Northern Nevada Democrats said they anticipated La Rue Hatch would consolidate support if she decided to throw her hat in the ring. But in a Tuesday text to The Nevada Independent, she ruled it out, expressing support for Benitez-Thompson. 

“I fully intend to run for [re-election] to my AD 25 seat this November,” La Rue Hatch wrote. “I am so happy to see that my former Assemblymember is running and eager to see her fight for the people of Northern Nevada.”

The self-funder running again

Wealthy investor Greg Kidd, 66, who ran a nonpartisan campaign last cycle and earned 36 percent of the vote to Amodei’s 55 percent with no Democrats in the race, has jumped into the race again — this time as a Democrat. 

“There’s really only one party right now,” Kidd said in an interview. “The Republican Party’s really become a party of one. … I’ve been a Republican before, so I expect to be able to talk to Republicans, like Ronald Reagan Republicans and Eisenhower Republicans. There’s an even bigger population of nonpartisans. That’s really what I ran at last time.”

Kidd, who grew up in Connecticut and moved to Nevada several years ago, said he would be willing to work across party lines just like the state’s current delegation. He feels even better about his chances with Amodei retiring.

“It’s an open race now, and it’s something we’ve always wanted and really dreamed about,” Kidd said. “I’m the person who’s been around and folks know me. And so we actually get a chance to talk about what’s gonna be different.”

One week after Amodei’s announcement, Kidd earned the most high-profile endorsement of the race so far from Rep. Susie Lee (D-NV), who called him “exactly the kind of leader Northern Nevada needs.” 

Asked if she had anything to add following Benitez-Thompson’s announcement, Kidd’s general consultant Pat Reilly did not mention the former Assembly leader by name, but said Kidd was a “political outsider running on accountability, affordability, and restoring Nevadans’ faith in our democratic principles” and emphasized he was unafraid to “challenge the status quo.” 

With Democrats defending Lee, Rep. Dina Titus (D-NV) and Rep. Steven Horsford (D-NV) in more traditional battleground seats, Kidd also brings an additional advantage: his own money. Last cycle, he bankrolled his campaign by loaning it millions of dollars, and he’s once again prepared to spend big. He loaned his campaign $350,000 last quarter, according to a January report filed with the Federal Election Commission.

“We’ll spend what it takes to make the race competitive,” Kidd said, though he added he’ll be focused on earned media the way New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani (D) did during his run. “We saw what happened with the Mamdani campaign and whatnot, and he did it with earned media, not paid media. … We will get out in front of issues. We’re definitely not a go-along-to-get-along kind of campaign.”

Still, some Democrats see his wealth as a mark against him. 

“I don’t think that a billionaire carpetbagger is going to be the voice of Northern Nevada in any effective way,” La Rue Hatch said last week. “We don’t have to beat around the bush. I do have concerns about Greg Kidd. I think someone that comes in and tries to buy a seat is not someone that represents the Northern Nevada that I know.”

The outsiders 

Another candidate in the race is former state party executive director Matthew Fonken, 42, who was once an attaché in the state Assembly. He has been organizing in the state for a decade around access to health care and other issues. 

Fonken, who grew up on a horse farm in Arkansas, has won endorsements from Clark County Commissioner Tick Segerblom and state Sen. Edgar Flores (D-Las Vegas). On Wednesday, his campaign released 50 new endorsements, many from Reno activists. 

Fonken said in an interview with The Nevada Independent that since his campaign launch in January, he’s mostly been focused on talking to voters while doing some behind-the-scenes planning for fundraising and events. 

“This comes down to folks wanting to vote for someone they see themselves in,” he said. 

Fonken served in state party leadership during a notably contentious progressive takeover that temporarily displaced the “Reid Machine” political apparatus that has historically run the state party. 

Asked about how he would navigate tensions between himself and current party leaders, Fonken said, “I’m really proud of the work we did while we were there — we were able to re-elect the entire Democratic delegation.” 

He added: “I believe once we get through the primary, our state party and our federal delegation will be on board.” 

Also running is Wadsworth, whose website touts that she is a sixth-generation Nevadan who has worked blue-collar jobs since she was 14. The 27-year-old said her candidacy was motivated by her previous studies on the pre-med track, which gave her an up-close view of systemic problems.

“Instead of saving a couple thousand of lives over my lifetime as a physician, I really wanted to go to the root cause of a lot of the problems that I was seeing and save millions of lives by going into Congress and reforming health care,” she said. 

Promising to fight corruption and money in politics, she has pledged not to take corporate, billionaire or foreign-influenced PAC money. She’s relying on social media, community endorsements and field work to make sure people know who she is — not only showing up at Democratic events, but going to festivals and farmers markets, and knocking on doors. 

“It’s not really about party machinery and money when you have a really [spread out] district like this one,” she said. “It’s definitely more about face-to-face, more about community backgrounds. It’s a high visibility, high trust kind of race.”

Who else could run? 

Several prominent Democratic figures in Northern Nevada have ruled out bids. 

“No, I’m running for governor,” Washoe County Commission Chair Alexis Hill (D) said in response to a question about whether she had any interest in the seat. “I want to fix Nevada.” 

Former Nevada Lt. Gov. Kate Marshall (D), who lost a 2011 special election for the seat to Amodei, was similarly disinterested.

“I have not been focused on that race,” she wrote in a text, “I am running for Mayor of Reno.”

Reno Mayor Hillary Schieve, a nonpartisan who is term-limited, said she was concentrating on the city during her final months in office and isn’t interested in the congressional seat at this time. However, she said she could be interested in running in the future if the timing and the fit were right. 

State Sen. Angie Taylor (D-Reno) texted she wasn’t interested either. Washoe County School Board member Beth Smith said she was honored to hear her name in the conversation but that she would not run. In a phone interview, Sparks City Councilmember Joe Rodriguez said he had been asked if he was interested as well. 

“I would be under different circumstances,” he said. “But I’m kind of busy with other things right now.” 

Whoever emerges from the primary will have a tough fight ahead. They’ll need to count not only on favorable political headwinds, but also on the voters’ independent streak.

“The thing that I know about Northern Nevadans is they are not blind party loyalists, and they are not people that are just going to click a box because a letter is next to someone’s name,” La Rue Hatch said. “They are people that are looking for someone that is independent, someone that thinks outside of the political machines, and, most importantly, someone that is fighting for Northern Nevada.”