For the first time in a generation, Democrats have fielded qualified and highly capable candidates in EVERY Texas congressional district. Not ONE Texas Republican Member of Congress or open seat candidate deserves consideration. ALL of them have abandoned any duty to Texas given their allegiance to the corrupt MAGA Trump forces loyal to billionaires and greedy corporations.
We urge you to find and support the Democrats running in hotly contested races and our challengers running in Republican-held seats.
Pay special attention to the South Texas Districts gerrymandered by Greg Abbott under orders from Donald Trump. Winning these districts undermines the Trump/Abbott power grab.
Yolanda Prince – District 1, Tyler & East Texas
- A proud Tyler native, Yolanda R. Prince was raised on faith, resilience, and the expectation that you don’t wait for change—you step up and create it. As the second of three children, a twin and an older brother, she early on learned the importance of family, responsibility, and standing firm in what you believe. Yolanda is a public servant, organizer, and leader who is not afraid to challenge systems that fail the people they are supposed to serve. Her work is centered on three priorities: advocating for rural opportunities and holding the government accountable, addressing economic affordability, and expanding access to healthcare.
- Opponent: Nathaniel Moran
Nathaniel Moran (R) is the incumbent, a former Smith County judge and attorney who has represented the district since 2023 in one of the most heavily Republican districts in the country, voting with House Republican leadership on nearly every roll call.
Shaun Finnie – District 2, The Woodlands & Montgomery County
- Shaun Finnie is a Woodlands businessman and former investment banker who spent his career in the energy sector before entering politics. An immigrant from Canada, Finnie became the Democratic nominee for Texas’ 2nd Congressional District after national Republicans’ preferred incumbent, Dan Crenshaw, lost his own primary earlier this year. Finnie has said his decision to run was driven by concern over the nation’s growing federal debt and the rising cost of living for working families. He has centered his campaign on rebuilding the middle class, lowering healthcare and housing costs, and strengthening public education and childcare. Finnie has spent the campaign traveling throughout the district, saying he asks voters across the political spectrum what keeps them up at night rather than lecturing them.
- Opponent: Steve Toth
Steve Toth (R) is a state representative and former House Freedom Caucus member who defeated incumbent Dan Crenshaw in the Republican primary by running to his right; reporting has described him as a longtime Trump loyalist whose campaign emphasized hardline culture-war issues over the district’s economic concerns.
Evan Hunt – District 3, Collin & Hunt Counties
- Evan Hunt is a retired U.S. Air Force Lt. Colonel, combat-proven aviator, accomplished business leader, and McKinney family man. His campaign is built around one principle: Service Before Self. Hunt is committed to delivering practical, common-sense leadership for North Texas families. He’s earned support from progressives, independents, and former Republicans because he is focused on real representation, healthy dialogue and debate.
Following the September 11 attacks, Hunt served our nation for 20 years, flying combat missions in a B-1 bomber and commanding Airmen in complex operational environments. Hunt used his military training and degrees in Political Science, International Relations and Conflict Resolution to build a successful career as an aerospace technology executive. He has briefed, negotiated with, and built relationships with senior government and military leaders. That proven record of success and real-world experience resonates with TX-03 Voters. - Opponent: Keith Self
Keith Self (R) is the incumbent, whose campaign has drawn scrutiny for relying heavily on corporate and defense-industry PAC contributions — including from Dell Technologies, Chevron, and RTX/Raytheon — while declining Hunt’s repeated public requests for a debate.
Jason Pearce – District 4, Collin County & Northeast Texas
- Jason Pearce grew up in Plano, Texas, working two jobs and eighty-hour weeks from a young age to make ends meet. He built a career in sales, becoming a top national performer in the mortgage industry and later working in finance and insurance, passing every professional licensing exam on his first attempt. After years of sacrifice, Pearce finally paid off his debt and began saving to buy a home — and then, he says, the 2024 election happened, prompting him to get involved in politics for the first time. He won a competitive Democratic primary for Texas’ 4th Congressional District in 2026. Pearce says his own experience living paycheck to paycheck, choosing between rent, food, and health insurance, shapes his understanding of what working families in North Texas are going through.
- Opponent: Pat Fallon
Pat Fallon (R) is the incumbent, a businessman first elected in 2020 who has held the seat through a heavily Republican district anchored in North Texas.
Chelsey Hockett – District 5, Dallas County
- Chelsey Hockett is a stay-at-home parent from the Dallas area who won the Democratic primary runoff for Texas’ 5th Congressional District in 2026. She is a first-time candidate running in a district that stretches from eastern Dallas County into rural exurban territory to the east. Hockett has focused her campaign on the everyday economic pressures facing families in the district, running a grassroots, low-budget campaign built on direct community engagement rather than large donor support.
- Opponent: Lance Gooden
Lance Gooden (R) is the incumbent, a former state legislator who has represented the district since 2019 and has built a reliably conservative voting record.
Danny Minton – District 6
- Danny Minton’s life reflects the promise that hard work and perseverance can change a family’s future. Raised by a devoted mother working three jobs while relying on food assistance to get by, Danny understands firsthand the weight of financial hardship and the need for economic stability. Driven to build a better future, he earned his degree from the University of Oklahoma and has spent over 30 years as a healthcare leader, specializing in breast cancer surgery, guiding surgeons and hospitals as they try to improve in providing the best possible care for their patients. Now, Danny is ready to bring that lifelong commitment to public service to District 6, ensuring every family moves beyond just getting by to truly thriving.
- Opponent: Jake Ellzey
Jake Ellzey (R) is the incumbent, a former Navy officer who has represented the district since a 2021 special election and has been named among congressional climate-policy obstructionists by the Center for American Progress; his campaign has received more than $170,000 from AIPAC and pro-Israel political groups.
Laura Jones – District 8, Polk, San Jacinto, & Montgomery Counties
- Laura Jones is a real estate agent, Army mom, and small business owner from San Jacinto County making her fourth run for Congress in Texas’ 8th District. She has chaired the San Jacinto County Democrats and worked as a field director for the Texas Democratic Party’s Rural Caucus. After running as a self-described moderate in her three previous campaigns against retiring Rep. Morgan Luttrell, Jones made the deliberate choice this cycle to run as an unapologetic progressive, saying she no longer wants to hide beliefs she has held all along. With Luttrell not seeking re-election, Jones is competing for an open seat for the first time, against a newly drawn district that stretches from west of Houston up to Huntsville. She has continued to knock on doors and attend community events across the district, including in heavily Republican precincts, even after three previous defeats.
- Opponent: Jessica Steinmann
Jessica Steinmann (R) is a former U.S. Department of Justice attorney who won the Republican nomination for this open seat with Donald Trump’s endorsement, after a better-funded primary opponent suspended his campaign following Trump’s intervention.
Leticia Gutierriez – District 9, East Harris County
- Leticia Gutierrez is a longtime east Harris County resident and community organizer with a background in finance and economics who works with Air Alliance Houston. She won the Democratic nomination for the newly redrawn 9th Congressional District, a seat redrawn by Republicans specifically to flip a district long represented by Democrats. Gutierrez says her campaign is rooted in lived experience rather than political positioning: “I’m not running to represent Congressional District 9 — I am Congressional District 9,” she has said, describing herself as someone who was raised in the district rather than sent there. She cleared a crowded six-candidate Democratic primary field outright, avoiding a runoff, and is campaigning on rejecting a system she says rewards corporations with public subsidies while families struggle to pay their bills.
- Opponent: Alex Mealer
Alex Mealer (R) is a small business owner, combat veteran, and former oil-and-gas finance executive who won a hard-fought Republican runoff after Donald Trump’s endorsement, running on a platform centered on border security and the “America First” agenda.
Caitlin Rourk – District 10, Austin to East Texas
- Caitlin Rourk is an Army veteran, working mom, and Democratic nominee for Congress in Texas’ 10th District. Her career has spanned bipartisan policy work, the private sector, and service as a Military Intelligence Officer in the Texas Army National Guard and U.S. Army Reserve. She’s running to put service over politics and bring practical, accountable leadership to Congress. Caitlin is fighting to lower costs, build an economy that rewards work, and restore accountability to government. Above all, she believes public service should be about serving people, not a party or political agenda.
- Opponent: Chris Gober
Chris Gober (R) is an attorney who served as the chief lawyer for Elon Musk’s America PAC and has raised more than $1 million for his campaign, with endorsements from President Trump, Governor Abbott, and Senator Cruz.
Claire Reynolds – District 11, San Angelo, Midland-Odessa & North Austin
- Claire Reynolds is an attorney who spent the past decade at the State Bar of Texas, where she served as Public Affairs Counsel in the office responsible for prosecuting attorney misconduct. She is running to fight the corruption, chaos and cruelty of the current administration and to ensure that the voters of CD11 are represented by someone not beholden to billionaires and corporate interests.
- Opponent: August Pfluger
August Pfluger (R) is the incumbent, who has held the seat since 2021 in a district Republicans hold by nearly a ten-to-one voter-registration advantage; he has drawn local criticism for comments perceived as dismissive toward victims of ICE enforcement actions.
Heli Rodriguez Prilliman – District 12, Fort Worth & Tarrant County
- Angela “Heli” Rodriguez Prilliman is a Fort Worth entrepreneur and educator with over a decade of experience in the technology sector, having helped thousands of small business owners grow their companies through her prior work at Fivestars. Raised in rural Stephenville and a graduate of Texas A&M University, she says she was forced out of the workforce by the lack of affordable child care in this country — an experience that now anchors her campaign. Rodriguez Prilliman has spoken candidly about growing up in a community that lacked access to healthcare and comprehensive education, and the consequences she says that produces. She won the Democratic nomination for Texas’ 12th Congressional District, a Tarrant County-based seat with one of the highest uninsured rates in the country, describing herself as a real, working mom bringing rural Texas roots to a district she says has been taken for granted by both parties.
- Opponent: Craig Goldman
Craig Goldman (R) is the incumbent, a former Texas House majority leader first elected to Congress in 2024, representing a district that includes a fast-growing, majority-Hispanic population.
Mark Nair – District 13, Texas Panhandle to Denton
- Mark Nair is a former Amarillo City Councilman, businessman, inventor, and teacher running unopposed for the Democratic nomination in Texas’ 13th Congressional District, one of the most rural and Republican districts in the country, stretching from the Texas Panhandle down through Denton. Nair’s background combines civic experience on the Amarillo City Council with entrepreneurship and education, giving him a range of perspectives on the district’s rural economy. He is running to give Panhandle and North Texas voters an alternative focused on practical governance rather than partisan theater.
- Opponent: Ronny Jackson
Ronny Jackson (R) is the incumbent, a former White House physician first elected in 2020 who won renomination in 2026 with roughly 89 percent of the primary vote.
Thurman Bill Bartie – District 14, Port Arthur & the Golden Triangle
- Thurman Bill Bartie is a retired funeral director, pastor, and former mayor of Port Arthur running for Texas’ 14th Congressional District along the Gulf Coast. His decades of service to the Port Arthur community, both as a faith leader and as a former elected official, give him deep roots in a district covering the Golden Triangle refining region. Bartie has built his campaign around bringing that same community-first leadership to Washington, competing in a Republican-leaning coastal district that has been represented by the same incumbent for well over a decade.
- Opponent: Randy Weber
Randy Weber (R) is the incumbent, first elected in 2013, representing a district anchored in the petrochemical industry along the Texas Gulf Coast.
Bobby Pulido – District 15, Rio Grande Valley to Guadalupe County
- Bobby Pulido is a Latin Grammy-nominated Tejano music icon from Edinburg who spent three decades as one of the genre’s biggest stars before deciding to retire from music and run for Congress. The son of a migrant farm worker, Pulido studied political science at St. Mary’s University before launching his music career, and says he has always wanted to serve his community. He won the Democratic nomination for Texas’ 15th Congressional District, a roughly 250-mile district stretching from the Rio Grande Valley to the edge of San Antonio that Republicans flipped in 2022. National Democrats view Pulido’s fame and moderate, culturally rooted profile as their best chance yet to win back Hispanic voters who have shifted toward Republicans in South Texas. His slogan, “Not team red. Not team blue. Team you,” reflects his pitch as a familiar, trusted voice for the region rather than a partisan warrior.
- Opponent: Monica De La Cruz
Monica De La Cruz (R) is the incumbent, the first Republican and first Latina to represent the district, who flipped the seat in 2022 and has since said publicly that the race “isn’t about who you want performing at your niece’s quinceañera” — a comment Pulido’s campaign has pointed to as dismissive of his South Texas roots.
Casey Shepard – District 17, Waco to Lufkin
- Casey Shepard is an indigent criminal defense attorney from Waco who won a Democratic primary runoff to represent Texas’ 17th Congressional District, a sprawling district stretching from Waco through Central Texas to the Lufkin area. Shepard’s work representing clients who cannot afford legal counsel has given him direct experience with the district’s justice system. His chief primary opponent suspended her own campaign after the first round of voting and endorsed Shepard heading into the runoff. Shepard has focused on restoring congressional oversight of the executive branch alongside the daily concerns of people in the district, and was endorsed by the Austin American-Statesman as the Democrat best positioned to draw support from independents and even some conservatives.
- Opponent: Pete Sessions
Pete Sessions (R) is the incumbent, who lost his previous Dallas-area seat to Colin Allred in 2018 before relocating to Waco — roughly 100 miles from his old district — specifically to run for this seat in 2020.
Kyle Rable – District 19, Lubbock & the South Plains
- Kyle Rable comes from a long line of working-class individuals and immigrants who worked hard to achieve the American Dream. He is proud of his family’s history and has embraced the work ethic of those who emigrated from abroad and those who fought for this country’s independence. His family’s military background, fighting for American freedoms and against fascism, inspired him to do the same.
Kyle followed in his parents’ footsteps and attended the University of Toledo, where he earned an Army ROTC scholarship. This allowed him to complete his undergraduate degree and receive his commission into the Army Reserves. After college, Kyle earned a Master’s degree at Bowling Green State University while continuing his work as an Army Officer. Kyle completed his education while working full-time in restaurants and kitchens to support himself.
After earning his master’s, Kyle was accepted into the PhD program at Texas Tech University, where he and his wife, Kristen, fell in love with the West Texas community. Kyle and Kristen are now happily raising their son, two rescue dogs, and a little girl on the way in Lubbock.
Kyle is committed to the worker and family farmer – the individuals forgotten in West Texas by both parties. He is running for Congress in 2026 to fight for all West Texas citizens. - Opponent: Tom Sell
Tom Sell (R) is a businessman and fifth-generation West Texan who spent years in Washington as deputy chief of staff for the House Agriculture Committee before returning home to run — a Washington-insider background that sits alongside his hometown branding.
Dr. Kristin Hook – District 21, San Antonio through the Hill Country to Austin
- Dr. Kristin Hook is a biological scientist with a Ph.D. in animal behavior from Cornell University who worked as a researcher at the National Institutes of Health before serving as an oversight investigator at the U.S. Government Accountability Office, where she worked to hold the Trump administration and corporate CEOs accountable while advising Congress on emerging technologies. She previously worked as a public school teacher and was raised in Corpus Christi by a single mother who lived paycheck to paycheck. Hook was the Democratic nominee for Texas’ 21st Congressional District in 2024 and won her party’s nomination again in 2026 to face a new Republican opponent. She has framed the district’s central divide not as left versus right, but as “top versus bottom” — the powerful versus everyday working people — and says her scientific training and oversight experience prepared her well for the accountability work of Congress.
- Opponent: Mark Teixeira
Mark Teixeira (R) is a former Major League Baseball All-Star and World Series champion with no prior political or policy experience, who won a crowded twelve-way Republican primary with Donald Trump’s endorsement.
Marquette Greene-Scott – District 22, Fort Bend County
- Marquette Greene-Scott is an attorney and Iowa Colony City Councilmember (serving as Mayor Pro Tem) making her third bid for Texas’ 22nd Congressional District, an open seat in the Fort Bend County suburbs south of Houston. Greene-Scott holds a Bachelor of Science in mathematics education, a master’s degree in mathematics, and a law degree from LSU’s Paul M. Hebert Law Center. Her advocacy for veterans and their families is deeply personal: her father returned from the Vietnam War traumatized and changed, and she has spent much of her public life supporting veterans dealing with similar experiences. Greene-Scott has run against the seat’s longtime Republican incumbent twice before, and is now competing for the open seat after that incumbent announced his retirement — centering her latest campaign on rejecting what she calls congressional inheritance, arguing that Congress is not a family business.
- Opponent: Trevor Nehls
Trever Nehls (R) is the identical twin brother of retiring incumbent Troy Nehls, who entered the race and received his brother’s endorsement the same day retirement was announced — a succession Greene-Scott has directly criticized as treating the seat like a family business rather than a job voters should decide.
Katy Padilla Stout – District 23, San Antonio to El Paso border region
- Katy Padilla Stout is a San Antonio attorney and former elementary school teacher who now works on child welfare and foster care cases at her family’s law firm. She has adopted two of her own sons through foster care and has served since 2017 on the Bexar County Child Welfare Board, in addition to sitting on the board of a nonprofit that helps children recover from abuse and trauma. Padilla Stout was not initially recruited by national Democrats to run in Texas’ sprawling 23rd Congressional District, which stretches roughly 800 miles from San Antonio to El Paso along the border, but her candidacy has drawn growing national attention after scandal forced the Republican incumbent from the race. The district includes Uvalde, the site of the 2022 Robb Elementary School shooting, and Padilla Stout has said her heart sank when she considered what a win by her new opponent would mean for that community. National Democrats have since added the district to their “Districts in Play” target list.
- Opponent: Brandon Herrera
Brandon Herrera (R), known online as “The AK Guy,” is a gun manufacturer and YouTube personality with a history of edgy, provocative public statements who won the Republican nomination after incumbent Tony Gonzales dropped his re-election bid amid a scandal involving an alleged affair with a former staffer; Herrera had opposed the district’s previous representative for supporting bipartisan gun-safety legislation passed after the Uvalde shooting.
Kevin Burge – District 24, Grapevine, Southlake, Coppell & North Dallas-Fort Worth
- Kevin Burge is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran with more than 20 years of leadership experience, including combat service in Iraq and Afghanistan, who went on to work as a cybersecurity specialist at the Defense Intelligence Agency and later served as a senior technical adviser in the White House Situation Room. Burge won a Democratic primary runoff to represent Texas’ 24th Congressional District, an affluent Dallas-Fort Worth suburban seat covering Grapevine, Southlake, Coppell, and surrounding communities. He has centered his campaign on reining in an out-of-control executive branch and restoring congressional power, alongside artificial intelligence oversight, education, and healthcare reform, earning endorsements from progressive organizations who cite his national-security background and command experience as evidence of his readiness to serve.
- Opponent: Beth Van Duyne
Beth Van Duyne (R) is the incumbent, a former Irving mayor whose 2015 comments during a local controversy over Islamic law drew a formal listing on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Hatewatch, a designation she still carries as the only sitting member of Congress with her own page on the organization’s site.
Dione Sims – District 25, Fort Worth & Tarrant County
- Dione Sims is the granddaughter of Dr. Opal Lee, the Fort Worth activist known nationally as the “grandmother of Juneteenth” for her decades-long push to make it a federal holiday, and Sims worked alongside her grandmother to help organize the National Juneteenth Museum. A graduate of Texas Wesleyan University, Sims founded the Fort Worth-based nonprofit Unity Unlimited in 2000 to promote educational opportunity and community understanding, and built her career as a software quality manager in the technology industry. She won the Democratic nomination for Texas’ 25th Congressional District, a seat reshaped by 2025 redistricting, saying it was that redistricting effort that spurred her to run for office for the first time. She has held leadership roles in numerous women’s and service organizations and serves as a minister of the Gospel in addition to her community advocacy work.
- Opponent: Roger Williams
Roger Williams (R) is the incumbent, a six-term congressman and former Texas Secretary of State who has run unopposed in his last two general elections and has held the seat since 2013.
Steven Shook – District 26, Denton County & North Texas
- Steven Shook is a nurse practitioner who won the Democratic nomination for Texas’ 26th Congressional District, a fast-growing suburban and exurban district north of Dallas-Fort Worth. His background in healthcare informs a campaign focused on the everyday cost pressures facing families in the district. Shook is running against a first-term incumbent whose brief tenure has already drawn national scrutiny for controversial public statements.
- Opponent: Brandon Gill
Brandon Gill (R) is the incumbent, a former investment banker and media commentator first elected in 2024, who has introduced legislation to strip birthright citizenship from children of undocumented immigrants he has termed “invaders,” proposed a 25-year moratorium on immigration from Somalia, and publicly told a journalist to “go back to the UK” during a televised exchange.
Tanya Lloyd – District 27, Corpus Christi to South Texas Gulf Coast
- Tanya Lloyd has spent 17 years teaching first grade in Lockhart, Texas, and is running for a second time to represent Texas’ 27th Congressional District along the Gulf Coast, campaigning under the slogan “Congress Needs a First Grade Teacher.” A lifelong Republican voter until the overturning of Roe v. Wade, Lloyd switched parties after reflecting on a pregnancy complication 22 years earlier that could have killed her without the choice she had at the time to make her own medical decision. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Texas State University and has built her campaign around the same values she brings to her classroom: honesty, practicality, and putting people first, returning for a second campaign after gaining name recognition and grassroots support across the district in 2024.
- Opponent: Michael Cloud
Michael Cloud (R) is the incumbent, first elected in a 2018 special election, representing a coastal district stretching from Corpus Christi into rural South Texas.
Frederick Haynes – District 30, Southern Dallas County
- The Rev. Dr. Frederick D. Haynes III has led Friendship-West Baptist Church in southern Dallas for more than 40 years and is a nationally known civil rights leader, hand-picked by Jesse Jackson to lead the Rainbow PUSH Coalition before an unexpectedly brief tenure as its president. A graduate of Bishop College with a Master of Divinity from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Haynes won the Democratic nomination for Texas’ 30th Congressional District with over 72 percent of the vote after outgoing Rep. Jasmine Crockett — a member of his own congregation — endorsed him to succeed her. He also earned the backing of the family of the late Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, who represented the district for three decades before Crockett. National progressive groups, including Justice Democrats, have championed Haynes as a potential new addition to the House’s most progressive ranks. He is heavily favored in one of the most reliably Democratic districts in the state.
- Opponent: Everett Jackson
Everett Jackson (R) is a T-shirt business owner and community activist who advanced through a Republican runoff in a district that is rated D+25, among the most reliably Democratic seats in Texas.
Justin Early – District 31, Williamson & Bell Counties
- Justin Early grew up in a working-class military family in Bell and Williamson County, Texas, the eldest of three children of two U.S. Army veterans. After graduating high school, he enlisted himself, serving as a paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne Division and later as a systems administrator at the Pentagon in the aftermath of 9/11. Since leaving the military, Justin has built a career in cybersecurity. Today he is a Cybersecurity Architect, where he helps large enterprises build the business case for data-security investment and chart multi-year roadmaps for governing how AI systems handle sensitive data. Justin is the Democratic nominee challenging 13-term incumbent John Carter in Texas’ 31st Congressional District, having already set a record for the most votes any Democrat has received in a TX-31 primary. Justin is running to lower costs and raise wages for working families, protect Social Security, Medicare, and veterans, defend Texans’ privacy against unchecked AI and corporate power, and bring accountability back to a Congress that has forgotten who it serves.
- Opponent: John Carter
John Carter (R) is the incumbent, an 84-year-old, twelve-term congressman who has held the seat since its creation in 2003 and chairs the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs Appropriations Subcommittee.
Dan Barrios – District 32, Northern Dallas County to East Texas
- Dan Barrios is a Richardson City Council member and former teacher who won the Democratic nomination for Texas’ 32nd Congressional District, a seat that was reshaped by 2025 redistricting from a solidly Democratic Dallas-based district into one stretching deep into rural East Texas. Barrios draws on his background in business development to support policies that help small businesses grow and create local jobs, alongside investments in education and workforce development. He has centered his campaign on kitchen-table issues — the rising cost of living and housing affordability — and has said he is committed to representing all residents of the district regardless of party or belief, seeking to build a coalition broad enough to compete in a seat redrawn specifically to favor Republicans.
- Opponent: Jace Yarbrough
Jace Yarbrough (R) is a Stanford Law School graduate and constitutional attorney who has litigated against vaccine mandates and DEI initiatives, founded a classical Christian academy in Denton, and secured Donald Trump’s endorsement in a district redrawn specifically to elect a Republican.
Colin Allred – District 33, Dallas County
- Colin Allred is a former NFL linebacker and civil rights attorney who represented Dallas’s 32nd District in Congress from 2019 to 2025 before giving up his seat to run for the U.S. Senate against Ted Cruz in 2024 — a race he narrowly lost. After Republican redistricting eliminated the competitive seat he once held, Allred returned to elected politics by running in the newly drawn 33rd District, where he defeated sitting Congresswoman Julie Johnson in a closely watched Democratic primary runoff. Before Congress, Allred worked as a civil rights lawyer and clerked for a federal judge after his football career ended. He has built his campaign around a message of economic fairness, telling supporters on the night of his runoff win that he is “going back to Washington to fight for every working family stretching a paycheck while this administration hands tax breaks to billionaires.” He is heavily favored in this solidly Democratic Dallas County seat.
- Opponent: Patrick Gillespie
Patrick Gillespie (R) is a customs broker for UPS Supply Chain Solutions making his first run for office. He defeated fellow first-time candidate John Sims in the Republican runoff but has not developed significant name recognition in a Dallas County district that leans heavily Democratic.
Johnny Garcia – District 35, Rio Grande Valley & Coastal Bend
- Johnny Garcia has spent nearly two decades with the Bexar Co. Sheriff’s Department, where he’s worked patrol, served on the SWAT hostage negotiation team, and worked most recently as the Sheriff’s spokesperson. Johnny is a lifelong San Antonian who is running to lower costs, stand up to corruption, and protect healthcare.
- Opponent: Carlos De La Cruz
Carlos De La Cruz (R) is a retired Air Force veteran and the brother of Rep. Monica De La Cruz, who secured a last-minute endorsement from President Trump and House GOP leadership ahead of the primary.
Rhonda Hart – District 36, Dickinson to the Golden Triangle
- Rhonda Hart grew up in the small town of Wasilla, Alaska. She is an Army Veteran and a mass shooting survivor. In May 2018, her daughter Kimberly was killed at Santa Fe High School. She is currently running for congress in Texas’ 36th district and enrolled in graduate studies for political science with University of Houston. She has been a volunteer with Newtown Action Alliance since 2019. In 2022, she helped pass the federal bill Kimberly Vaughan Safe Storage of Firearms Act. In 2023, she passed SB 435 (disclosure of public information law) at the Texas state level. Rhonda is running to lower the cost of living, solve universal healthcare, supporting the military and veterans, and to end corruption in Washington DC.
- Opponent: Brian Babin
Brian Babin (R) is the incumbent, a dentist first elected in 2014 who has represented the district, which stretches from Pearland to Jasper, for over a decade.
Melissa McDonough – District 38, Klein, Cypress, Katy & Tomball
- Melissa McDonough is a real estate brokerage manager from Tomball who won the Democratic nomination for Texas’ 38th Congressional District, an open seat covering wealthy Houston suburbs including Klein, Cypress, Katy, and Tomball being vacated by Rep. Wesley Hunt’s run for the U.S. Senate. McDonough was the Democratic nominee for this seat in 2024 as well, giving her a head start in name recognition for this second campaign. She has built her professional career managing real estate transactions across the Houston suburbs, giving her direct insight into the district’s housing affordability pressures, and is competing for an open seat in a well-funded, competitive suburban primary field.
- Opponent: Jon Bonck
Jon Bonck (R) is a mortgage banker endorsed by President Trump and Senator Ted Cruz who won the Republican nomination campaigning on cutting regulations to boost homeownership, in a district covering some of the wealthiest suburbs in the Houston area.
