Denise Powell projected to win Democratic primary in key Nebraska district

Politics Denise Powell projected to win Democratic primary in key Nebraska district By Caitlin Yilek Caitlin Yilek Politics Reporter Caitlin Yilek is a politics reporter at CBSNews.com, based in Washington, D.C. She previously worked for the Washington Examiner and The Hill, and was a member of the 2022 Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellowship with the National Press Foundation. Read Full Bio Caitlin Yilek May 13, 2026 / 8:29 PM EDT / CBS News Add CBS News on Google Denise Powell, a political organizer, won the competitive Democratic primary in Nebraska's 2nd Congressional District, CBS News projected, amid concerns that another leading hopeful in the race risked harming the party in presidential politics. Powell will face Republican Brinker Harding, a member of the Omaha City Council, in the general election. Harding did not have a challenger in the primary to replace GOP Rep. Don Bacon, who is retiring after a decade in Congress.  Though the Omaha-area district has been in GOP hands for all but two years in the last three decades, the district has voted Democrat in three of the last five presidential elections. Nebraska, a solidly Republican state, allocates its Electoral College votes by congressional district, instead of winner-take-all, giving Democrats a chance to deny Republicans of at least one electoral vote in the presidential election. The vote could take on greater importance in a close race for the White House. In 2024, President Trump and his allies unsuccessfully pressured Nebraska Republicans to change the allocation to winner-take-all for the state. Kamala Harris won the district — known as the "blue dot" — that year. Barack Obama won the district in 2008, followed by Mitt Romney in 2012, Mr. Trump in 2016 and Joe Biden in 2020. The state's electoral system was a key issue in the Democratic primary. Powell warned that if state Sen. John Cavanaugh had won the contest and went on to flip the House seat in N...