Election results for TN-7 House race (December 2, 2025)

Politics & Elections
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Today’s the day that voters in Tennessee’s 7th House district vote to replace Mark Green, who resigned.

From Politico:

The result — which is shaping up to be far closer than President Donald Trump’s 22-point victory there in 2024 — will portend Democrats’ odds of pulling off a blue wave next fall, whether their nominee wins or not.

[G]iven the highly partisan bend of the district, Republicans and Democrats alike are predicting GOP nominee Matt Van Epps will topple Democrat Aftyn Behn on Tuesday night. If he does, the margin of victory will provide clues into whether Democrats stand to continue their overperformance on Election Day last month. Republicans, meanwhile, are eager to curb the left’s enthusiasm ahead of the midterms and see this race as crucial to that goal.

Trump has waded into the fight, holding two tele-rallies for Van Epps, and over the weekend he broke a month-long hiatus on X, urging Republicans to get out and vote. Speaker Mike Johnson — who can only afford to lose three seats and still retain his majority next year — spent Monday campaigning with Van Epps.

Democrats have tapped into their own starpower for the race. Vice President Kamala Harris made her first post-election surrogate speech for Behn, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) hosted a virtual rally alongside former vice president and Tennessean Al Gore on Monday night, demonstrating the range of Democratic Party ideologies backing Behn.

But here’s the kicker: Republicans spent over $3 million to the Democrats’ $2.3 million…in a district that Trump won by 22 points last November. That’s a shit ton of money for a race that should be a cakewalk for the Pubs

I’m hoping Aftyn Behn can pull off the upset, but I’m not holding my breath. If she can make it close (what’s reasonable? Within 5%? 10%? I’ll say if she can lose by single digits) that’s a strong tilt to the Dems in a very red House district, and portends great things for the midterms.

Polls closed at 7:00pm est, I believe, but no results have come in yet.

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Now I see that polls close at 7, which means they won’t be closed for the full state until 8pm est.

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I keep confusing her with the author Aphra Behn.

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I’d agree that anything under 10% should be seen as a very positive sign for Democrats. As you said it was Trump +22 in 2024.

Early returns seem to indicate Van Epps is running 10-12% behind Trump’s numbers in the rural counties that have reported (small numbers overall so far). So if the Nashville suburbs come in with strong Democratic turnout you could see a margin in the 8% range. It would take something very surprising to get much closer than that.

ETA: I should add that those margin deltas probably aren’t accurate since House district boundaries don’t align with county boundaries. So they should be taken with a large grain of salt.

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YES. I just had this conversation with a bunch of (current and former) English faculty. One of them said she’d vote for her for that reason alone!

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Aftyn is a completely unfamiliar name I’d never heard of before. But then so is Aphra a name I’ve never heard of apart from that one author.

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NYT predictor-bot is showing R+2.9. That feels a bit Democrat-friendly to me, but with nothing reported from the part of Nashville in this district it’s hard to know for sure.

Montgomery County is D+3 so far (was Trump+18 in 2024) but that could be a mirage due to early voting being reported first. Also that swing might still not be enough unless the turnout margins are quite different than 2024.

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And there is the first Nashville dump. Behn gets 85% of the vote, picking up 14k votes or so. That’s half of what that county expects to report, and she definitely needs to keep that margin to overcome the rest of the district’s ruby-red tilt.

The NYT bot doesn’t think it’s enough, with the forecast going to R+3.3.

Either way it looks like it will be under 10%, perhaps even under 5%. Moral victories aren’t as nice as real victories, but it’s something.

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42% of vote in: 52.5% Behn (D), 46.2% Van Epps.

Lots of rural votes still to be counted, which will likely lean heavily (R), even though the farmers are getting screwed over.

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Two very small counties have completed their reporting (basically) and they show a 17- and 10-point swing towards the Democrats from 2024. While that is certainly promising for 2026, it won’t be enough for Behn tonight unless the Nashville same-day vote comes in very strong and Williamson County swings by more than those two did.

ETA: NYT forecast up to R+4%. I think something more like a 7% Van Epps win seems likely based on the swing between early voting and same-day voting. That would be a 15-point swing from 2024, which is nothing to sneeze at.

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And there’s the flip - suddenly it’s Van Epps 55%, Behn 44%.

If I was as insane as a MAGA, this is the point where I would shout "THEY’RE FLIPPING THE BALLOTS ON THE MACHINES! FRAUD!

But I won’t because I understand how election counting works.

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Yes indeed. Even a 10% swing from last election results nationally would give a huge blue wave victory in the midterms in 2026.

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Yeah, Williamson county came in Van Epps +11% or so. Which is a big swing, but will likely come down as same-day vote comes in. And also isn’t enough anyway.

NYT up to Van Epps+5.5% in the forecast.

Absolutely, but midterms are a different beast from special elections. Even half of that swing should be enough to take the House, however, even with the redistricting shenanigans.

ETA: Third completed county was only a 7-point swing toward the Democrat.

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The Hill is projecting Van Epps as the winner with 71% of the vote in.

He’s currently up by 7.7%.

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So is MSNOW with 75% of the vote.

But it will be interesting to see the final margin. A Democrat keeping this race within single digits is going to cause a meltdown in the GOP caucus.

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While keeping it under 10% is a good sign for 2026, a final margin of 6-8% isn’t so great for what it says about the polling that had the race more in the 2-4% range. Maybe polling just sucks, or maybe Dem turnout wasn’t as great as hoped.

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Polling just sucks.

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I don’t think the polls were that off. There was just the one Emerson poll that was R+2. Most of the others, including ones sponsored by Behn, were R+8. I’m quite sure the average of the polls (if someone like Silver did one) would have been just about spot on.

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Even 4% off is totally reasonable polling error in a house race where there isn’t going to be much polling. Polling isn’t a crystal ball. It the best source of election predictions we have, but you need to have realistic expectations of what it can do.