Down ballot, many races have yet to be decided. As of Wednesday, both the House and Senate Agriculture Committees will see changes to membership in the upcoming legislative session, with two incumbent committee members, New York Rep. Marcus Molinaro (R) and Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown (D), losing re-election.

The following is a roundup of the results from key races with incumbents whose districts are predominately rural or who sit on either the Agriculture Committee or Agriculture Appropriations Committee. These committees are important in determining rural-related budgets and the still-stalled farm bill re-authorization process that is likely to be negotiated in the 119th Congress.

U.S. Senate

Nebraska

In one of the more surprising races this year, independent candidate Dan Osborn narrowly lost a tight battle for a U.S. Senate seat in Nebraska. Republican incumbent Deb Fischer, who has held the seat since 2013 and whose current candidacy backed out of a long-held campaign promise of a pledge to only serve two terms. Osborn, a former union organizer, ran a labor-backed campaign whose working-class message and critique of corporate infiltration in politics drew in voters across the red-solid Nebraska. “Our U.S. Senate is a country club,” Osborn told Barn Raiser in an interview. “It’s full of millionaires, business execs and lawyers. Working-class people just aren’t represented.” Fischer supported the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, supports a national abortion ban without exceptions, and has sided with meatpackers and the agribusiness lobby to deny relief for ranchers in the state.

Montana

Republican Tim Sheehy, a former Navy Seal from a wealthy suburban Minneapolis family, defeated Democratic Sen. Jon Tester, a rancher, 53% to 45%, with 96% of the vote counted.

Apparently Sheehy’s derogatory comments about Native people made little impression on Montana voters. The Char-Koosta News, the official news publication of the Flathead Indian Reservation, reported that in an audio recording of a November 6, 2023, fundraiser, Sheehy bragged “about roping and branding with members of the Crow Nation.” He said, “It’s a great way to bond with Indians—while they are drunk at 8 a.m.” Attendees can be heard laughing.

We checked in with Gilles Stockton, a third generation Montana rancher, from Grass Range, Montana, who is a former president of the Montana Cattleman’s Association and author of Feeding a Divided America: Reflections of a Western Rancher in the Era of Climate Change. We asked Stockton, why Montanans voted for Sheehy and decided not to return Tester to the Senate for a fourth term?

“You mean, what is wrong with my neighbors? Well, that’s a hard one isn’t it? Why did people have so much confidence in Trump? I think it’s that they are just opposed to Democrats.

“Tester ran an authentic, beautiful campaign at every level. Although all of his campaign ads featured ranchers who were supporting him, his stump speech didn’t bring up agriculture at all. It was about public lands and healthcare and schools.

“The attack ads against him were based on making shit up. What do voters think they are going to get with Sheehy? He is a proven—if not a liar—a dissembler.”

That last comment was a reference to an Afghan War injury that Sheehy invented. At the same time, Stockton credits his fellow Montanans for voting for a constitutional amendment to protect women’s reproductive rights that passed by a wide margin.

U.S. House

Alaska 1

Democratic incumbent Mary Peltola faces off against third-generation Alaskan Nick Begich III (R). As of Wednesday evening, Peltola was trailing Begich by around 10,000 votes, with 75% of votes reported. Peltola is the first Alaska Native to serve in Congress, and first won the seat after beating Begich and former Alaska governor Sarah Palin in a 2022 Special Election with the slogan “Fish, Family, Freedom.” Begich’s grandfather, Nick Begich Sr., previously held the seat in the 70s, but disappeared on a chartered plane en route to Juneau. The race is currently leaning towards Begich, but results may not be known until all ranked-choice tabulations are released later in the month. Ballot Measure 2, an effort to repeal Alaska’s ranked choice voting system, is on track to pass. 

While both candidates have expressed similar views in support of oil drilling in Alaska, Peltola is in favor of larger federal infrastructure projects, and Begich has associated himself with deficit hawks in the congressional Freedom Caucus.

California 13

Freshman congressman John Duarte (R) faced off in a rematch with Adam Gray (D), who he narrowly defeated in the 2022 midterm election. As of Wednesday evening, Duarte held a nearly 3-point lead with a little more than 50% of the vote counted. Duarte has campaigned as a moderate Republican focusing on economic issues like inflation and touting his differences from national Republican policies on immigration and abortion, though he has voiced his support for the Dobbs decision that reversed Roe v. Wade.

Gray has consistently portrayed himself as a centrist who worked with members across the aisle during his time in the California assembly. Both candidates have close ties to the Central Valley’s agriculture economy—Duarte’s family owns one of the largest crop nurseries in the country, while Gray grew up working in his family’s farm supply store. The race is currently leaning towards Duarte. 

California 22

About 60% of votes have been tallied as of Wednesday evening, and Republican incumbent David Valadao, a former dairy farmer, is currently leading by a 10-point margin. California’s 22nd is a largely rural district in the Central Valley. Rudy Salas, his Democrat opponent, is looking to win a rematch he lost in 2022. Salas, whose parents immigrated from the Azores, once worked as an underage farmworker in the Central Valley as part of his father’s crew. He is a centrist that is seen to largely represent farmworkers in the valley.

Valadao won this district in 2022, after redistricting. He previously served in the 21st congressional district and was one of the few Republicans who voted to impeach Donald Trump in the wake of January 6. As a representative, his career has largely been shaped by water politics, where protecting water access to the valley’s massive farms and dairy operations often clashes with concerns of drinking water contamination by agricultural runoff. Valadao has been criticized for voting against the Inflation Reduction Act because it allowed the federal government to negotiate the price of insulin.

Colorado 8

In a race that remains too close to call, freshman Democratic Rep. Yadira Caraveo has a lead of about 4,000 votes over Colorado state Rep. Gabe Evans (R).

Iowa 3

Rep. Zach Nunn, a first-term Republican incumbent, member of the House Agriculture Committee and Air Force Reserve member, defeated a formidable challenge from Democratic candidate Lanon Baccam, an Army veteran and former federal Agriculture Department official with deep roots in rural Iowa.

Nunn held off Baccam by a four-point margin in a congressional district that covers parts of the Des Moines metro area and parts of southern Iowa. Baccam ran on a platform of protecting public education, reproductive rights and fighting for expanding rural economic development. Nunn won on a message of strengthening the economy by reining in bureaucracy and strict immigration laws.

Maine 2

As of Wednesday evening, with over 90% of the votes reported, Democrat Jared Golden has held on to a slim lead in his incumbent bid for the U.S. House in Maine, the country’s most rural state. Golden, a third-term representative and one of five Democrats that voted for Trump in 2020, is holding off a challenge by Trump-backed Republican Austin Theriault, a state representative and former NASCAR driver. More than $21 million in outside spending has been invested in the campaign, which has largely focused on guns, abortion and the high cost of living.

Nebraska 2

With over 95% of votes reporting, Republican incumbent Don Bacon, a retired Air Force commander, once again is narrowly edging out Democrat state Sen. Tony Vargas, a former science teacher and first-generation immigrant of Peruvian parents. This was a rematch from 2022, which Bacon won by just 6,000 votes, in Nebraska’s 2nd congressional district, a primarily urban and suburban district that includes Omaha and surrounding suburban and rural areas. Bacon has served on the House Agriculture Committee since he won this seat in 2016.

New York 19

Democrat Josh Riley toppled House Republican Marc Molinaro, a House Agriculture Committee member, to win a crucial seat in upstate New York that covers parts of the Hudson Valley, New York’s Southern Tier and the Finger Lakes. The district is larger in landmass than the state of Massachusetts, but with nearly 800,000 people. Molinaro defeated Riley in 2022 by fewer than 2 points. He was seen as one of the most bipartisan members of Congress. Riley’s 2024 upset capitalized on Molinaro’s rightward leap this election cycle, railing him as a “career politician” without a vision for solving D.C. gridlock and a Trump sycophant with a dangerous anti-immigrant platform.

New Mexico 2

Democratic incumbent Rep. Gabe Vasquez defeated Republican Yvette Herrel, who in 2022 Vazquez ousted from Congress. Vasquez, a first generation Mexican American, was born in El Paso, Texas, and raised in Cuidad Juárez, Mexico. He sits on the Agriculture Committee, representing a rural district that has a landmass larger than Pennsylvania.

Herrel ran a campaign largely focused on border security and crime. Albuquerque, one quarter of which is in the 2nd district, has a rate of violent crime that is almost double the national average.

Conceding defeat, Herrel posted on X:

“The results tonight weren’t what we hoped for, but I’m so grateful to the incredible people of #NM02 for their support over the years. With [Donald Trump] back in the White House, our country’s future is bright. Let’s come together and Make America Great Again!”

North Carolina 1

Democratic Rep. Don Davis, a first-term Democrat and Air Force veteran, has prevailed against former defense contractor Laurie Buckhout in largely rural congressional district in northeast North Carolina. Buckhout has voiced support for the January 6 insurrectionists and identifies herself as: “Mom. Wife. Combat Commander. Business leader. America First Conservative Fighter.” Davis has built an image as a bipartisan congressman, becoming one of the House Democrats most likely to vote against his party. He has the dubious distinction of being the lone Democrat in Congress to co-sponsor a GOP bill to limit Medicare’s ability to negotiate drug prices.

Oregon 5

Democratic state Rep. Janelle Bynum held on to a nearly 8,000 vote lead Wednesday evening against Republican incumbent Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer. Chavez-DeRemer, is outside her party’s mainstream, being one of only six Republican House members to sign a pledge to respect the results of the 2024 presidential election. Bynum, a member of the Oregon House who with her husband Mark owns several McDonald’s franchises in the Portland area, has twice gone up against Chavez-DeRemer in Oregon State House races, defeating her each time.

Washington 3

In Washington’s 3rd district, with 82% of the vote counted Wednesday evening, Marie Gluesenkamp Pérez appears headed to a second term in the House. The Reed College graduate who owns an auto repeair shop with her husband, is leading the GOP’s Joe Kent, 52% to 48%. Gluesenkamp Pérez defeated Kent in 2022, making national news by winning in a congressional district that Trump won by four points in 2020.

Kent, an Army Special Forces veteran who worked for the CIA, has claimed the Covid-19 vaccines are an “experimental gene therapy” and employed the consulting services of a Proud Boy member during his 2022 campaign. He was endorsed by Donald Trump.

At an election night celebration Gluesenkamp Pérez, who is co-chair of the Blue Dog Democrats, spoke to her supporters. “It is possible to take a different path. Step away from the national talking points and the hyper-partisanship, and run a campaign based on respect for working people and the issues that directly impact us here at home,” she said. “Focusing on the issues at home is how we break the extremism and the gridlock and start to fix what is broken in our country.” She did not endorse Kamala Harris for president.

Wisconsin 3

In Wisconsin’s 3rd District, Derrick Van Orden, a Christian Nationalist, defeated Rebecca Cooke, 51% to 49%.

In a story published on December 9, 2022, the day the Barn Raiser website launched, Jim Goodman, a retired dairy farmer and board chair of the National Family Farm Coalition,  reported on his newly elected GOP congressman, Derrick Van Orden, a man he described as a “former Navy Seal, Trump-endorsed election denier and January 6 insurrection participant.” Goodman wrote:

He claimed to have a plan for Wisconsin farmers but never elaborated in any detail. My guess is his plan will be scripted by corporate interests. Outside money and endorsements by big agriculture groups always come with strings attached.

During his campaign Van Orden fueled the fires of the culture wars rather than addressing the needs of farmers. At a prayer breakfast in October, Van Orden said, “There are many God-fearing Christians who are Democrats. There’s not a single God-fearing Christian that is a leftist, because those two things are incompatible.”

When one claims to be a Christian as Van Orden does, it is hard to understand his hypocritical, un-Christian behavior, violent threats, homophobia, and particularly his bragging about the time in the military when he delighted in exposing a young lieutenant’s poison-oak-swollen genitals to “two cute girls” who were his fellow officers.

Barn Raiser turned to Jim Goodman, a retired dairy farmer and board chair of the National Family Farm Coalition, to explain how Orden won this time around.

“Incumbency has something to do with it,” he said. “He was on the Ag Committee and being a rural district that was pretty important. He did send out a newsletter, so he had the illusion of keeping in touch with the farmers in the district. He didn’t talk about yelling at Senate page or the last insurrection he participated in. He tried to paint himself as a guy who was out there working for farmers, working on the farm bill and for more imports.”

Goodman was happy to see that Democratic Senator Tammy Baldwin beat back a challenge from Eric Hovde, winning with 49.4% of the vote to his 48.5%.

“She is good at being a moderate on farm issues,” he says. “She is all about Wisconsin having more markets for dairy products. And the fact of her being openly gay and winning farmers over is quite an accomplishment. And she talked quite a bit about the right to repair farm machinery.”

As for the incoming Trump administration, Goodman worries that Kip Tom, who is one of Indiana’s largest farmers and who served as Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations Agencies for Food and Agriculture, is on Trump’s short list for Secretary of Agriculture. “Again it is going to be ‘get big or get out,’ ” says Goodman. 

Ballot Measures and Referendums

In deep-read Missouri a measure to increase the state’s minimum wage to $15 an hour and guarantee paid sick leave won in rural counties and passed statewide by nearly 60%.

Almost 75% of Nebraskans voted in favor of requiring employers to provide earned paid sick leave.

In Washington state, voters beat down a measure that would have rolled back the state’s long-term care program, which applies a 0.58% tax on the paychecks of workers in the state to provide a lifetime benefit of $36,500 for nursing home care and long-term care.

Abortion

Americans in 10 states voted on whether to enshrine the right to abortion into their state constitutions. Five of those states had the opportunity to overturn statewide abortion bans that were passed after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022, which eliminated the federal right to an abortion. In other states like Colorado and New York, voters decided whether to boost abortion protections that already exist under state law, making them harder to roll back in the event conservatives take power.

In Arizona, a large majority of voters said “yes” to Proposition 139, a measure that enshrines the right to abortion until fetal viability, or about 24 weeks, in the state constitution. Abortion is currently banned in the state after 15 weeks.

In Colorado, more than 60% of voters went in favor of amending the state constitution to block the state government from denying, impeding or discriminating against individuals’ right to abortion. There is currently no gestational limit on the right to abortion in the state. It needed 55% of the vote to pass.

In Florida, a majority of voters approved a measure to overturn the state’s six-week ban, however the measure failed because it did not gain the 60% of the vote needed to pass. It would have added the right to an abortion up until viability to the state’s constitution.

Maryland’s measure passed overwhelmingly. Initiated by legislators rather than citizens, it amends the state constitution to confirm individuals’ “right to reproductive freedom, including but not limited to the ability to make and effectuate decisions to prevent, continue, or end the individual’s pregnancy.” There is currently no gestational limit on the right to abortion in the state.

In Missouri, 51% of voters passed an amendment to overturn the state’s current, near-total abortion ban and establish a constitutional guarantee to the “fundamental right to reproductive freedom,” including abortion care until fetal viability.

In Montana, nearly 60% of voters approved an amendment to the state constitution to explicitly include “a right to make and carry out decisions about one’s own pregnancy, including the right to abortion” up until fetal viability, or after viability to protect a patient’s life or health.

Nebraska is the only state where voters faced competing ballot measures. The measure that garners the most votes would take effect.

A narrow margin of Nebraska voters rejected Initiative 439, which would have enshrined the right to abortion up until viability into the state constitution.

A slightly larger margin of voters approved Nebraska Initiative 434, which keeps intact the state’s current 12-week ban.

Nevada voters overwhelmingly agreed to amend the state constitution to protect the right to abortion up until viability, or after viability in cases where a patient’s health or life may be threatened.

In New York, abortion is currently protected until fetal viability. A majority of voters approved Proposal 1, which, while it does not explicitly reference abortion, encompasses abortion protections by broadening the state’s anti-discrimination laws by adding, among other things, protections against discrimination on the basis of “sex, including sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive health.” It does not explicitly reference abortion, but advocates say its pregnancy-related language encompasses abortion protections.

South Dakota voters rejected a constitutional amendment that would protect the right to an abortion only in the first trimester of pregnancy.

Ranked Choice Voting

Voters in four states—Colorado, Idaho, Nevada and Oregon—rejected measures to allow ranked-choice voting (RCV) in their state. Alaska voters are on track to narrowly repeal RCV in the state, which was established in the 2020 general election. Maine is the only remaining state to have adopted this nonpartisan measure for fairer results, and voted for president this fall with RCV.

Justin Perkins

Justin Perkins is Barn Raiser Deputy Editor & Publisher and Board Clerk of Barn Raising Media Inc. He is currently finishing his Master of Divinity at the University of Chicago Divinity School. The son of a hog farmer, he grew up in Papillion, Neb., and got his start as a writer with his hometown newspaper the Papillion Times, The Daily Nebraskan, Rural America In These Times and In These Times. He has previous editorial experience at Prairie Schooner and Image.

Joel Bleifuss

Joel Bleifuss is Barn Raiser Editor & Publisher and Board President of Barn Raising Media Inc. He is a descendent of German and Scottish farmers who immigrated to the Upper Midwest in the 19th Century to become farmers in Wisconsin, Minnesota and the Dakotas. His grandmother was born in the Scottish Highlands to parents listed in the Census of Great Britain, 1881 as “farm servants” on land owned by the Duke of Fife. Joel himself was born and raised in Fulton, Mo., a small town on the edge of the Ozark Highlands. He got his start in journalism in 1983 as a feature writer and Saturday reporter/photographer for his hometown daily, the Fulton Sun. Bleifuss joined the staff of In These Times magazine in October 1986, stepping down as Editor & Publisher in April 2022, to join his fellow barn raisers in getting Barn Raiser off the ground.

Paco Alvarez

Paco Alvarez is Barn Raiser Assistant Editor. Previously, he was the Don and Doris Shaffer Research Fellow at Type Investigations, a staff writer for the immigration newsletter Migratory Notes, and a Fall 2020 Civic Reporting Fellow for City Bureau, where he covered the 2020 elections and political participation in immigrant communities. His work has appeared in the Chicago Reader, Block Club Chicago and South Side Weekly.