This rare Nebraska district backed Harris but sent a Republican to Congress. Can Democrats win here?

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — “Do they still like Trump in Nebraska? I think so,” the president said during a recent event in Washington.

Given that the state easily backed Republican Donald Trump three times and hasn't supported a Democrat for the White House since Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964, the answer may seem obvious.

But in Nebraska’s largest city, it's an open question and could decide one of the country’s most-watched congressional races. Retiring Rep. Don Bacon ’s open seat pits fellow Republican and Omaha City Councilmember Brinker Harding against Democratic activist Denise Powell.

The district encompasses an increasingly Democratic-leaning Omaha metro area of 1 million-plus and its more conservative suburbs — famous for steaks and the Reuben sandwich's birthplace, though New York disputes that.

It's one of just eight districts nationwide that elected Republicans in House races while supporting Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris over Trump two years ago.

Harding and Powell have been making the rounds at parades and festivals where meat raffles offer oversized sausages as prizes. However, those on-the-ground appeals could be drowned out by Trump who, like most things in politics, has moved to shape November's midterm elections in his own image.

The president is organizing a Republican midterm convention in Dallas next month that will serve as much a two-day rally for him as a boon to party candidates nationwide. Trump is also frequently visiting tightly contested districts, despite his low approval ratings and the unpopular war in Iran.

While Trump centers himself, Democrats are happy to oblige.

When Powell knocks on doors to talk to voters, she asks, “What’s keeping you up at night?” On a sweaty Saturday afternoon, John Rosseter responded without hesitation. “Well, Trump.”

“I want to see the history books written years from now,” said Rosseter, 67, who owns a carpentry business. “They won’t be pretty.”

Nebraska splits its presidential electoral votes, and the 2nd Congressional District's delegate has gone to Democrats three out of five times since 2008, making it a “ blue dot ” in an otherwise Republican red state. But a Democrat has won the House seat just once since 1994.

Harding plays up Trump's primary endorsement, and House Speaker Mike Johnson and Majority Leader Steve Scalise campaigned for him. Harding said he has “the full confidence of, not only the White House, but leadership in the Congress.”

He has also tried to appeal to swing voters and says he knows the district better than does Powell, co-founder of Women Who Run Nebraska, which supports female candidates.

Two possible Democratic 2028 presidential candidates — ex-Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Rahm Emanuel, an ex-Chicago mayor who was President Barack Obama's first White House chief of staff — have campaigned with Powell.

She talks about how Medicare cuts have increased anxiety about affordability. Powell also points to Trump and his family's business dealings as an example of “the choices that they have made while people on the ground are struggling” and she says that resonates with Republicans.

“Even the ones who aren’t necessarily anti-Trump," Powell said, "understand the need for checks and balances.”

Jason Brown and his wife, Ruth Huebner-Brown, caused a sensation in 2024 by spray painting about 50 reused lawn signs with blue dots and distributing them around Omaha's Dundee neighborhood. The couple has since expanded to professionally produce signs promoting a “Blue Dot Wave.”

Brown said the Republican-controlled Congress has capitulated on “every Trump nominee, every Trump policy, all the way down to putting gilding gold on statues.”

Supporters of Harding have countered with red “Brinker Dot" signs.

“We need to make sure that we keep this country on the track to being even better,” Harding said.

Jack Hosking, the 90-year-old retired former head of a title insurance company, organizes a weekly coffee to discuss political and community issues. He estimated that about 70% of attendees are Trump voters and “maybe even more so lately, because of the crap that the New York mayor started,” referring to Zohran Mamdani's efforts at pushing the Democratic Party to the left.

Both Powell and Harding have addressed Hosking's group, though, and he predicted that as much as half will support the Democrat.

“She spoke well enough that, my sense is, a lot of them will cross over," Hosking said, noting that when it came to campaigning, “Brinker’s not doing much.”

The Republican National Committee views Trump as a national asset, betting he can prevent complacency in a year without a presidential race, when enthusiasm for the party in power typically wanes.

The committee rebranded its “Young Guns” program for key candidates to “MAGA Majority” in deference to Trump's “Make America Great Again” movement, and many congressional candidates will be at the Dallas convention with Trump.

Others aren't waiting that long.

Republican Reps. Mike Lawler of New York and Tom Barrett of Michigan, whom Democrats are aiming to unseat, both appeared with Trump during his rallies in their districts. When the president visited Macungie, Pennsylvania, in June, he joined Republican Rep. Ryan Mackenzie, saying, “I’m here for him.”

Trump also traveled to the Wisconsin district of Republican Rep. Derreck Van Orden, as have Cabinet members.

Rep. Juan Ciscomani, facing a reelection fight, appeared with Trump during an April event in Arizona. Two Iowa Republicans in what could be toss-up reelection contests, Reps Zach Nunn and Mariannette Miller-Meeks, both were by Trump's side when he kicked off his midterm campaign outside Des Moines.

Bacon sometimes defied the White House in his final term. He criticized Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and tried to curb Trump’s ability to impose tariffs and was the only House Republican who opposed renaming the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America.

Mary Jane Truemper, who heads the Nebraska Republican Party, said Powell and the state's Democrats have moved too far to the left. She called Harding “a steady force” and said the nominee is not as fond of picking high-profile fights the way Bacon sometimes was.

“I think he speaks to the moderate Democrats as well as the Republicans,” said Truemper, who managed Bacon’s reelection campaign in 2018 and also worked for an unsuccessful primary challenger to him.

Even Powell said, “Don Bacon was a good representative of this district, and I think that there are a lot of people drawn to a pragmatic style of leadership in a state like ours.” But that may not be enough this year.

“People are worse off than they were before,” Powell said.

In the Elmwood Park neighborhood, Andy Maxwell, a 58-year-old pediatrician, said he likes to find the middle ground in politics and his community. But he recalled that, after putting up a Biden sign in his yard in 2020, his neighbors erected a Trump one.

“We don’t like all the turmoil part of it,” Maxwell said of politics nationally.

Nearby, 80-year-old Jerard Pearson called Democrats “feckless,” but said of Trump's base supporters, “I’ve always been curious about this one-third level of crazy out there, a third of the population.” He is also no fan of a neighbor's large “Harding for Congress” sign.

Truemper said Harding appreciates Trump's endorsement but Nebraskans like to be wooed "person-to-person, rather than a national entity coming in."

“Is that going to be the deciding factor?" she asked of Trump. "I don't know.”

Kathy Bigsby Moore, left center, chats with Denise Powell, the Democratic candidate for the House of Representatives in Nebraska's second congressional district, during an event celebrating Powell's new campaign office in Omaha, Neb., Saturday, Aug. 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Rebecca S. Gratz)

Denise Powell, left, the Democratic candidate for the House of Representatives in Nebraska's second congressional district, chats with Andy Maxwell on his doorstep in Omaha, Neb., Saturday, Aug. 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Rebecca S. Gratz)

Denise Powell, left, the Democratic candidate for the House of Representatives in Nebraska's second congressional district, and her husband, Hobson, walk with the Nebraska Democratic Party in a Juneteenth Parade in Omaha, Neb., Saturday, Aug. 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Rebecca S. Gratz)

Lailend Duncan, 17, left, secretary of the Nebraska Young Democrats, chats with Denise Powell, the Democratic candidate for the House of Representatives in Nebraska's second congressional district, while walking in a Juneteenth Parade in Omaha, Neb., Saturday, Aug. 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Rebecca S. Gratz)

Denise Powell, the Democratic candidate for the House of Representatives in Nebraska's second congressional district, walks with the Nebraska Democratic Party in a Juneteenth Parade in Omaha, Neb., Saturday, Aug. 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Rebecca S. Gratz)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Instead of adding new roses, President Donald Trump’s White House Rose Garden is growing statues.

Trump put statues of some of America’s founders in the garden just off the Oval Office after he replaced its plush lawn with a white stone patio, turning the historic outdoor space into a look-alike of the one at his Mar-a-Lago home and private club in Palm Beach, Florida.

At least one statue was a gift. Others are on loan from people who wish to remain anonymous.

The latest addition, a bronze depiction of a seated Thomas Jefferson signing the Declaration of Independence, was a gift from George Lundeen, a sculptor from Loveland, Colorado. It joins statues already displayed there of George Washington, Alexander Hamilton and Ben Franklin. A fifth sculpture named “Freedom’s Charge” is also on the patio.

The statues are part of Trump’s sweeping series of White House renovations, from his gilded makeover of the Oval Office to the ballroom and helipad that the Republican president is having built on the south grounds. These projects fit into Trump’s broader plan to leave his mark on downtown Washington through other construction projects, including a statue garden on federal land near the National Mall.

Lundeen said he made the sculpture of Jefferson, the third U.S. president, decades ago and kept it at his ranch until he decided to spruce it up and send it to Trump for display at the White House in time for July Fourth celebrations of America's 250th birthday. Steven Barber, his friend and collaborator, had reached out to contacts at the White House on Lundeen's behalf.

“I thought it would just be a real nice thing on the 250th for people to look at Thomas Jefferson as he was writing the Declaration of Independence,” Lundeen said in a telephone interview.

But the statue did not get to the White House in time. Barber said it was stuck on a truck partly because of heavy security around the celebratory events. Trump was shown photos and liked the sculpture so much that he decided to put it in the Rose Garden.

When the president called Lundeen to thank him, he got voicemail. After the holiday, Lundeen's office manager insisted he listen to one message in particular.

“Hi, George. It's your favorite president, Donald Trump, and I just wanted to thank you,” the president said on the recording, which Lundeen shared with The Associated Press. “The sculpture, it looks really beautiful ... just by the picture I can see it's really incredible, and we have a wonderful place right in the Rose Garden, and I appreciate it.”

Barber said in a separate telephone interview that he had been calling the White House for months to discuss the statue but got little in the way of a response until about three weeks before Independence Day, when in came a “flurry of emails saying they wanted it.”

Details on the other statues added to the Rose Garden are relatively sparse.

The statue of Washington, America’s first president, was lent by Harlan Crow, the White House said. Representatives for the Texas-based real estate tycoon and GOP megadonor, who made headlines in recent years for his friendship with Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, did not respond to email messages from the AP seeking comment.

A third statue, "Freedom's Charge,” a 14-foot-tall (4.3-meter-tall) bronze sculpture of two Revolutionary War soldiers separated by a flag, was relocated from Dallas. Chas Fagan, the sculptor, did not respond to emailed requests for comment.

The Franklin and Hamilton statues are from anonymous donors, according to the White House.

White House spokesperson Davis Ingle explained Trump's fondness for statues by saying that no other president has done more to beautify the White House and its surroundings.

"From restoring our treasured landmarks, which had suffered years of abuse and vandalism, to cleaning our parks and the Reflecting Pool, President Trump’s bold vision ensured that America rang in its 250th birthday celebration with glory and pride,” Ingle said in an emailed statement that referenced Trump's troubled effort to spruce up the pool near the Lincoln Memorial.

He said Trump continues to make “long-overdue and necessary” renovations to the White House.

"Thanks to the Builder-in-Chief, the White House will be properly glorified and remain in excellent condition for generations to come,” Ingle said.

Next door to the White House, Trump had a statue of Christopher Columbus installed on the grounds of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in March.

More recently, the National Park Service installed a series of sculptures of Revolutionary-era subjects and themes at a plaza near the White House.

Trump's marquee statue plan involves building a National Garden of American Heroes near the National Mall that would feature sculptures of 250 Americans who have made significant cultural, political and other historical contributions to the United States. Several preservation and cultural heritage organization have sued to block the project, arguing that Congress must first authorize it.

Barber said he and Lundeen are “in the mix” to make statues for that garden, too.

At his golf club in West Palm Beach, Florida, Trump has on display a 7-foot (2.1-meter) bronze sculpture depicting him with his fist raised after the 2024 assassination attempt during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. It was also made by Lundeen and was given to Trump by Anthony Constantino, a businessman and Republican congressional candidate from New York.

The White House has long been a showcase for art, perhaps no work more famous than the Gilbert Stuart portrait of Washington that hangs in the East Room and was saved by first lady Dolly Madison after the British set the White House on fire during the War of 1812.

Presidents have access to the White House's vast art collection. Trump has said he went to the “vaults” and found the presidential portraits and other art he hung in the Oval Office and in other rooms in the White House. Portraits of former presidents and former first ladies also adorn hallways and public rooms in the mansion.

In Trump's first term, first lady Melania Trump installed a piece by Japanese American sculptor Isamu Noguchi near the Rose Garden, making him the first Asian American artist to be featured in the White House collection.

Before that, then-first lady Michelle Obama's renovation of the Old Family Dining Room in 2015 included the addition of a painting by Alma Thomas, who was the first African American female artist to have her work added to the collection.

FILE - A statue of Ben Franklin is seen as servers prepare the Rose Garden for a dinner after President Donald Trump hosted the 2026 College Football Playoff national champions Indiana University on the South Lawn of the White House, May 11, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)

FILE - A bronze statue of President George Washington is seen at the edge of the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington, Oct. 12, 2025. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein, File)

FILE - President Donald Trump walks on the red carpet in the Rose Garden with Britain's King Charles III, Queen Camilla and first lady Melania Trump at the White House, April 28, 2026, in Washington, during a State Visit. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)

FILE - A statue of Alexander Hamilton is seen in the Rose Garden at the White House, March 6, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, File)

FILE - A bronze depiction of Thomas Jefferson seated and signing the Declaration of Independence is seen before President Donald Trump speaks during an event to honor the 2025 World Series champions Los Angeles Dodgers in the Rose Garden of the White House, July 23, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, File)