Republican Tennessee congressional candidate Matt Van Epps won the special election Tuesday for Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District, securing 81,017 votes (52.4%) over Democratic Tennessee congressional candidate Aftyn Behn, who received 71,912 votes (46.5%), with 93% of votes in, according to The New York Post.
Former Republican Tennessee Rep. Mark Green resigned in July, stepping down fewer than six months into his fourth term. The 7th District — which President Donald Trump carried by 20 points in 2024 — drew millions of dollars from both of the two major political parties in the run-up to Tuesday’s vote, despite Republicans historically dominating the area. Van Epps ultimately kept the seat in GOP hands.
Van Epps is a West Point graduate and former Army helicopter pilot who completed multiple overseas deployments, including in Iraq and Afghanistan. He later served in the Tennessee Army National Guard, eventually rising to the rank of lieutenant colonel.
Van Epps briefly led the Tennessee Department of General Services after being appointed commissioner in late 2024 before resigning to run for Congress. He won the crowded Republican special primary in October with the help of a late endorsement from Trump.
Behn is a progressive Tennessee state lawmaker and longtime activist who built her political profile through protests and direct-action campaigns at the state Capitol. She has repeatedly taken combative stances against Tennessee’s Republican leadership, including a confrontation in 2019 that led to her removal — by force — from Republican Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee’s office. In another incident, she was also removed from the House chamber.
Behn aligned herself with far-left positions on issues like abortion access, transgender policies and policing. She frequently promoted views that placed her well outside of Tennessee’s political mainstream. In earlier public statements and podcast appearances, she criticized Nashville, called Tennessee a “racist state,” and urged radical approaches to social policy.
“I hate the city, I hate the bachelorettes, I hate the pedal taverns, I hate country music, I hate all of the things that make Nashville apparently an ‘it’ city to the rest of the country. But I hate it,” Behn said on the “Year old GRITS” podcast in February 2020.
(Featured Image Media Credit: Thomas R Machnitzki/Wikimedia Commons)
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