Kentucky Republicans expanded their dominant supermajority in the state House in 2022 through victories in an unlikely place — Louisville, typically one of the best areas for Democratic candidates.
Republican challengers knocked off two longtime Democratic incumbents in southwest Louisville, while flipping another open seat where the incumbent was drawn into another district through redistricting. These wins — as well as two where GOP incumbents withstood challenges — increased their supermajority from 75 to 80 seats in the 100-seat House chamber.
Two years later, Democrats have high hopes to make up ground in Jefferson County — one of the few places outside Lexington where they have any Kentucky General Assembly seats remaining.
Democrats are putting a large amount of money and effort into taking back two of the seats that Republicans flipped in 2022, as well as another in eastern Louisville where they hope to defeat a GOP incumbent.
One reason for Democratic optimism in these three races is the fact that just last year, voters in these districts gave Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear a comfortable victory over his Republican opponent. Beshear has endorsed and attended fundraisers for the campaigns of all three Democrats.
Mirroring Beshear’s tactics, the Democratic candidates and aligned political action committees are going on offense on abortion rights, targeting the GOP incumbents for not doing enough to roll back Kentucky’s near-total ban on abortion.
Some Republicans have attempted to counter attacks on the issue of abortion by presenting themselves as moderates who support certain exemptions to the ban, to the disappointment of Kentucky Right to Life, the leading anti-abortion group in the state.
Also at play in these races is the issue of education, as voters weigh a ballot referendum on whether or not to approve a constitutional amendment to allow public dollars to go toward private or charter school education. Unlike rural areas — where many Republicans are opposed to the idea — some in the GOP believe the issue could get a receptive ear in Louisville, where there are many private and Catholic schools, as well as pervasive criticism of Jefferson County Public Schools.
The messaging of the Republican incumbents trying to hold onto their seats is very similar to their previous races, highlighting themselves as tough on crime and in support of lowering taxes.
The campaigns of all three Republicans have touted their votes this year for the Safer Kentucky Act — a wide-ranging anti-crime bill that increases felony penalties and makes street camping a crime — as well as their continued support for a law that aims to eventually eliminate Kentucky’s individual income tax.
Here’s a closer look at each of these three races, which include:
- House District 31, stretching from Hikes Point to Jeffersontown, where first-term incumbent Rep. Susan Witten takes on Democratic challenger Colleen Davis.
- House District 48, reaching from Indian Hills out to a small portion of Oldham County, where incumbent Republican Rep. Ken Fleming faces off against Democrat Kate Farrow.
- House District 37, stretching from Beechmont to the edge Bullitt County, where first-term incumbent Emily Callaway faces Democratic challenger John Stovall.
House District 31
Rep. Susan Witten won her House seat in 2022 after the Democratic incumbent, liberal firebrand Rep. Josie Raymond, was drawn out of her own district. Witten defeated Democrat Sue Foster to flip the district red by 782 votes, despite Democrats having a significant voter registration advantage over Republicans in the central Jefferson County district.
Witten now faces Colleen Davis, a trial attorney who won the Democratic primary in May. Democrats are optimistic that Davis can take back the seat after the narrow 2022 loss, as Beshear won the district with more than 62% of the vote last fall.
With the district’s voters leaning left, Witten’s messaging in the campaign has taken on a more moderate tone than many GOP candidates, especially on the issue of abortion.
Mailers for Witten that were paid for by the Republican Party of Kentucky tout that the “pragmatic” incumbent is “fighting for commonsense exceptions to” the state’s near-total ban on abortion.
However, PACs opposing Witten have fired back with ads questioning her commitment to that fight, noting that she did not cosponsor House Bill 711 in the 2024 session, which would have provided exemptions for certain non-viable pregnancies and for victims of rape and incest up to six weeks into their pregnancies.
Ads from Planned Parenthood Action Kentucky state that Witten “did nothing to restore abortion access or protect IVF, putting abortion rights at risk,” noting she also did not cosponsor a bill to explicitly guard against any effort to restrict in vitro fertilization.
The Middle Eight is a new PAC that has also reported spending around $7,000 so far on digital ads that hit Witten over her lack of action to roll back any part of the abortion ban.
Despite noting that Witten “has voted 100% pro-life” in her first term, the voter guide of Kentucky Right to Life withheld an endorsement for her, instead saying they only “recommended” Witten due to her declining to answer the anti-abortion group’s candidate survey this year.
Overturning the state’s near-total abortion ban is one of the top issues for her Democratic opponent, as Davis says she wants to keep decisions about reproductive health care “between a woman and her doctor, not by politicians.”
Both candidates are well-funded, as the campaigns of Witten and Davis each reported raising well over $100,000 as of last week.
Coming to the aid of Witten is the Kentucky chapter of Americans for Prosperity, a conservative advocacy group that reported spending $17,096 on ads touting her as a champion for tax cuts and affordable housing.
Witten — who co-chairs a new legislative task force on the availability of housing in Kentucky — is also receiving support from the National Association of Realtors Fund, a federal PAC that reported spending $8,750 on mailers for her this week.
Like many Republican candidates across Kentucky this year, Witten’s campaign has also touted her support for cutting and eliminating the state income tax as a way to “fight inflation.”
Davis’ campaign has emphasized her support for a so-called “red flag law” — setting up a court process to temporarily remove firearms from those deemed a threat to themselves and others — while Witten has prominently touted Ethan’s Law, the bill she was the lead sponsor of to increase criminal penalties for those who torture cats or dogs.
Despite various groups spending millions of dollars on ads in support and opposition to the Amendment 2 ballot referendum on education funding, the campaigns of both candidates have conspicuously avoided directly weighing in on the coming vote.
Witten voted for the bill to put Amendment 2 on the ballot, while Davis has called for “fully funding public schools,” including universal pre-K and pay raises for K-12 staff.
House District 48
Rep. Ken Fleming has served in his east Louisville district for most of the past decade, taking on the same Democratic opponent in four straight elections.
He first won office in 2016 against Maria Sorolis, then was unseated by her in 2018. Fleming reclaimed the seat in 2020 by a narrow margin, then defeated Sorolis again in 2022 by 8 percentage points.
This time he is taking on Democratic challenger Kate Farrow, a retired operations manager at the Louisville Water Company who in recent years has been a vocal advocate for science-based reading curricula.
Though the district has 2,400 more registered Republicans than Democrats and Fleming extended his margin of victory last year, Democrats still believe Farrow has a chance to flip the seat, in part due to Beshear winning 60% of the vote in the district in 2023.
Despite last year’s outcome, Fleming says the typical Republican voter in his district is likely to come back home and vote to reelect him this fall.
“I believe that my district is very sophisticated,” Fleming said. “They understand and look at the individual, what they bring to the table, in terms of getting results and so forth. So I think they can see through that… They can vote for Gov. Beshear and vote for me.”
Fleming’s campaign has been driving home the message of getting results, with ads touting large appropriations the recent state budget directed to Louisville and legislation he supported that has cut the individual income tax rate from 6% down to 3.5% by 2026.
His campaign also has plenty of money to distribute that message, as his general election campaign raised more than $182,000 as of last week — more than all but two other House candidates in Kentucky, who are both in GOP leadership positions. Fleming reported spending roughly $80,000 on mailers and digital ads, with $93,516 left to spend.
However, Fleming’s opponent is far from empty-handed, as Farrow’s general election campaign has raised more than $100,000, while at least two PACs are coming to her aid.
The main line of attack on Farrow’s side has been on the issue of Kentucky’s abortion ban. In one digital ad, she says Fleming voted for Kentucky’s abortion ban and against an amendment to add exceptions for rape, incest and non-viable pregnancies.
Fleming did vote for House Bill 3 in 2022, which banned abortion at 15 weeks into a pregnancy and did not include those exceptions. He also joined other Republcians in voting down a floor amendment to that bill to add in rape and incest exemptions. The law went into effect in 2022 after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, along with Kentucky’s much more severe trigger law passed three years earlier, which banned abortion at six weeks, also without these exemptions.
Responding to those criticisms, Fleming said he was not in office when the trigger law was passed into law in 2019. He also highlighted he was the lead sponsor of HB 711 in this year’s session to allow exceptions in the very early stages of a pregnancy.
While HB 711 did not pass, it did draw the ire of Kentucky Right to Life. Despite noting that he “votes 100% pro-life,” the group chose not to recommend or endorse him in the race, putting a frowny face next to his name in their voter guide and stating he “co-sponsored pro-abortion legislation in 2024.”
Farrow has countered that HB 711 was merely an election year stunt to shield Fleming from his previous votes, while ads from Planned Parenthood Action Kentucky state that he “supported Kentucky’s abortion ban and voted against exemptions for rape and incest until it was no longer popular.”
The Middle Eight also plans to target Fleming with ads in the coming weeks on abortion. Stephanie Bishop — the chair of the PAC that has raised $85,000 — said they will point out that many women do not even know they are pregnant at six weeks, making the proposed exemptions of HB 711 meaningless.
The Kentucky chapter of Americans for Prosperity has come to Fleming’s aid, reporting $17,096 of spending on ads touting his vote for the “school choice” bill that put Amendment 2 on the ballot.
Fleming’s ads and website have steered clear from any direct reference to Amendment 2, instead touting his vote for a budget that increased funding for K-12 schools and teacher salaries. Fleming sponsored a bill to create a task force to examine the possibility of breaking up JCPS into multiple districts, with ads saying he is “holding school boards accountable.”
Though she has the support of teachers unions that are funding the effort to defeat Amendment 2, Farrow’s campaign material has also steered clear of directly addressing that ballot referendum. Her website mentions that she’s for “providing adequate funding for public education and striving for excellence in the education system,” noting her grassroots advocacy for the Read to Succeed Act that passed into law in 2023.
While Fleming’s ads have touted his voting record, the Republican Party of Kentucky has paid for mailers in the district that go on the attack, painting Farrow as “too extreme” and “soft-on-crime Kate.”
One RPK mailer claims that Farrow supports “children having life-changing gender reassignment surgeries” by citing her endorsement from the Fairness Campaign, though the LGBTQ+ rights group has never supported such procedures for minors. Another mail piece says she’s “good for criminals, bad for Kentucky,” citing her endorsement by a group that advocated reforming Kentucky’s cash bail system in 2019.
HOUSE 37 - Callaway v. Stovall
Rep. Emily Callaway, a freshman lawmaker, beat out a long-time Democratic incumbent to win her seat in southwest Louisville by a 16-point margin in 2022.
Though Democrats have a significant voter registration advantage in the district — and Beshear won more than 58% of the vote there last fall — registered Democrats tend to be more conservative in south Louisville than other parts of the city, increasingly willing to cross party lines and vote for Republican candidates in recent years.
Callaway, a former teacher at Whitefield Academy, a private school which provides a “Christ-centered, Biblically-based education,” now faces John Stovall, a former Jefferson County Public Schools employee who has led the local Teamsters union representing JCPS bus drivers and EMS workers for the past decade.
Unlike the races in Districts 31 and 48, abortion has not been a front and center issue of either candidate so far. Stovall does not mention abortion on his campaign website, while Callaway’s only mentions that she is “pro-life” under a section labeled “South End Values.”
Callaway only received the recommendation of Kentucky Right to Life and not their endorsement, as the group noted she declined to answer their candidate survey. She previously drew criticism from Right to Life in 2023, when she filed legislation that would have charged a woman seeking an abortion with homicide. That measure even went too far for the anti-abortion group, which said it opposes any legislation to criminalize mothers.
Stovall has called his opponent “a first-term extremist Republican” whose views don’t align with her constituents. While his campaign is largely focused on his pro-labor platform, Stovall told Kentucky Public Radio the GOP is overstepping on abortion and legislating what a “woman can and cannot do with her own body.”
“That's not freedom, and they're wanting to get involved in stuff that they have no business being involved in,” Stovall said.
Callaway did not return a request for an interview.
One of the top issues Callaway has highlighted — along with supporting increasing criminal penalties and lowering the state income tax — is her support for Amendment 2, which she and proponents call the “school choice” amendment.
“All the Amendment does is give us more options for our kids and their parents,” Callaway wrote in a Facebook post. “Don't trust the monopoly's ads to be honest about it. We want to fund students, not systems.”
On X.com, formerly known as Twitter, Callaway recently reposted a video arguing that “America was founded as a Christian nation” and an article arguing that the “establishment fears the rising power of classical Christian schools,” and telling readers to vote for Amendment 2 to support those schools.
Callaway has also criticized public higher education in Kentucky as not having “activities for whites,” as lawmakers discussed diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.
“I see Black student unions. I don't see ‘white’ anything. No mention… My son, what would he relate to on your campus? And how is this inclusive?” Callaway asked. “There's no mention of any activities for whites.”
The Republican Party of Kentucky has reported spending $13,547 on mailers touting Callaway’s support for fighting inflation by cutting taxes and her vote for the Safer Kentucky Act. She’s also received donations from the leadership PACs of top GOP leaders in the state, like U.S. Rep. Brett Guthrie, U.S. Sens. Rand Paul and Mitch McConnell, and former Attorney General Daniel Cameron.
In addition to Stovall’s campaign receiving contributions from PACs representing labor unions, two new union-affiliated PACs intend to make independent expenditures in support of him.
A new PAC called Working Hard for Kentucky has not yet reported any spending, but as of last week it had raised $13,000 from two Teamsters locals. United Kentucky, another new PAC affiliated with the United Auto Workers union that represents local Ford workers, was also recently formed to conduct door-to-door canvassing for him and other Democratic candidates in Louisville.
Stovall says one of his top priorities in office would be to “create good-paying, family-supporting jobs for Kentuckians” in partnership with Beshear. He said he would fight back against GOP attempts to roll back labor protections and benefits in recent years, including a bill to weaken state child labor laws (which Callaway voted against) and another to make it harder for people to qualify for SNAP benefits (which Callaway voted for).
“The Republicans control everything, and they're used to riding shotgun, and they ain't really had no resistance,” Stovall said. “Sometimes we need to fight back more, instead of being passive and not really going after them. Expose the flaws that they're putting out there.”
Callaway has substantially outraised Stovall as of their early October filings, having raised more than $73,000 compared to Stovall’s nearly $39,000 for the general election.
State government and politics reporting is supported in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
