Politics
Tennessee Democrats Flip Five Counties in Governor's Race Despite Statewide Loss
Unofficial results show Democrats turned Madison, Montgomery, Hamilton, Knox and Rutherford counties blue compared with 2024, and every county shifted toward the party even as Marsha Blackburn won the governorship.
NASHVILLE â Tennessee Democrats lost the governor's race, but unofficial returns show the party made measurable gains across the state, flipping five counties compared with the 2024 presidential election and improving its margins in every county, according to data from the Tennessee Secretary of State's Office and the Associated Press.
The five counties that moved from red to blue in the governor's contest were Madison, Montgomery, Hamilton, Knox and Rutherford, according to the unofficial county breakdown. Seven of Tennessee's ten largest cities sit in counties that backed Democrat Jerri Green, the party's gubernatorial nominee, Census Bureau data show.
Republican Marsha Blackburn won the statewide race and will become the first woman to hold the governor's office when she is sworn in in January. Most of Tennessee's 95 counties remained red, and Republicans did not flip any counties in the governor's race. The GOP has controlled the governor's office for 15 years; the last Democrat elected to the post was Phil Bredesen, who served from 2003 to 2011.
The county-level flips are part of a broader shift. AP statistics comparing this cycle with 2024 show movement toward Democrats in every Tennessee county. Davidson County, a Democratic stronghold, saw a 25.6-point rise in Democratic support. Williamson County, long a Republican bastion, posted a 17.6-point increase. In Maury County, where nearly 72% of residents backed Republicans in 2024, the Democratic share rose by 21 points this year, leaving the county at roughly 54% Republican and 33% Democratic.
The governor's race itself was far tighter than polling had suggested, with the lead trading between Green and Blackburn for hours on election night. That closeness, combined with the county-level gains, points to an expanding Democratic base even as the state remains firmly in Republican hands.
Down-ballot, Tennessee's newly redrawn congressional map produced a split: Republicans flipped the 9th Congressional District and Democrats flipped the 4th. Heading into the Nov. 3 election, Republicans held both chambers of the Tennessee General Assembly and all but one of the state's congressional seats.
The national environment weighed heavily on the midterms. Midterm elections often favor the party out of power, and Democrats sought to capitalize on President Donald Trump's falling approval ratings as the war in Iran pushed up prices at the pump and in grocery stores. Vice President JD Vance blamed the war for the GOP's losses around the country. Several historically red states, including Texas, Iowa and Kansas, elected Democratic governors this cycle.
For Tennessee Democrats, the results offer both encouragement and a caution: the party's share of the vote grew nearly everywhere, but not by enough to overcome the GOP's structural advantage statewide.