Congressman Wesley Bell defeated former Congresswoman Cori Bush on Tuesday in a bitter rematch of the 2024 Democratic primary to represent Missouri’s 1st District.
The Associated Press called the race for Bell at 8:02 p.m., when he was leading Bush with more than 70% of the vote.
Bell is likely to keep his House seat representing St. Louis and much of St. Louis County because of the district’s overwhelmingly Democratic base.
Bell, a former St. Louis County prosecutor, is in his first term after defeating Bush, who represented the 1st District from 2021 through 2025, in the primary two years ago.
Loading...
Bell received support from House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Kansas City Congressman Emanuel Cleaver, the Congressional Black Caucus and a variety of trade unions.
Bell’s victory follows a tense campaign against the former congresswoman. It’s a disappointment to the growing progressive movement that has seen strong wins, especially in recent months, unseating incumbents in primary races in New York, Denver and other cities.
Bush was part of a similar progressive insurgency in 2020 when she beat longtime Congressman Lacy Clay. Bush had hoped to recapture that same energy this time around. She ran a campaign that focused on “Medicare for All,” affordability and abolishing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. She also criticized the Iran war and campaigned on securing funding to help St. Louisans recover from the May 2025 tornado.
Bell shared many of those positions, but their campaigns diverged significantly when it came to whether the United States should extend or cut off military aid for Israel, a defining issue of this campaign and many other Democratic primary races over the past few years.
Bush campaigned on cutting off aid, citing reports by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch that have called Israel’s actions in Gaza a genocide. Bell criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu but has said the U.S. needs to support its allies in the Middle East. He also declined to call Israel’s actions in Gaza a genocide.
Bush’s campaign criticized the amount of money that Bell had received from pro-Israel groups like the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and its political action committee, the United Democracy Project PAC.
Bush received endorsements from Sen. Bernie Sanders, Rep. Rashida Tlaib, former St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones, St. Louis Board of Aldermen President Megan Green and multiple service unions.
Bell argued his experience as a congressman during the Trump administration helped secure the state’s disaster declaration. Bush said she would have secured more tornado relief funding, citing bipartisan work with Republican Sen. Josh Hawley to get the Radioactive Exposure Compensation Act even after she was ousted from Congress.
Bell will face off in the Nov. 3 election against either Paul Berry III or Andrew Jones, who were neck-and-neck in the count Tuesday evening in the Republican primary.
1st District’s future in doubt
Missouri Republicans have openly discussed embarking on another redistricting plan next year in which they’d pair pieces of St. Louis and St. Louis County with largely rural areas. That’s become possible because of a U.S. Supreme Court decision that substantially weakened the Voting Rights Act.
If Republicans follow through on that plan, they would be breaking a decades-long alliance with St. Louis’ Black Democrats. The Missouri GOP largely supported keeping the state’s 1st District majority African American, since it made the 2nd and 3rd districts more Republican.
The GOP-controlled legislature divided Kansas City into three districts last year, though whether that stands is up in the air because of a redistricting referendum that voters could decide on later this fall.
2nd and 3rd districts
Congresswoman Ann Wagner defeated four Republican primary challengers in the 2nd Congressional District and will square off in the fall against either Fred Wellman or Joan VonDras, who were in a tight Democratic primary race Tuesday night.
In the 3rd District, GOP Congressman Bob Onder and Democrat Bethany Mann both won their primaries Tuesday and will face each other in November.
Onder easily won his race against Mann in 2024, though the 3rd District is more competitive after 2025 redistricting.
