John Cavanaugh concedes to Denise Powell in Nebraska’s 2nd District primary

John Cavanaugh on Friday officially conceded to Denise Powell in the contentious race for the Democratic nomination in Nebraska’s 2nd Congressional District.

Though the Associated Press called the race for Powell on Wednesday evening, Cavanaugh waited to concede until the Douglas County Election Commission released vote totals from thousands of mail-in ballots that were turned in on election day. Those results were released at 12:15 p.m. on Friday.

“Now that all of the votes have been counted, I’ve called Denise Powell and congratulated her,” Cavanaugh said in a statement shortly after the commission’s release. “Thank you to everyone who has been a part of this campaign.”

According to unofficial results, Powell received 22,270 votes to Cavanaugh’s 20,923 votes. The percentage totals end up at about 38.7% for Powell and 36.4% for Cavanaugh, which puts the race outside of the 1% margin needed to trigger an automatic recount.

Douglas County Court Clerk Crystal Rhoades finished a distant third to Powell and Cavanaugh.

Powell outperformed Cavanaugh in all three counties that make up the 2nd District, but she performed particularly well in suburban Sarpy and Saunders Counties. In the parts of western Sarpy County included in the 2nd District, Powell held a 14-percentage-point lead over Cavanaugh. In Saunders County, she led him by 9 percentage points.

The race to represent Nebraska’s “blue dot” in the general election was defined by an influx of outside spending from PACs, which ran millions of dollars worth of ads to oppose Cavanaugh and support Powell. Cavanaugh began running negative ads against Powell in the final weeks of the campaign, referring to her as “dark money Denise” – a tagline that Republicans have now utilized in their own advertising.

At her election night party on Tuesday, Powell said the outside spending was “a testament to how important this race is.”

“I think that people see Nebraska 2 as one of the top flip opportunities in the country for Democrats, so I think there are a lot of folks invested in it,” she said.

Powell will face off with Republican Brinker Harding in the general election. Both are seeking to replace five-term Republican Rep. Don Bacon, who last summer opted not to run for reelection.