Luria and Kiggans rematch in Va.’s 2nd Congressional District among most-watched races in nation

Virginia’s 2nd Congressional District has emerged as one of the most competitive in the country ahead of the Nov. 3 midterm election, with incumbent U.S. Rep. Jen Kiggans, R-Virginia Beach, working to hold her seat against Democrat and former representative Elaine Luria, whom Kiggans ousted in 2022. 

Two independent candidates, Matt Baker and Bishop Staten, are also on the ballot to lead the district, which U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson said  “will determine the fate of the country,” as Republicans vie to maintain their slim majority in Congress. 

The Virginia Beach-anchored district oscillates between partisan control and contains the state’s largest concentration of military personnel.

The 2nd District backed Democrat Abigail Spanberger by 53% in the governor’s race last year, which could signal a shift in the sentiments of voters who first elected Republican Kiggans to represent them four years ago.

The district spans the Eastern Shore, Virginia Beach and reaches through Suffolk, Isle of Wight County, Franklin and parts of Chesapeake. Over 593,000 registered voters live there.

In seeking reelection, Kiggans defends healthcare record, Iran war support 

Kiggans, a former Navy pilot who then became a nurse practitioner, is vying for her third term in the House. She also previously served as a state senator in Virginia’s General Assembly. 

Her 2022 bid for Congress came a year after Republican Glenn Youngkin won the Virginia governorship on a “Parents Matter” platform. While still in the state senate, she carried unsuccessful bills to ban “inherently divisive concepts” and a bill to bar transgender girls from joining girls’ sports teams.

In 2024, she was reelected as President Donald Trump reclaimed the White House. 

In the past year, Kiggans and other republicans have also had to defend their healthcare votes in what may be a litmus test for this year’s elections. 

H.R. 1, a Trump-backed federal spending bill passed last summer, puts 300,000 Virginians at risk of losing Medicaid next year, with 5,800 lawful immigrants set to lose it next month. 

Expiring Affordable Care Act subsidies have also spurred nearly 100,000 Virginians to drop that form of insurance. 

Ahead of the passage of H.R. 1, Kiggans joined an open letter opposing aspects of it but ultimately voted to support it. She also signed a letter backing ACA credits extension, before voting to let them expire. 

Kiggans answered questions by email earlier in the summer but did not follow through on an interview request by the time of publication. 

She previously wrote that her H.R. 1 vote helped protect Medicaid “for those who truly need” it and framed her ACA subsidies vote as an action against “waste, fraud and abuse.” 

The Virginia’s Attorney General office has prosecuted seven Medicaid fraud cases and settled two civil cases over the past year, resulting in millions in restitution paid to the state, the Virginia Medicaid Fraud Control Unit’s 2025-2026 annual report stated. 

Vice President J.D. Vance announced on Sep. 22 that at least 750,000 people nationwide have been kicked off ACA due to fraud. It’s unclear how many Virginians are included in that total. 

Kiggans has also strongly supported the war in Iran, which President Donald Trump launched without congressional approval in February.  

Amid rising gas and grocery prices in the eighth month of the conflict, Kiggans acknowledged the war’s factor in higher prices at the pump and told the John Fredericks Show this summer that gas prices “need to come down before the midterms.”

Luria, Baker and Staten counter that Congress needs to do more to address rising costs and balance the president’s power.

Alongside Kiggans, US House Speaker says Va.’s 2nd District ‘will determine the fate of the country’

Despite siding with her party on contentious votes more recently, Kiggans was once ranked 19th in Georgetown University’s  Lugar Center’s 2023 Bipartisan Index. 

Kiggans this year co-sponsored the latest legislative attempt to curb congressional stock trading. 

The incumbent’s campaign released an ad this month that accused Luria of leaving Congress $21 million richer than she entered due to stock trading.

The allegation is not supported by publicly disclosed trading records, though Luria was not always on board with efforts to ban congressional stock trading. 

The most recent Federal Election Commission filings indicate Kiggans has nearly $3.4 million in cash on hand for her campaign. 

Luria plans a comeback, touts affordability agenda

Luria, a retired Navy commander, was first elected to Congress in 2018’s “blue wave,” where Democrats nationwide regained control of the House during the midpoint of Trump’s first presidency. 

Like Kiggans, Luria went on to defend her seat for a second term before losing it. 

While in Congress, Luria helped pass the PACT Act, which expanded healthcare and benefits to veterans exposed to toxic chemicals in their line of duty. She also supported Chesapeake Bay environmental protections.

Primary focus points for Luria — and many Democrats’ campaigns this year — are addressing healthcare affordability and access issues and finding ways to curb inflation, she outlined in an interview. 

Aside from restoring the expired ACA subsidies, Luria said that Congress should also “allow Medicare to negotiate costs for more prescription drugs, and invest in medical training, technology, and facilities so that no family has to choose between putting a roof over their head and paying for the care that they need.”

Both Kiggans and Luria have been supportive of Virginia’s offshore wind project — which Trump  has repeatedly tried to thwart and which proponents believe can help drive down energy costs and help the state lower its carbon footprint. 

Though Congress passed a bipartisan housing bill this year aimed at addressing supply and affordability challenges, Luria said that Trump’s tariffs “have led the cost of construction to skyrocket.” 

Luria’s most recent ranking in the bipartisan index before leaving Congress was 28th. She said she was proud to have found “areas of compromise” with her colleagues and would bring that perspective back if elected. 

Dark money in politics — when political action committees or special nonprofit entities exploit loopholes to donate undisclosed amounts to candidates or causes — has had too much sway for too long, Luria said. 

She co-sponsored legislation to curb dark money donations while in Congress and plans to champion the effort again. 

“I do not believe the Republican Party or the Democratic Party are doing nearly enough to clamp down on this culture that rewards those who are well-off and well-connected while leaving working people behind,” she said. 

As of late-September, Luria’s campaign had $3.5 million in cash on hand. 

Independents Matt Baker and Bishop Stanton give voters another option

Retired U.S. Marine Corps Col. Matt Baker, one of two independents in the race, aligns with Luria on supporting campaign finance reform. 

His political persuasion would also enable him to act as a “conduit” between Republicans and Democrats, he said. 

As Congress has failed to pass its annual budgets on time and had a downward trend in productivity in recent years, Baker hopes to help ease the gridlock. 

He would also advocate for the U.S. to conclude its war in Iran. 

“We’ve got to figure out a way to extricate ourselves,” he said. “That’s the nature of war, you don’t want to stay in one.” 

He also said that “the federal government has been ignoring the problem” of regulating data centers and artificial intelligence, leaving too much of the burden on states and localities. 

Like Baker, independent candidate Geral “Bishop” Staten said he would help facilitate productive conversations across the aisle. Though not running under a party umbrella, he said that his political alignment skews Democratic Socialist. 

A history of pro-Trump social media posts during the president’s first term, reported by Virginia Scope, has called his stances into question. 

Luria’s campaign filed a suit alleging Staten lacked the signatures to qualify for the ballot but said they dropped it earlier this month. 

In an interview with The Mercury, Staten explained that he doesn’t currently support Trump and that he has typically voted for Democrats. He said that he voted in the 2024 GOP primary for Nikki Haley in an attempt to keep Trump from advancing. 

“This (Make America Great Again) administration got into office and they’ve done everything outside of what we want as people,” he said. 

If he were to join Congress, Staten said he would vote “a hard yes” on extending the ACA subsidies. 

He would also support legislation mandating stronger pricing and billing transparency from healthcare providers and would advocate for more transportation funding.

Staten, Baker and Luria told The Mercury that they are critical of Trump’s immigration policies and would support streamlining citizenship processes for certain immigrants, like non-violent people whose only crime was entering illegally, or children of immigrants. 

Kiggans voted to increase immigration enforcement funding and has visited the U.S.-Mexico border wall that was a key goal of Trump’s first term. 

With early voting under way, Election Day is Nov. 3. Read The Mercury’s voter guide to learn more about Virginia’s congressional districts, candidates and the stakes of the races.