Mendoza wins congressional seat from Republican Ciscomani

Democrat challenger JoAnna Mendoza has beaten Republican incumbent Juan Ciscomani to take over the seat of the state’s most competitive district.  

The Associated Press called the race for Mendoza Thursday afternoon, when she was up eight points. 

Since it was created in 2021, Congressional District 6 has been Arizona’s most competitive district, with an electorate that is nearly evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats. 

Ciscomani won his last two elections by 1.5% and 2.5% 

The district has been a major target of national Democrats, who see the seat as key to flipping control of the U.S. House of Representatives. 

A growing dislike of President Donald Trump and the fiscal impacts of his administration’s policies took center stage as Democrats sought to use that unpopularity against Republican incumbents across the country. 

National Republican organizations connected to party leadership invested in Ciscomani’s race. House Speaker Mike Johnson’s joint fundraising committee, Grow the Majority, gave Ciscomani $530,210, more than all but two other Republican incumbents. And the former staffer for Gov. Doug Ducey has also received hundreds of thousands of dollars from both Majority Whip Tom Emmer’s committee, Emmer Majority Builders, and Majority Leader Steve Scalise’s Defend Our Majority. 

All told, as of March, the GOP leadership committees had funneled $977,809 to Ciscomani for the 2026 election, nearly a quarter of all the money Ciscomani raised throughout his campaign. Comparatively, approximately 7% of Ciscomani’s 2025 donations came from small donors. 

Democratic groups also funneled money to back Mendoza, sending her campaign $2.3 million during the first quarter of 2026, among the highest of Democratic candidates at the time. 

In 2024, Trump narrowly won the district that pre-election polling showed Mendoza with a lead of up to three percentage points. 

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