House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) is parachuting into Kentucky to raise money for the Republican running in a seat the GOP has held for more than a decade that suddenly seems to be in play.
Johnson will headline a 90-minute breakfast fundraiser Friday for Ralph Alvarado, a Winchester doctor and former state senator, the Lexington Herald-Leader reported. Tickets are $3,500, or $5,000 with a photo, and the location is given only to guests who RSVP.
The event is hosted by the Alvarado Victory Committee, a joint fundraising group made up of Alvarado’s campaign, the Republican Party of Kentucky and the National Republican Congressional Committee. Alvarado’s campaign did not respond to the Herald-Leader’s request for comment.
Alvarado is running against Democrat Zach Dembo, a former federal prosecutor, for the seat Rep. Andy Barr (R-KY) is leaving to run for the U.S. Senate. Barr has held it since 2012 and won with 57 percent to 63 percent of the vote in his last three races. The legislature also redrew the district to remove Democratic-leaning Franklin County.
Polls still show a close race, in part because of President Donald Trump’s unpopularity, and outside groups have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars there.
Last week, the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics moved the race from “Likely Republican” to “Leans Republican.” That’s the second shift toward Democrats in the past 16 months, Spectrum News reported. The analysts first moved it off “Safe Republican” in June 2025.
Kyle Kondik, managing editor of Sabato’s Crystal Ball, cited Trump’s sagging approval and the fact that the seat is now open. He also pointed to 2018, when Barr narrowly beat Democrat Amy McGrath.
“In 2018, the last big Democratic midterm wave year, this was also a hotly contested district,” Kondik said.
Alvarado’s campaign in August quietly swapped out text on its website boasting the candidate is an “AMERICA FIRST FIGHTER” and instead promises “INDEPENDENT LEADERSHIP,” and a paragraph aligning him with Trump has been replaced with one centered on healthcare and a photo of him with the president was swapped to a solo shot.
“This race has moved in our direction because folks believe in our message: ban congressional stock trading, end the Iran war, roll back these reckless tariffs, and lower costs for working families,” Dembo said.
Alvarado’s campaign manager, Andy Westberry, downplayed the new rating.
“You should ask the staff at Sabato’s Crystal Ball how President Kamala Harris is doing,” he said.
Kondik still expects Republicans to hold the seat. He said Kentucky reports results early, so the race will be “an early sign as to what’s going on” on election night.
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