Zach Dembo, a Democratic former federal prosecutor and Navy veteran, was elected to an open House seat in Central Kentucky’s Sixth District on Tuesday, according to The Associated Press, delivering an upset in a traditionally conservative stronghold as Republicans struggled with President Trump’s waning popularity.
Mr. Dembo’s victory against Dr. Ralph Alvarado, a physician and former state senator who was backed by President Trump, was a signal of Democratic strength in a district that voted heavily for Mr. Trump two years ago.
The seat had been vacated by Representative Andy Barr, a Republican making a Senate bid to replace Senator Mitch McConnell, who is retiring.
Democrats invested heavily in Mr. Dembo’s campaign, which was included in the Democratic House campaign arm’s “Red to Blue” program. The party establishment viewed his background — he is an ex-military serviceman, an alumnus of the Justice Department and a former official in the administration of Gov. Andy Beshear of Kentucky, a popular Democrat — as an asset.
By contrast, Dr. Alvarado was shadowed by his ties to former Gov. Matt Bevin, Mr. Beshear’s predecessor, whose single term was marked by discord and conflict.
Mr. Dembo, a ninth-generation Kentuckian raised in Lexington, traces his family roots to the 1700s, when generations of his ancestors were farmers. A graduate of Stanford University, he joined the Teach for America program after college and spent two years working as an English teacher in the underserved Mississippi Delta.
He later earned his law degree from the University of Michigan and served for more than four years on active duty as an officer in the Judge Advocate General’s Corps of the U.S. Navy. In 2017, he became a federal prosecutor in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. He returned to Kentucky in 2020, when Mr. Beshear appointed him as legislative director.
Mr. Dembo served as an assistant U.S. attorney in Lexington, but resigned in May 2025 over what he said was concern over the politicization of the justice system under the Trump administration.
His House campaign prioritized ending the war in Iran to reduce gas prices, which Dr. Alvarado, in a break with Mr. Trump, also expressed support for later in his campaign. Mr. Dembo criticized Mr. Trump’s signature domestic policy law, which was passed and signed into law in 2025. He specifically denounced the act’s cuts to Medicaid and its tax breaks for the ultrawealthy.
Mr. Dembo called for the restoration of subsidies provided by the Obama-era Affordable Care Act that expired at the end of last year and supported a public option for health insurance. Dr. Alvarado has criticized the Affordable Care Act.
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