Every two years in the United States, the House of Representatives’ seats are up for election. In District 8, incumbent U.S. Representative Jason Smith is running for reelection, along with challengers on the other side of the aisle and in his own party.
District 8 is composed of 30 counties and covers areas such as Rolla, the Bootheel, Cape Girardeau, West Plains, Farmington, and Festus, according to Statistical Atlas. This election comes after controversy over Missouri’s mid-decade congressional redistricting, which redraws the lines of District 5 and puts parts of Kansas City with surrounding rural areas, according to Ballotpedia. While this change does not affect District 8, it could potentially add another consistently Republican seat to the House, according to the Beacon News.
There are three Democratic candidates, one other Republican candidate besides Smith, and one Libertarian candidate registered in the District 8 race, according to Missouri’s Secretary of State. All of these candidates will be entered into the primary election, which is set to take place on August 4.
Smith, originally an attorney, previously served as MO District 120’s State Representative and has held his current seat for 12 years, according to Ballotpedia. He currently serves as the Chair of the Ways and Means committee in Congress, and his campaign for reelection has received the endorsement of President Donald Trump.
Associate professor of Political Science, Philosophy, and Religion, Dr. Ivy Shen, said that Smith comes into the race with an incumbent advantage.
“I think the biggest advantage is that Congressman Smith is an incumbent, so he’s currently in office,” Shen said. “Incumbents certainly have the advantage of being in this political power, having a political clout, and him having a bigger donor base than the other competitors in this race.”
Shen also pointed out that his ties to Trump could be a potential disadvantage.
“I think the disadvantage is that Congressman Smith is still very tied to President Trump, and the 2026 Iran War has not been doing Republicans a huge favor,” Shen said. “I look through some other Republican candidates wanting to challenge and unseat Congressman Smith, and they have distanced themselves from the President, whereas Jason Smith has been a vocal supporter of the President since the very beginning…”
Gordon Heslop, a former accounting professor at East Texas A&M University, is the sole challenger against Smith in the Republican Primary. Heslop has been a conservative for 44 years, according to Ballotpedia, and is running on the theme of “Make America Normal Again”.
Heslop has also made education one of the main issues of his campaign.
“I would make radical changes in the education system,” Heslop said. “Some people get scared when you use the word radical. I’m not talking about radical in terms of being bad. I’m talking about radical in terms of introducing a much better system.”
He said that he proposes changing bachelor’s degrees to a three-year program and promoting trade schools over traditional universities.
“In the past, you’ve heard some politicians say everybody should go to university. Well, that’s one of the stupidest ideas I’ve ever heard.” Heslop said. “There are some people who can’t afford to go to university. There are others who don’t have the academic ability. There are some that just don’t have the interest, and we’ve ignored [them] for far too long, the trades.”
While education is important to Heslop, one of the reasons he decided to run was the length of time that Smith has held the position.
“He’s been in there too long. We don’t need lifetime politicians,” Heslop said. “He’s been a politician, and I’m not criticizing the man, I’m not into that, but he’s been a politician virtually his entire adult life, and I believe in term limits.”
Heslop also said that Smith has not acted to reduce the national debt.
“Since he’s been in office, the national debt has more than doubled, more than $20 trillion has been added to the national debt, and I’m not aware of any work he has done in that area,” Heslop said. “That’s one of the things I’ll be putting before voters. I’m willing to lead that fight. We have to reduce the national debt, otherwise we’re going to have a financial catastrophe down the road.”
Funding and the economy are among the key aspects of another challenger in the District 8 primary. Chris Reichard, an Army veteran, is running as a democrat and wants to see funding returned to District 8 and improvements made to the area.
“I want to address getting funding back to Missouri’s Eighth District, for our health care and for our education, because we are doing worse than the state in pretty much every metric we’ve got, the highest unemployment, the highest poverty rate. We rank around the lowest [in] education. It’s just constant.” Reichard said.
MO District 8 is an extremely conservative district, with Smith winning 76.2% of the vote in the 2024 election and Trump winning 74.7% of the vote, according to Ballotpedia. Despite this, Reichard believes in running as a democratic candidate.
“It feels more like a moral obligation at this point, especially when the MAGA circumstances around the Republican Party, it’s just something that I can’t buy into,” Reichard said.
Reichard also expressed frustration about the current way the district is being represented.
“It comes back to being angry and disappointed everywhere I go, the people I talk to in the district, Jason Smith doesn’t come out and speak to people unless it’s a paid engagement or an exclusive farm tour with big donors”, Reichard said. “It just seems like he doesn’t care and forgot his roots here in the area. So I am putting boots on the ground, actually talking to people I want to find out what their problems are, because it’s not just what I want to solve in DC if I get there, it’s got to be what the people want whenever I get there, that’s who I’d be accountable to.”
Reichard is one of three democratic candidates registered for the primary. Frank Barnitz is a former member of the Missouri State Senate, representing District 16, and served as Minority Caucus Leader, according to Ballotpedia. Clayton Harbison, a resident of Arcadia Valley and a “community advocate”, is also running to upgrade roads and get big money out of politics, according to his website.
Rebecca Sharpe Lombard, a public policy analyst, according to her Facebook page, is also running as a Libertarian candidate, according to Ballotpedia.
While Smith is the likely candidate to win the election in November, Shen said that the Republican Party might not fare so well.
“I do not think the Republicans are going to do well this midterm election because they have a very small margin and given that statistically speaking, the President’s party almost always loses during a midterm election, so Republicans are most likely going to lose, my prediction, of course, will be Democrats taking both the House and also the Senate, and the Republicans will be pushed to the minority status,” Shen said.
The District 8 congressional candidates will appear at a town hall, hosted by Indivisible SEMO on April 24th from 5 to 7 p.m. at the Arena Park Shelter #1. Congressman Smith will be speaking and attending the Red Rally, hosted by the SEMO Federated Republican Women at the Arena Building from 6 to 8 p.m. on April 24th. He is expected to attend both events.
The midterm elections will be held on November 3, 2026, when voters will decide who represents Missouri’s 8th District, the rest of the House, and one-third of the Senate.
The Arrow, a Southeast Missouri State University student-run publication and news partner with KRCU Public Radio, originally published this story.