Incumbent Filemon Vela Jr., D, vacated the seat at the end of March to take a position at a lobbying firm. This area in Texas has been trending more Republican, and Joe Biden carried this congressional seat in the presidential vote by less than 5 points. A decade earlier, both Democratic presidential and congressional candidates routinely carried this area by a 60-40 margin, but this significantly narrowed in 2020 to a smaller 14 point win for Vela and smaller still for Biden, south Texas being one of the more noted areas in the country where Donald Trump grew his support considerably over 2016.

Mayra Flores is representing the Republicans, and Dan Sanchez the Democrats. However this is a nonpartisan blanket primary where two other candidates, Democrat Rene Coronado and Republican Juana Cantu-Cabrera are also on the ballot, raising the possibility that if no candidate wins a majority of votes, it will go to a runoff prior to the November midterms.

Regardless of a runoff or not, it is expected that Mayra Flores will pick up this currently constituted seat for the Republicans. She is also the designated November Republican nominee against Democrat Vincente Gonzalez, who currently represents the 15th congressional district. However the November race will be fought on reconstituted lines widely considered to be more favourable to Democratic chances.

In the meantime, national Democrats have largely sat out this race, while the Republicans have significantly outraised their Democratic rivals by what CNN reported was a 20 to 1 margin.