The district covers Northwest Arkansas and takes in Fort Smith, Fayetteville, Springdale, and Bentonville.

With a Cook Partisan Voting Index rating of R+15, it is the third most Republican district in Arkansas, a state with an all-Republican congressional delegation.

The district swung Republican long before the rest of the state.

It has been in Republican hands continuously since the election of John Paul Hammerschmidt in 1966.

However, conservative Democrats continued to hold most state and local offices well into the 1990s.