Missouri's 5th congressional district has been represented in the United States House of Representatives by Democrat Emanuel Cleaver, the former Mayor of Kansas City, since 2005.
After mid-decade redistricting in 2025, the district was redrawn to include parts of urban Kansas City, which contain much of its population, as well as many rural counties in central Missouri and the northern Ozarks. This was part of Governor Mike Kehoe's intention to redistrict the Fifth into a map favoring Republicans by adding more Republican-leaning areas, in hopes of unseating Democratic incumbent Emmanuel Cleaver. The map was passed by the legislature and will be in effect starting in the 2026 elections.
For the 118th and successive Congresses (based on redistricting following the 2020 census), and until 2025, the district contained all or portions of the following counties, townships, and municipalities:
Clay County (11)
Jackson County (12)