Sam Rushworth was elected Labour MP for Bishop Auckland on 4 July 2024 with 17,036 votes (42.1 percent) and a majority of 6,672 (16.5 percent). He took a seat previously held by Dehenna Davison, one of the most high profile "red wall" Conservatives, a Levelling Up minister and the youngest Conservative MP when elected in 2019, who did not contest 2024. He had stood and lost twice before, in Blackpool North and Cleveleys in 2015 and Tatton in 2017.

Born in 1984 and holding a doctorate from the University of Manchester and the University of East Anglia, his career was in international development: he co-founded African Dreams Ltd in 2017, a consultancy on development projects in Rwanda, where he remains CEO, founded Our World Research and Consultancy, lectured at Macclesfield College, and worked at Durham University managing its Strategic Research Fund, specialising in education and conflict prevention. He is a UK delegate to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and is writing a biography of Margaret Bondfield, Britain's first female cabinet minister, forthcoming from Bloomsbury. He is a development company CEO, a Council of Europe delegate and a Bloomsbury biographer, not simply a researcher.

He sits on the International Development Committee, matching his expertise, alongside the Council of Europe delegation and the Bishop Auckland Stronger Town Board. The constituency covers Bishop Auckland, Shildon, Barnard Castle and Crook. Reform UK took 23.4 percent, only just behind the Conservatives on 25.6 percent, making the three way contest unstable. In May 2025 a man was jailed for repeatedly threatening to kill him.

Rushworth's strengths include a doctorate, Manchester and UEA education, CEO level development consultancy experience, Council of Europe delegate status providing international parliamentary engagement, the International Development Committee matching his expertise, the Margaret Bondfield biography showing historical scholarship, and a 16.5 percent majority that is larger than many red wall gains. His weaknesses include no ministerial office, no legislative achievement, the Rwanda consultancy potentially raising questions about interests if development policy is debated, the constituency not being his original political base (he contested two other seats first), and Reform UK at 23.4 percent making the seat vulnerable. At 41, with the doctorate, the Council of Europe role, and the Bloomsbury biography in progress, he has an intellectual profile that exceeds most backbenchers. Whether Bishop Auckland voters see the relevance of Council of Europe work and African development consultancy to their town centre, hospital and transport problems is the harder question.