Rep. Ilhan Omar Defeats Minnesota Democratic Primary Challenger
Rep. Ilhan Omar, one of the country’s most prominent and controversial progressive lawmakers, won the Democratic primary for Minnesota’s 5th Congressional District on Tuesday. In the overwhelmingly Democratic seat, Omar’s primary win all but officially confirms that she is returning to Washington.
Omar defeated employment attorney Antone Melton-Meaux, a more moderate liberal, who ran as an antidote to what he called Omar’s “divisive” legislative style.
With almost 99% of the votes counted, Omar led Melton-Meaux 57% to 39%. Turnout in the district far exceeded the number of people who voted in the 2018 primary, despite the absence of statewide candidates at the top of the ballot this cycle.
“If this election showed us anything, it’s the lengths that those seeking to uphold systems of oppression will go to stop a movement that wants to put power back in the hands of people,” Omar said in a statement. “But in Minnesota, we know that organized people will always beat organized money. Tonight, our movement didn’t just win. We earned a mandate for change.”
Her victory is another boost for the activist left ― and a disappointment for the conservative forces that had invested heavily in her ouster.
Omar “has an incredibly strong social media presence and a very, very powerful following among the millennials and other young voters,” said David Schultz, a political science professor at Hamline University in St. Paul. “She was able to get them out in sufficient numbers to win the primary.”
Voters are generally reluctant to throw out incumbents without a strong reason to do so. And as an incumbent, Omar had the complete support of Minnesota’s Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party and organized labor.
Both the DFL, which is the state’s Democratic Party, and Minnesota’s influential labor unions worked hard to discredit Melton-Meaux in the final weeks of the campaign.
Unions blasted Melton-Meaux for his tenure at the mega-law firm...
