Omar defeated her challenger by a 13 percentage point margin. In another district, Rep. Michelle Fischbach (R-Minn.) also fended off a primary challenge.
MINNEAPOLIS—Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) has won the Democratic primary in Minnesota’s 5th Congressional District after fending off a challenge from a moderate Democrat in a close contest.
Omar, who has represented the district that covers most of metropolitan Minneapolis for three terms, won the primary with 56.2 percent of the vote, according to the Associated Press. She defeated former Minnesota City Council Member Don Samuels, her principal opponent, who won 42.9 percent.
“This campaign has been one of the ugliest, most disgusting campaigns against me that I have ever witnessed,” Omar remarked at her election night victory party at Nighthawks bar in Minneapolis.
She said that the campaign overcame a “massive number of Republicans voting in our primary, egged on by every single Republican influencer across the country.” Minnesota does not register voters by party affiliation and allows all voters to participate in one party’s primary election.
Omar and Samuels previously faced each other in the 2022 Democratic Primary, which was narrowly decided. Omar won that primary by 2.15 percent of the vote.
The latest victory makes Omar the likely winner of the general election on Nov. 5 as Minnesota’s 5th District is among the most Democratic-leaning districts in the country, with a Cook Partisan Voting Index score of D+30.
The Republican primary in the district was uncontested, with former journalist Dalia Al-Aqidi being the unopposed GOP candidate running in November.
Omar is the first Somali-American and hijab-wearing lawmaker elected to Congress and is a member of the “Squad”—a group of progressive House Democrats. She has been critical of Israel and has charged that the Jewish state is committing a “genocide” in Gaza.
“I had the honor of seeing the Columbia University anti-war encampment firsthand,” Omar said on social media while visiting the pro-Palestinian protest site at Columbia University in New York in April. “These students are joyfully protesting for peace and an end to the genocide taking place in Gaza.”
