Maryland Rep. Kweisi Mfume won the Democratic nomination on Tuesday for a full term in the U.S. House seat once held by Elijah Cummings.
Mfume will run in November's general election against Kimberly Klacik, the Republican candidate whom he handily defeated in a special election in April but who went on to win the GOP nomination on Tuesday.
Mfume held the seat for five terms from 1987 to 1996 before joining the NAACP as its chairman. He easily won the seat over Klacik after Cummings' death in 2019. Democrats hold more than a 4-1 edge on Republicans in the 7th Congressional District.
Mfume prevailed Tuesday in a crowded Democratic primary election held mostly by mail because of the coronavirus pandemic. He defeated nearly 20 candidates, including Cummings' widow, in a majority-black district that includes parts of Baltimore and its suburbs.
Klacik has appeared on Fox News and caught President Donald Trump's attention with her social media posts, which prompted the president to describe the congressional district as a "disgusting rat and rodent infested mess."
Klacik has been advocating to help struggling parts of Baltimore through a federal program known as opportunity zones. The program, which is supported by Trump, focuses on increasing private investment in distressed communities with tax incentives for people who invest in real estate projects and operate businesses in designated low-income communities. The primaries were delayed from April 28 because of the pandemic.
