Iowa Republican Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks successfully fended off Democratic challenger Christina Bohannan in the race for the state’s 1st Congressional District, the Associated Press reported Wednesday.
Miller-Meeks has been a member of the U.S. House of Representatives since 2021, and currently represents the state’s 1st Congressional District, which includes cities such as Davenport and Iowa City in the southeastern part of the state.
She flipped the seat from blue to red in 2020 and watched this year’s race go from a “likely” Republican victory to a runoff. She won the 2020 race by just six votes, but expanded her advantage even further in 2022.
Rep. Miller-Meeks defeats conservative primary challenge in Iowa election
Congresswoman Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-Iowa) speaking at a town hall event in Washington, D.C. (Samuel Corum/Getty Images)
While fending off a Republican primary challenger who earlier in the cycle accused her of voting “against you and the Republican platform more than 40% of the time,” Miller-Meeks told voters that she was promoted himself as a “proven conservative.”
The Iowa Republican received support from the Trump campaign during the campaign, including former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell and former Trump Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
“There is no better conservative fighter for Iowa’s 1st Congressional District than Congresswoman Mariannette Miller-Meeks,” said House Speaker Mike Johnson. I’m proud to work with you and help undo disastrous policies from the Biden administration.” He said this when he endorsed Miller-Meeks at the beginning of the election cycle.
Mr. Miller-Meeks is a physician and a 24-year veteran of the U.S. Army before retiring as a lieutenant colonel.
former Iowa Congresswoman Christina Bohanan; (Iowa State Legislature)
Bohannon, the Democratic challenger, is a law professor at the University of Iowa School of Law and previously served in the Iowa House of Representatives from 2021 to 2023. She campaigned to make Iowa’s public school system one of the best in the nation and enacted “common sense.” He vowed to enact “gun control laws,” fight to “return Roe v. Wade to federal law,” and “work with everyone to protect our borders.”
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The two men sparred last month in a debate on topics including abortion, the economy and immigration reform. Miller-Meeks, like Republicans across the country, blamed the Biden-Harris administration for the illegal immigration crisis following former President Donald Trump’s White House border policies.
“Trump-era policies that have helped reduce the amount of illegal immigration coming across the border and curbed the amount of illegal drugs and illicit fentanyl have ensured that our Customs and Border Protection agents are actually doing their jobs. I felt that way,” Miller said. Meeks said during the debate.
Bohannan said bipartisan border legislation was supposed to pass this year, but Republicans “ruined” the border. Republicans say the immigration bill, if passed, would make the crisis worse, arguing that the bill was effectively broken on arrival.
Greg Gutfeld: Mariannette Miller-Meeks ‘missed opportunity’ to speak publicly about lives ruined during coronavirus era
The U.S.-Mexico border wall in Sasabe, Arizona. (Valerie Macon/AFP via Getty Images)
“We recently had a tremendous opportunity to pass the toughest border security bill this country has seen in a very long time, maybe ever, and Congressman Miller-Meeks and her party killed it,” Bohannan said last month. .
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Miller-Meeks previously defeated Bohannan in the 2022 general election, 53% to 47%. The entire 1st District voted for Trump in the 2020 election, voting for him over President Biden by about 3 percentage points.
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Fox News Digital’s Adam Shaw contributed to this report.
