Two-term Democratic U.S. Rep. Hillary Scholten of Grand Rapids has won over Republican Terri DeBoer, a well-known former TV meteorologist, to secure a third term in a Michigan congressional district anchored by Grand Rapids.

NBC News and the Decision Desk HQ called the race for Scholten shortly after 11:30 p.m. Tuesday. The Democratic incumbent was ahead with 57% of the vote to DeBoer’s 42% with an estimated 97.4% of the votes counted around 3 a.m. Wednesday, Nov. 4, according to unofficial returns. Green Party candidate Joe Jock trailed them with 1.4%.

Scholten in 2022 became the first woman to ever represent Michigan’s 3rd District, which includes portions of Kent, Ottawa and Muskegon counties, encompassing Grand Rapids and reaching out to the lakeshore following Interstate 96.

Scholten, 44, has run for reelection while declining to endorse Democrat Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan’s hotly contested U.S. Senate race after the former public health official campaigned with far-left social media influencer Hasan Piker, whose rhetoric the congresswoman condemned as “dangerous for everyone.”

Piker once remarked during a livestream that the United States “deserved” the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks. The California-based Twitch streamer later said his comments were meant to be satirical and his word choice was “inappropriate.”

Before running for office, Scholten worked as an immigration attorney in the President Barack Obama-era U.S. Department of Justice and at the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center.

DeBoer, 61, who lives in Byron Center, spent three decades on the air in west Michigan. She left WXMI-TV, the FOX television affiliate in Grand Rapids, to run for office, but previously spent 28 years reporting the weather at WOOD-TV, starting in 1995.

When DeBoer announced her candidacy in March, she said her intention was to “safeguard liberty and economic prosperity for the next generation of Michiganders.”

“I spent my career predicting storms, but today I see a different kind of turbulence on the horizon — one that threatens our safety, our freedoms, and our children’s future,” DeBoer said in a statement.

In 2022, Scholten beat Republican John Gibbs, a former Trump administration appointee and, eventually, a fired Ottawa County administrator, by more than 13 percentage points.

The last Republican to represent the district — which became more favorable to Democrats after legislative redistricting in 2020 — is former U.S. Rep. Peter Meijer, who was denounced by local GOP groups after voting to impeach President Donald Trump for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.

gschwab@detroitnews.com

This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: Democrat U.S. Rep. Scholten wins over GOP’s DeBoer in 3rd District

Reporting by Grant Schwab and Breana Noble, The Detroit News / The Detroit News

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