Progressive Aisha Wahab has been elected to Congress in a special election following a bitter intra-party battle over the seat formerly held by Eric Swalwell, who resigned in April after facing sexual misconduct allegations. Swalwell has denied the allegations.<\/p>\n
Wahab, a state senator, was widely considered the frontrunner in the district in California<\/a>\u2019s East Bay and had the backing of the state Democratic party as well as Our Revolution, labor unions, local officials and the state\u2019s attorney general, Rob Bonta.<\/p>\n She won the primary for the special election for the final months of Swalwell\u2019s term by more than 20 points over Melissa Hernandez, the president of the board of directors for the Bay Area Rapid Transit (Bart) agency.<\/p>\n \u201cI will fight for this district that raised me,\u201d Wahab said in a statement on Thursday. \u201cFrom foster care to Congress, this journey shows the possibility of the American Dream.\u201d<\/p>\n While Wahab held a major lead throughout the race, Hernandez\u2019s campaign received a significant boost as Super Pacs connected to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) poured money into the race.<\/p>\n With 95% of votes counted on Thursday afternoon, Wahab led Hernandez by just over six points in Tuesday\u2019s election to fill the remainder of Swalwell\u2019s term \u2013 a much closer race than expected.<\/p>\n Earlier this month, it emerged that Super Pacs had spent more than $5m in a matter of weeks on pro-Hernandez ads and Wahab attack ads. Track Aipac, which monitors the group\u2019s funding of US politicians, recently reported<\/a> that the lobby had spent nearly $6.4m to support Hernandez.<\/p>\n Wahab, the first Muslim woman and Afghan American elected to the California legislature, told the Guardian<\/a> there had been a sudden surge of critical ads that had misrepresented her record. She described the Super Pacs\u2019 involvement as election interference, and said they were attempting to buy the seat.<\/p>\n The race further intensified in recent days after the congresswoman Zoe Lofgren, chair of California\u2019s Democratic delegation, endorsed Hernandez.<\/p>\n Lofgren said Wahab did not back an effort to elect a caretaker candidate<\/a> in order to fill Swalwell\u2019s seat as quickly as possible.<\/p>\n