Once rising GOP star, Utah’s Mia Love loses seat to Democrat

Once rising GOP star, Utah’s Mia Love loses seat to Democrat

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Utah’s Mia Love was tabbed as a rising star in the GOP when she became the first black Republican woman in Congress with her 2014 victory.

But on Tuesday she became the latest Republican incumbent to fall in the midterm election’s Democratic wave that has seen more than three dozen Republican-held seats flipped across the country.

Ben McAdams, a Democratic mayor of Salt Lake County, defeated Love by fewer than 700 votes in a back and forth race that took two weeks to sort out in deep-red Utah.

Love had a built-in advantage with Republican voters outnumbering Democrats three-to-one in the mostly suburban Salt Lake City district, but she never seemed to catch on with voters the way other Republican incumbents have in the state, said Damon Cann, a political science professor at Utah State University.

She tried to distance herself from Trump on trade and immigration and she highlighted the times she stood up to the president, like when Trump used an expletive to describe her parents’ home country of Haiti.

Trump won Utah in 2016 but the state’s voters have long been uncomfortable with Trump’s brash style and his comments about women and immigrants.

“She seemed to struggle a little bit more how to strike that balance without losing too many votes,” Cann said.

Trump didn’t appreciate her approach, calling her out by name in a news conference the morning after Election Day, where he also bashed other Republicans who he said lost because they didn’t fully embrace him.

Love, the first and only black female Republican in Congress, was seeking a third term. She said in a statement she planned to call McAdams, but didn’t say if she would concede or congratulate him. She said she’s traveling with family for Thanksgiving and won’t speak about the race until Monday.

“Regardless of how you voted, I want to express my sincere appreciation to you for engaging in the process,” Love said. “It is one of many reasons this is the greatest country on earth.”