AP calls US House 5th District race for Democrat Janelle Bynum; GOP Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer concedes

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Democrat Janelle Bynum has flipped Oregon’s 5th Congressional District and will become the state’s first Black member of Congress, The Associated Press reported Thursday as it called the close race nine days after the election, prompting Republican Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer to concede.

Bynum, a state representative who was backed and funded by national Democrats, ousted freshman lawmaker Chavez-DeRemer. Republicans lost a seat that they flipped red for the first time in roughly 25 years during the 2022 midterms.

“It’s not lost on me that I am one generation removed from segregation. It’s not lost on me that we’re making history. And I am proud to be the first, but not the last, Black member of Congress in Oregon,” Bynum said at a press conference last Friday. “But it took all of us working together to flip this seat, and we delivered a win for Oregon. We believed in a vision and we didn’t take our feet off the gas until we accomplished our goals.”

The contest was seen as a GOP toss-up by the Cook Political Report, meaning either party had a good chance of winning.

Bynum had previously defeated Chavez-DeRemer twice when they faced off in state legislative elections.

Chavez-DeRemer narrowly won the seat in 2022, which was the first election held in the district after its boundaries were significantly redrawn following the 2020 census.

The district now encompasses disparate regions spanning metro Portland and its wealthy and working-class suburbs, as well as rural agricultural and mountain communities and the fast-growing central Oregon city of Bend on the other side of the Cascade Range. Registered Democratic voters outnumber Republicans by about 25,000 in the district, but unaffiliated voters represent the largest constituency.

A small part of the district is in Multnomah County, where a ballot box just outside the county elections office in Portland was set on fire by an incendiary device about a week before the election, damaging three ballots. Authorities said that enough material from the incendiary device was recovered to show that the Portland fire was also connected to two other ballot drop box fires in neighboring Vancouver, Washington, one of which occurred on the same day as the Portland fire and damaged hundreds of ballots.

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Chavez-DeRemer Statement on 5th District Election Result

HAPPY VALLEY, Oregon – Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (OR-05) released the following statement conceding the race for Oregon’s 5th Congressional District:

“I'm deeply grateful for the opportunity I had to serve as Oregonians’ voice in Congress. I've always been passionate about helping improve my community through public service, and it's been a sincere honor to do so over the last 24 years – from Happy Valley’s Parks Committee, City Council, Mayor, and all the way to the halls of the U.S. House of Representatives. I'd like to extend a heartfelt thank you to my family, my supporters, and my team, who have been by my side through it all. Although this isn’t the outcome we had hoped for, I’m proud of what we accomplished together. I hope Ms. Bynum will follow the example I have set over the past two years and serve as a pragmatic, thoughtful, and bipartisan leader who will work with the Trump administration to address housing affordability, improve public safety, and secure the border,” Chavez-DeRemer said.