FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz cruised to victory on Tuesday, easily defeating four other candidates in the Democratic primary and all but guaranteeing a 12th term in Congress.

At 7:30 p.m. with early votes and some mail votes counted, unofficial returns showed Wasserman Schultz with 50.3% of the vote.

She was running almost 30 points ahead of the the apparent second-place finisher, former Broward County Commissioner Dale Holness. The other candidates are Luther Campbell, Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick and Elijah Manley.

The Associated Press declared Wasserman Schultz the winner at 7:24 p.m. When CNN showed her as the winner on big screens, the congresswoman’s friends, family and colleagues gathered for her election night party at Lucky Strike Tamarac cheered.

Brutal campaign

The primary campaign was short, but bruising, after a dizzying whirlwind of political developments during the spring and summer.

President Donald Trump told Republican states this year to change their districts in ways designed to elect more Republicans and fewer Democrats. Gov. Ron DeSantis pushed the Republican-controlled Florida Legislature to change the boundaries of all the state’s congressional districts.

In Broward, the state’s most Democratic county, the plan chopped up Wasserman Schultz’s previous district into five pieces. One part went to the reconfigured 20th District, where the DeSantis staffer who crafted the plan crammed as many Democrats as possible to make the adjacent districts more Republican.

The 20th District includes most of Broward’s African American and Caribbean American communities. The four other candidates in the primary, all of whom are Black, said Wasserman Schultz, who is white, shouldn’t have run there, arguing the district should be represented by someone with the lived experience of such a large bloc of residents.

Wasserman Schultz, 59, the senior Democrat in the Florida Congressional Delegation, touted her background as someone who has championed all communities, pushed back against President Donald Trump, and has the ability to get things done.

She is a senior Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee and a co-chair of the Democratic Party Steering and Policy committee, which is part of the House leadership.

Wasserman Schultz had endorsements from some Black community and political leaders. And, notably, Maisha Williams, the late Congressman Alcee Hastings’ stepdaughter, recorded a video testimonial distributed by Wasserman Schultz’s campaign.

“My Dad and Debbie Wasserman Schultz were more than just colleagues in Congress, they were friends. He was also her mentor, and together they fought like hell for the communities he cared so much about,” Williams said. “When Debbie sees injustice and racism, she stands up, she speaks out, and she fights just like my dad. Listen, results matter. I’m voting for Debbie because she has the passion and the experience and will continue to deliver for all of us.”

Other candidates

The other candidates tried to forge an agreement to coalesce around one, but the effort failed when they couldn’t agree on who would stay in a one-on-one contest and who would drop out.

Cherfilus-McCormick, 47, was the first Haitian American elected to Congress. In April, she resigned, just before the House Ethics Committee was to consider what sanction to recommend after a subcommittee found she committed 25 ethics violations. She faces a federal criminal trial next year on charges that include some of the issues the House Ethics Committee examined. She has pleaded not guilty and denied wrongdoing.

Campbell, 65, was leader of the rap group 2 Live Crew, which led to his becoming a free-speech activist. More recently he has been a youth football coach and podcaster and unsuccessful candidate for Miami-Dade County mayor in 2011. He qualified to appear on the ballot using the nickname he’s well known for, “UncleLuke.”

Holness, 68, is a former Broward County commissioner and former Lauderhill city commissioner who lost two previous congressional primaries. He was the first Jamaican American to serve a term as county mayor.

Manley, 27, was the most progressive candidate in the group, and has talked about his upbringing, which includes a time in which his family was homeless. He is now a civic activist who has unsuccessfully run for Broward School Board and the state Legislature.

Looking ahead

On the Republican side, unofficial results showed Brent Andersen far ahead of Lateresa “LA” Jones, Rod Joseph and Carla Spalding.

Andersen is a Pompano Beach insurance broker, who was active in the Massachusetts Republican Party before moving to Florida.

The district is so overwhelmingly Democratic that winning the primary is tantamount to winning the general election.

—The district’s active registered voters are 52.0% Democratic, 26.5% independent/no party affiliation, 18.2% Republican and 3.3% minor parties.

—In the 2024 presidential election, Trump finished 39 points behind Democrat Kamala Harris in the new 20th District’s precincts, data analysts have reported.

—The partisan voting index from the nonpartisan Cook Political Report rates the district as D+20, which means it performed 20 points more Democratic than the nation during the last two presidential contests.

—Independent ratings, from Cook, Inside Elections and the University of Virginia Center for Politics, all rate it as a solid or safe Democratic district.

20th District

The reconfigured 20th District is basically a square in the central part of Broward, all north of Interstate 595. Most of its eastern boundary is Federal Highway or the FEC railroad tracks. Most of the northern boundary is Sample Road and much of the western boundary is the Sawgrass Expressway.

It has a protrusion that reaches north to the Palm Beach County line to pick up a swath of Democratic voters straddling Interstate 95.

The district includes all or parts of Coconut Creek, Coral Springs, Deerfield Beach, Fort Lauderdale, Lauderdale Lakes, Lazy Lake, Lauderhill, Margate, North Lauderdale, Oakland Park, Plantation, Pompano Beach, Sunrise, Tamarac and Wilton Manors.

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