New Jersey Democrat Analilia Mejía won a special election for the US House of Representatives on Thursday, defeating Republican Joe Hathaway, on a message of standing up to US President Donald Trump and defending progressive policies.

Mejía, 48, a former head of the Working Families Alliance who had support from Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, will fill the seat previously held by Democratic Gov. Mikie Sherrill and serve until January.

Her victory is a win for progressives and means Democrats hold on to the 11th District seat in the House, where Republicans hold a thin majority. It also adds to a string of victories for Democrats heading into this year’s midterm elections.

Mejía’s victory came two months after she secured the Democratic Party nomination in the primary election, defeating former Rep. Tom Malinowski and about a dozen other candidates.

During the primary, the major pro-Israel lobby AIPAC spent $2.3 million against Malinowski after he questioned unconditional aid to the Israeli government. Malinowski is a moderate who describes himself as pro-Israel.

The effort appeared to have backfired as it boosted Mejía, who has said that Israel committed genocide in Gaza during the war against Hamas, an accusation Malinowski had not made.

AIPAC has defended its approach and suggested it would do so again, stressing that the seat will be up for election again during this year’s midterm vote.

“The real race for the full congressional term is in the June primary, and we’re going to take a close look at that,” said Patrick Dorton, spokesperson for AIPAC’s super PAC, the United Democracy Project.

The election came as AIPAC has found itself under an increasing spotlight, as many politicians, especially Democrats, have moved to distance themselves from the lobby group and publicly reject its endorsement.

Several AIPAC-backed candidates have lost in other primaries for special elections, signaling that the powerful lobby group has lost its luster, with its reputation souring in both left- and right-wing circles. None of the potential 2028 Democratic Party candidates has embraced AIPAC.

After her victory Thursday, Mejía spoke in Montclair to an enthusiastic crowd of supporters who called out in unison with her that she was an “unbought, unbossed, sassy new member of Congress.”

Republicans criticized her throughout the campaign as too far to the left. She pushed back against those arguments, calling for better health care and education and attacking billionaires for having a “stranglehold” on the economy.

“It is not radical to say that a worker who toils every day cannot make ends meet, that they deserve justice, that they deserve higher wages,” Mejía said Thursday night. “That is not radical, that is good conscience. That is a good economy.”

Her speech echoed Sanders, who congratulated her in a social media post and said she would be a “great progressive addition” to Congress.

Mejía emerged from a crowded primary in February and cast the race as a test of Trump’s leadership. She criticized his pardons of people convicted of January 6-related crimes and faulted him for freezing funds authorized by Congress.

She campaigned on populist economic policies and pushing to abolish US Immigration and Customs Enforcement. She has criticized the Israeli government and said she stands with Palestinian communities in their “pursuit of peace and dignity.”

Republican Hathaway, 38, tried to use Mejía’s progressive credentials to his advantage, as national Republicans cast her as a socialist. After her victory, he congratulated Mejía and wished her well. He added that he still believes the district is looking for “balanced, pragmatic” leadership, not “far-left policies.”

The two could go head-to-head again in November’s election for a full two-year term.

The 11th District, which covers parts of Essex, Morris and Passaic counties in northern New Jersey’s wealthy suburbs, was long a Republican stronghold but has become increasingly Democratic since Trump’s first term.

Sherrill first won the seat in 2018’s midterm elections, when Democrats flipped dozens of seats to take control of Congress. In 2024, she won reelection by about 15 points, while Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, carried the district by nearly 9 points.

Mejía’s margin of victory was greater. With more than 90 percent of votes counted late Thursday, she led Hathaway by about 20 percentage points. Additional mail-in ballots — which have favored Mejía by an even larger margin — will be counted in the coming days as they can arrive as late as Wednesday.

Over the years, Mejía has been a regular presence in the state Capitol, advocating for progressive causes, and was Sanders’ political director during his 2020 presidential run. During the Biden administration, she was deputy director of the Labor Department’s Women’s Bureau.

In addition to winning Sanders’ endorsement, she was backed by US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.

Hathaway, a former Yale University football player, has worked in health care and finance as well as in politics as an aide for former GOP Gov. Chris Christie.

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