SALT LAKE CITY (AP) – Former U.S. Rep. Mia Love of Utah, a daughter of Haitian immigrants who turned the primary black Republican girl elected to Congress, died Sunday.
She was 49.
Love’s household posted information of her dying on Love’s X account.
Love had been present process remedy for mind most cancers, and her daughter stated earlier this month that the previous lawmaker was now not responding to remedy. She had been receiving immunotherapy as a part of a medical trial at Duke College’s mind tumor middle.
Love entered politics in 2003 after profitable a seat on town council in Saratoga Springs, a rising group about 30 miles (48 kilometers) south of Salt Lake Metropolis. She later turned town’s mayor.
In 2012, Love narrowly misplaced a bid for the Home in opposition to the Democratic incumbent, former Rep. Jim Matheson, in a district that covers a string of Salt Lake Metropolis suburbs.
She ran once more two years later and defeated first-time candidate Doug Owens by about 7,500 votes.
Love didn’t emphasize her race throughout her campaigns, however she acknowledged the importance of her election after her 2014 victory. She stated her win defied naysayers who had urged {that a} Black, Republican, Mormon girl couldn’t win a congressional seat in overwhelmingly white Utah.
She was briefly thought of a rising star inside the GOP and she or he saved her distance from Donald Trump, who was unpopular with many Utah voters, whereas he was working for president forward of the 2016 election.
In 2016, dealing with reelection and following the discharge of a 2005 recording through which Trump made lewd feedback about groping ladies, Love skipped the Republican Nationwide Conference and launched an announcement saying definitively that she wouldn’t vote for Trump. She as a substitute endorsed Texas Sen. Ted Cruz within the GOP race, however he dropped out months later.
Whereas in search of a 3rd time period in 2018, Love tried to separate herself Trump on commerce and immigration whereas nonetheless backing her social gathering’s positions on tax cuts. Regardless of Republican voters outnumbering Democrats by a virtually three-to-one margin in her district, although, she misplaced by fewer than 700 votes to former Salt Lake Metropolis Mayor Ben McAdams, a Democrat.
Trump known as out Love by title in a information convention the morning after she misplaced, the place he additionally bashed different Republicans who didn’t totally embrace him.
“Mia Love gave me no love, and she or he misplaced,” Trump stated. “Too unhealthy. Sorry about that, Mia.”
After her loss, Love served as a political commentator on CNN and as a fellow on the University of Sydney.
Following Trump’s election in November, Love stated she was “OK with the end result.”
“Sure, Trump says a whole lot of thoughtless issues which are unlucky and unimaginable to defend. Nonetheless, his insurance policies have a excessive likelihood of benefiting all People,” Love wrote in a social media publish.
