Biography:

Elijah E. Cummings is a native of South Carolina and a longtime resident of Baltimore. Cummings graduated from Baltimore City College, a high school in the city, and received a bachelor's degree from Howard University in Washington in 1973. He received a law degree from the University of Maryland School of Law in 1976 and was admitted to the state bar that same year. Cummings operated his own law practice in Baltimore.

In 1982, he won his first election, taking a seat in the Maryland House of Delegates.

Cummings has two daughters from a previous marriage.

Past Campaigns:

Elijah Cummings won his first race for elected office in 1982, when he replaced Lena K. Lee in the Maryland's House of Delegates. He won re-election in 1986, 1990 and 1994.

He was elected to the U.S. House in an April 1996 special election to serve the remainder of Democratic Rep Kweisi Mfume's term after Mfume resigned to take over the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

Faced with a field of 27 Democrats vying to replace Mfume in the overwhelmingly Democratic congressional district, Cummings raised nearly $250,000, far outdistancing his opponents, and staged an 11th hour media blitz that saw him easily beat the rest of the competition, including the Rev. Frank Reid III, the stepbrother of Baltimore Mayor Kurt Schmoke.

Cummings defeated Republican Kenneth Kondner with 81 percent of the vote. In the November 1996 general election, Cummings defeated Kondner again, this time with 83 percent of the vote.

Cummings was re-elected in 1998 with 86 percent of the vote and in 2000 with 87 percent of the vote.

In 2002, he won re-election with 74 percent of the vote. Cummings defeated Charles McPeek in the 2004 primary with 91.4 percent of the vote.

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