OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Republican James Lankford has won election to the open U.S. Senate seat in Oklahoma being vacated by Doctor Tom Coburn.
A two-term congressman from Edmond, Lankford topped Democrat Connie Johnson and independent Mark Beard in the race to fill the seat for the final two years of Coburn's term. Lankford will have to run again in 2016 for a full six-year term.
The 46-year-old Lankford is a longtime Baptist minister who spent more than a decade as director of Falls Creek, one of the largest Christian youth camps in the country with more than 50,000 attendees annually.
He was a political novice in 2010 when he won an open U.S. House seat. He then rose quickly among the leadership ranks.