Story highlights Donald Trump campaigned for John Kennedy

The seat has been considered safely Republican

(CNN) CNN projects Republican John Kennedy has won Saturday's US Senate runoff election in Louisiana.

According to preliminary votes from the Louisiana secretary of state, the vote count as of 10:30 p.m. ET was Kennedy with 64% of the vote, at 466,412, and Democrat Foster Campbell with 36%, at 266,673.

It was the final Senate race of the 2016 election cycle, and the seat had been considered safely Republican in the deep red Southern state. The Republicans now hold a slim majority of 52 seats in the Senate.

Saturday's contest comes after no one candidate captured a majority of the votes in November, a requirement of state law to avoid a runoff. The field originally had two dozen candidates including former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke

The top two vote finishers were Kennedy, the state treasurer, with 25% of the vote and Campbell, who had 17.5% of the vote.

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