When Rep. Martin Olav Sabo, D-Minn., won the 5th Congressional District race Tuesday night, some asked him how many more terms he would serve and not about how it felt to win.

Despite forecasts of his victory prior to the election, he said he never felt comfortable taking the race for granted.

“I thought we were in good shape close to the election, to be honest,” he said. “But you still take it seriously – you take the election seriously.”

Sabo was elected to his 14th term in the U.S. Congress, winning 69 percent of the vote.

Sabo’s Republican opponent Daniel Mathias said that although he lost, he was proud of his campaign and would not change his techniques if he could do it over again. The only thing he said he would have liked was more money.

Mathias also lost against Sabo two years ago.

“Minneapolis is the most reliable democratic part of the state,” Mathias said.

Mathias said he might run again, but it’s too early to predict.

Julian Plamann, a University senior political science student who is a Republican, said Sabo’s name and money helped him win the election.

“I think that it has a lot to do with Sabo being in office for such a long time,” Plamann said.

Mathias’ lack of public service experience also might have hurt him, Plamann said.

Many University students who voted at De La Salle High School said they were not voting for 5th District candidates.

They said not enough attention was given to the U.S. congressional candidates.

“Really, I don’t know who the candidates even are or what they stand for,” University senior Lisa Stanwyck said.

In terms of advertising, Stanwyck said the 5th District candidates did not have the resources to compete with the presidential candidates. The lack of information caused Stanwyck to not vote for a 5th District candidate, she said.

Univerisity junior Leslie Clark said all the presidential hoopla distracted her from learning about the 5th District candidates.

“There was such a barrage of presidential ads that it was hard to pay attention to anything else,” she said.

Jeremie Berglin, who graduated from the University of Minnesota-Morris this spring, said he was voting for Sabo only because of his party.

“I know Sabo’s the incumbent, but that’s about it,” Berglin said.

Sabo said he is not sure what he will do first in his new term.

“We’ll get organized. But we still don’t know who the president is going to be,” he said. “That’s going to be very fundamental.”

Sabo also said he had no specific plans for higher education.

“You’d like me to promise lots of money but that’s going to be in the context of budgets,” he said. “I just don’t believe in dealing with one thing in isolation of others.”