Peter Meijer, a Republican who voted to impeach Trump, is running for Senate

Peter Meijer, the one-term Republican congressman who lost his seat after voting to impeach President Donald J. Trump, has announced he is running for Senate in Michigan, entering a crowded primary in a key battleground goes.

“We are in dark and uncertain times, but we have been through worse,” Mr. Meijer said said in a statement announced his candidacy on Monday.

Mr. Meijer, an heir to the Meijer supermarket empire and an Army Reserve veteran who served in Iraq, joins a field that also includes Mike Rogers, another former representative who served seven terms in the House of Representatives and led the House Intelligence Committee, which announced his candidacy in September.

Also active in the Republican primaries James Craigformer chief of the Detroit Police Department; Nikki Snydera member of the State Board of Education; Dr. Sherry O’Donnell, a physician and former 2022 congressional candidate; Sharon Savagea former teacher; Ezra Scotta former Berrien County commissioner; Alexandria Taylora lawyer; J.D. Wilson, a technology consultant; And Michael Hoovera businessman.

The crowded Republican field reflects a party eager to make gains in Michigan after Democrats swept the state in 2022. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer handily won reelection that year, part of a political trifecta as Democrats gained full control of the state government. .

President Biden narrowly won in Michigan in 2020 and the state is considered a battleground in next year’s presidential election.

Mr. Meijer, 35, is vying for the seat of Senator Debbie Stabenow, a Democrat who announced this year that she would not seek another term in 2024. The race for the open seat is competitive, but leans toward the Democratsaccording to a projection by the Cook Political Report.

Ms. Stabenow’s retirement set off a frenzy among ambitious Michigan Democrats who are now seeking to succeed her.

Among them is Rep. Elissa Slotkin, a moderate and former CIA analyst who has earned a national profile and scored victories in several close races for her seat in the House of Representatives. Also in the running Nasser Beydoun, a businessman from Dearborn; Hill Harper, an author and actor; Leslie Lovea former state representative from Detroit; Pamela Pug, the chairman of the State Council of Education; and Zach Burns, an attorney and Ann Arbor resident.

Mr. Meijer was elected in 2020 to represent his Grand Rapids district. Just days after taking office, he was thrust into the national spotlight when he voted to impeach Mr. Trump on January 6, 2021, for incitement of insurrection.

Only two of the ten Republicans in the House of Representatives who voted to impeach Trump survived the retaliation from Republican voters that followed. Mr. Meijer narrowly lost his primary to a Trump-backed opponent, John Gibbs, who was backed by Democrats and who was defeated by his Democratic opponent in the general election.