enlarge Associated Press photo (left) and Derek Davis/Staff Photographer

Charlie Summers, left, and Chellie Pingree, both photographed last night, will face off in November for the 1st District congressional seat.

Chellie Pingree of North Haven handily won a hard fought six-way race Tuesday for the Democratic nomination in Maine’s 1st Congressional District.

With 84 percent of precincts counted, Pingree, a former Senate majority leader who later served as national president of Common Cause, had 44 percent of the vote while Adam Cote, a Portland lawyer and Iraq war veteran, had 29 percent.

Michael Brennan of Portland was third at 11 percent, followed by Ethan Strimling, a Portland state senator, also at 11 percent. York County District Attorney Mark Lawrence and Augusta pediatrician Steve Meister placed a distant fifth and sixth, respectively.

“We had five hard-working opponents. … It’s great, great to be the winner in that field,” Pingree said in a speech to supporters at the Porthole restaurant in Portland.

Pingree will face Republican Charlie Summers of Scarborough in the Nov. 4 general election. Summers, a former aide to Sen. Olympia Snowe, defeated Eliot businessman Dean Scontras with 60 percent of the vote, though his margin of victory was subject to change in late returns.

The 1st District seat is being vacated by Democratic Rep. Tom Allen, who is challenging Republican Sen. Susan Collins. The district includes much of southern, coastal and central Maine.

Partial Democratic returns showed that Pingree was leading in Cumberland, Knox, Sagadahoc and Kennebec counties, while Cote led in his native York County.

In a concession speech to supporters at Portland’s Eastland Park Hotel, Cote vowed to support and campaign for Pingree.

“She’s a fantastic candidate,” he said. “We had a phenomenal race. We shocked a lot of people.”Strimling also vowed to campaign for Pingree in November. “She will be a great standard-bearer for us,” he said.

Brennan, in comments made before the winner was determined, said he was proud of the campaign he ran. “We were outspent 5 to 1 by Chellie,” he said. “I think we’ve shown in this campaign that ideas do make a difference.”

Lawrence, who collected just 5 percent of the vote, said it had been a disappointing night, but added that Pingree would make a great member of Congress.“My view is that Democrats congealed behind one person,” Lawrence said.

The Democratic race began to shape up last year, when rumors about Allen’s Senate ambitions first emerged.

Over the course of the race, the six candidates raised a total of $3.86 million, according to the latest available totals from the Federal Election Commission.Pingree was the leading fundraiser, collecting $1.36 million, according to the latest finance reports. She was followed by Strimling at $613,000; Cote at $553,000; Lawrence with $445,000; Brennan at $243,000; and Meister with $108,000.

The contest came down to Pingree, a longtime party figure who lost a bid for the U.S. Senate to Collins in 2002, and Cote, a moderate who trumpeted his military service in Bosnia and Iraq but was assailed by opponents because of his stint as a member of the Republican Party.

Cote was initially seen as a long shot, but his campaign gained strength. In the race’s final days, Pingree, who was widely acknowledged as the front-runner, ran ads targeting Cote.

In his concession speech, Cote took satisfaction that many previously unenrolled voters joined the Democratic Party to vote in Tuesday’s primary.“This campaign brought a lot of people into the party,” he said.

Pingree’s message meshed more with the party’s liberal wing. On the campaign trail, she expressed support for a single-payer health care system, and vowed to vote to cut off funding for the Iraq war.

In her victory speech, Pingree said she will campaign to end the war in Iraq, move...