Ruth Fortune secured a spot on the Democratic primary ballot for Connecticut’s 1st Congressional District on Monday, making it a four-way contest for the seat held by longtime U.S. Rep. John B. Larson.

After failing to make the ballot at last month’s nominating convention — the more traditional route — Fortune pulled off the logistically challenging feat of qualifying for the ballot through the petition process. She becomes the first person to qualify via petitioning for a primary challenge against an incumbent member of Congress from Connecticut.

The Hartford Board of Education member went around the 27 towns and cities of the 1st District to collect the 3,743 signatures to qualify, which is 2% of Democrats registered in the district. To boost her chances, her campaign had said it collected about double of what was needed. A spokesman for the Secretary of the State’s office did not have details Monday night but said Fortune had qualified.

Petitioning onto a ballot is a rarely successful endeavor because of Connecticut’s more restrictive ballot access laws. Fortune said she needed the “perfect storm for me to get this right.” She said her work as an attorney and the time she had allowed her to pull it off. But she doesn’t believe it should be this hard for future candidates, especially since most people don’t have “the privilege of being out sometimes 14 hours a day to get signatures.”

“All of these skills have prepared me for this,” Fortune said in an interview on Monday night. “Someone shouldn’t need all of these skills to get on the ballot.”

She said she hopes state legislators will take up ballot access laws in the next General Assembly session, and on the federal level, she wants Congress to focus on raising the federal minimum wage and tackle comprehensive immigration reform. Fortune came to the U.S. from Haiti as a young immigrant who was undocumented for a decade.

“It’s a big deal for Connecticut,” Fortune said. “I was the first person to enter this race particularly because I felt a lot of that engagement wasn’t being done.”

Four candidates are now on the ballot for the Democratic nomination on Aug. 11. Fortune joins Larson, former Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin and state Rep. Jillian Gilchrest of West Hartford on the ballot.

Larson, Bronin and Gilchrest all qualified at last month’s convention, where they needed to secure support from at least 15% of local delegates. Bronin pulled off an upset by getting majority support on the second ballot. That earned him the party endorsement, and his name will appear first on the primary ballot.

In a statement, Larson congratulated Fortune on making the ballot and widening the field. But he once again trained his fire on his main primary opponent, who has been at the center of most of his attacks.

“John Larson congratulates Ms. Fortune and welcomes her onto the ballot. With four candidates in the race, Rep. Larson will continue communicating with voters about his record fighting for working people and delivering for Connecticut,” Larson spokesperson Bee Ungar said in a statement. “Voters will also learn more about Luke Bronin’s record and his deep support from a billionaire network trying to buy this seat for a corporate Democrat.”

Larson had been complimentary of Fortune’s efforts while she was still gathering signatures ahead of the deadline. When asked at the time how a larger field would affect the race and if it helps an incumbent, he said, “it depends,” but he agreed that historically more candidates in the race tends to bode well for sitting members.

“The question then becomes — there’s three progressives and one moderate, so is it the progressives that divide up the vote? Or is it the anti-incumbent that divides the vote? So it’s kind of a mixed bag,” Larson said in an interview from Washington, D.C., earlier this month.

Gilchrest also congratulated Fortune. The two have struggled to raise the same levels of funds as Bronin and Larson and have bemoaned a political system that prioritizes big fundraisers. She has regularly called for campaign finance reform and public financing for federal races.

“Ruth earned her spot. It’s a refreshing contrast to the men in the race who bought their way to the front of the line,” Gilchrest said. “The wealthy are trying to pick our candidates for us. Voters deserve a choice.”

Bronin’s campaign argued that the larger primary field reflects voters’ desire for generational change for the first time in a few decades.

“People know it’s time for a change, and for the first time in almost 30 years, we have a choice,” Bronin’s campaign manager Akash Kaza said in a statement. “Luke is focused on one thing only: doing everything possible, every single day, to reach as many voters as possible and make the case that the Democratic Party needs to bring some new energy to the fight.”

Whoever wins the primary will be virtually guaranteed the Hartford-based seat since it’s a heavily blue district.

But Fortune hopes that more options on the ballot will create better candidates and provide voters with more engagement.

“Four of us going to voters … will engage people in all different ways,” Fortune said, arguing that a lack of competition across Connecticut doesn’t push lawmakers in “making new conversations happen.”

“When we are competitive, we will see that from them.”