Elijah Cummings, Baltimore Congressman and “friend of Bermuda”, has died at the age of 68.

The congressman died at Johns Hopkins Hospital from “complications concerning longstanding health challenges” yesterday.

Ewart Brown, former Premier, said: “Elijah Cummings was a friend, a fellow alumnus of Howard and a friend of Bermuda.

“He worked quietly to ward off the efforts of those who would make life more difficult for Bermuda insurance companies.

“He once told me that one of the reasons he attended Howard and eventually spent more than two decades in public service was that as a high-school student leader he had admired what the Howard students were doing in the late sixties.”

Dr Brown added: “America and his friends will miss him.”

Mr Cummings, a Howard University and University of Maryland graduate, practised law for 19 years before he was elected to Congress in 1996.

As a congressman he served on the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, the Select Committee on Benghazi and as chairman of the Congressional Black Congress.

Mr Cummings came to Bermuda in 1998 as the guest speaker at the 17th annual Labour Day Banquet.

In his presentation, Mr Cummings told the audience that the gap between the “haves and the have-nots” had grown across the world.

He said: “There is a reason why united we stand, divided we fall. And the last thing folk want to see is you all united.”

Mr Cummings also heaped praise on Jennifer Smith, the then leader of the Progressive Labour Party, in advance of the party’s historic election victory later that year.

He said: “When I was told that the leader of the party was a woman, and tough, and bad, I appreciated her and I know how special and unique that would be in America.”

Mr Cummings met multiple Bermuda premiers, including Dr Brown and Craig Cannonier.

Cummings was a formidable orator who advocated for the poor in his black-majority district, which encompasses a large portion of Baltimore.

Former President Barack Obama, whose 2008 presidential bid counted Cummings as an early supporter, said he and his wife, Michelle, were “heartbroken” by the loss of their friend.

“He showed us all not only the importance of checks and balances within our democracy, but also the necessity of good people stewarding it,” Obama said.

He described Cummings as “steely yet compassionate, principled, yet open to new perspectives”.