Ministry leader Victor Marx has won the Republican primary for governor of Colorado, NBC News projects, setting up a general election matchup with state Attorney General Phil Weiser, the Democratic nominee.

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Marx narrowly defeated Republican state Sen. Barb Kirkmeyer after a protracted count of the final votes following the June 30 primary. Marx took 39.9% of the GOP primary vote, while Kirkmeyer took 39.4%.

A third Republican candidate, state Rep. Scott Bottoms, finished a distant third.

Marx, a former Marine and the founder of an evangelical ministry, gained wider notice this year after a controversial interview.

Marx has long claimed that an abusive stepfather forced him to kill a man when he was only 7 years old.

The assertion resurfaced when Marx said in a May interview with NBC affiliate KUSA of Denver that he’d also possibly killed other people.

“I’ve been in other situations where, possibly, people or persons died as a result of me defending myself in other countries,” he said.

The reporter interviewing him asked: “Do you think that you’ve killed people as an adult?”

“Does it matter?” Marx responded.

It’s unclear whether Marx’s claims were referring to his time in the military.

Marx’s campaign website says he endured a troubled childhood — including being the victim of sexual abuse — before he turned his life around in the Marines.

He says his ​All Things Possible Ministries has rescued women and children held in captivity, including one particularly daring mission rescuing kidnapped girls from Islamic State territory.

Marx enters the general election as the underdog against Weiser as they vie to succeed term-limited Democratic Gov. Jared Polis. Colorado voters haven’t elected a Republican governor in more than two decades.

Weiser, a two-term state attorney general and former University of Colorado Law School dean, beat Sen. Michael Bennet in the Democratic primary in a campaign that centered on an anti-Trump and antiestablishment message.