<Table> <Tr> <Td> </Td> <Td> This article needs additional citations for verification . Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources . Unsourced material may be challenged and removed . (August 2015) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) </Td> </Tr> </Table> <Tr> <Td> </Td> <Td> This article needs additional citations for verification . Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources . Unsourced material may be challenged and removed . (August 2015) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) </Td> </Tr> <P> The incumbent is the current holder of a political office . This term is usually used in reference to elections, in which races can often be defined as being between an incumbent and non-incumbent (s). For example, in the Hungarian presidential election, 2017, János Áder was the incumbent, because he had been the president in the term before the term for which the election sought to determine the president . A race without an incumbent is referred to as an open seat . </P> <P> The word "incumbent" is derived from the Latin verb incumbere, literally meaning "to lean or lay upon" with the present participle stem incumbent -, "leaning a variant of encumber, while encumber is derived from the root cumber, most appropriately defined: "To occupy obstructively or inconveniently; to block fill up with what hinders freedom of motion or action; to burden, load ." </P>

In an election what is the person who already holds an office