By Sean Coit
PoliticsPA
sean@politicspa.com

Former state treasurer Barbara Hafer is officially out of the race for the 12th district seat held by John Murtha until his death in February.

Longtime Murtha aide Mark Critz first received the support 12th district Democrats over the weekend, and was subsequently endorsed by the Democratic state committee Monday evening.

Despite the party’s support for Critz, Hafer continued to attack the Democratic nominee, including in an interview with Politico only yesterday. “This is a flawed candidate that has a lot of ethical problems, and he’s going to have to answer to them,” Hafer said. “Someone can do opposition research and find a lot of skeletons in his closet.

The decision is a stark reversal for Hafer, who filed petitions to be placed on the primary ballot only Tuesday. Her campaign, like all the Democratic campaigns in the 12th District, had to scramble to receive enough signatures to be listed in the last few weeks.

UPDATED:

Capitolwire is reporting that Hafer would likely have been thrown off the primary ballot after gathering only 1,013 signatures — just 13 more than the minimum requirement.  She told the state Capitol news service that any challenge to remove her from the ballot would likely have been successful.

“We did file enough signatures, but we ran into some problems, and that could be a problem, if there was a challenge,” Hafer said.

Hafer’s statement is below:

“Today I am announcing I am withdrawing my petitions and will not be seeking the Democratic Party’s nomination for the U.S. House in Pennsylvania’s 12th congressional district.  We had a spirited campaign for who would make the best nominee in the special election, but in the spirit of Jack Murtha I believe now is not the time to continue this race.  I look forward to finding other ways to continue to serve the public and change this state and this country for the better.”