Brown Out

According to the Boston Herald, Brown will not run for Senate in the special election to succeed John Kerry. Massachusetts holds their gubernatorial election in 2014. UPDATE: Brown confirms.

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REUTERS/Jessica Rinaldi

Senator Scott Brown (R-MA) gestures as he addresses supporters during a campaign rally in Wakefield, Massachusetts November 1, 2012.

The Boston Herald has reported that former Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown will not run for Senate in the special election to succeed John Kerry, opening up the possibility that he may run for governor next year.  The newspaper has cited “a source close to the senator.” Two days ago the Boston Herald wrote that Brown was “leaning strongly” towards reclaiming a Senate seat, again citing unnamed sources.  If Brown did run, that would be his third Senate race since 2010, with a fourth campaign coming up in 2014.

If Brown refuses to run the race for Massachusetts Senate, Democratic Reps. Ed Markey and Stephen Lynch look to be the frontrunners.  The special primary will be on April 30; the special general election will be on June 25.  In the interim, Mo Cowan, Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick’s ex-Chief of Staff, will temporarily hold the vacated seat.

UPDATE: Here is Brown’s full statement on why he has decided not to run:

Representing Massachusetts in the United States Senate was the greatest privilege of my life, an experience that takes second place only to my marriage to Gail and the birth of our daughters. It was a higher honor than I had ever expected, and in the time given to me I always tried to make the most of it.

When I was first sent to the Senate in early 2010, it wasn’t exactly welcome news for President Obama or many other Democrats. Yet among my best memories from those three years in office are visits to the White House to see the President sign into law bills that I had sponsored. I left office last month on the best of terms with colleagues both Republican and Democrat. I had worked well with so many of them, regardless of party, to serve the public interest just as we are all supposed to. All of this was in keeping with the pledge I made at the beginning to do my own thinking and to speak for the independent spirit of our great state.

Over these past few weeks I have given serious thought about the possibility of running again, as events have created another vacancy requiring another special election. I have received a lot of encouragement from friends and supporters to become a candidate, and my competitive instincts were leading in the same direction.

Even so, I was not at all certain that a third Senate campaign in less than four years, and the prospect of returning to a Congress even more partisan than the one I left, was really the best way for me to continue in public service at this time. And I know it’s not the only way for me to advance the ideals and causes that matter most to me. That is why I am announcing today that I will not be a candidate for the United States Senate in the upcoming special election.