Former Republican Rep. Lou Barletta will be running to be Pennsylvania’s next governor.
Barletta, 65, announced his candidacy for the 2022 gubernatorial elections on social media Monday morning.
He served as mayor of the town of Hazleton, Pennsylvania, from 2000 to 2010 and then spent four terms in the House of Representatives before he lost a Senate bid in 2020, despite obtaining former President Donald Trump’s endorsement.
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In his announcement video, Barletta rebuked Gov. Tom Wolf, a Democrat, for his handling of the coronavirus. Wolf is not eligible to run for reelection again due to a two-term limit.
https://twitter.com/RepLouBarletta/status/1394249476508950532?s=20
“The Pennsylvania we all grew up with, the one we all knew just a few years ago, is slipping away from us. Our way of life changed dramatically during the pandemic,” Barletta said. “Look, everyone’s did. But here in Pennsylvania, it was made so much worse by politicians, politicians who weren’t just looking to stop a virus, but politicians hell-bent on trying to change who we are and how we live.”
“These politicians, and I’m talking about Gov. Wolf and the Harrisburg insiders, they had a disastrous response to the pandemic,” he added, before accusing him of having “blood on his hands for sentencing our seniors to die in nursing homes.”
Only one other Republican has entered the gubernatorial race: Joe Gale, a Montgomery County commissioner. Democratic Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro is also expected to join the field.
Barletta’s relationship with Trump could help him secure the nomination.
Ahead of Barletta’s unsuccessful senatorial challenge against Democrat Bob Casey, Trump visited Pennsylvania twice to campaign for one of the first members of Congress to endorse him during the 2016 GOP presidential primary.
Barletta would like the endorsement again.
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“I would love his endorsement, and I’m going to try to earn it,” Barletta told the Associated Press.
The former congressman echoed Trump’s dubious claims about the outcome of the 2020 election, telling the outlet in December that “there’s no question there was fraud” and, as a result, “no one knows” for sure who the legitimate winner is.
“Who can say for certain how much the election was changed to the difference that would have made? Nobody,” Barletta said, adding that he would consider signing election reform legislation limiting absentee voting because “I believe it’s ripe for fraud.”
