Candidate who hoped to challenge Salinas in November ends campaign
The nonaffiliated Oregonian hoping to challenge Democratic U.S. Rep. Andrea Salinas in Oregon’s 6th Congressional District has ended his campaign.
Jason Faler, a combat veteran and former healthcare executive based in Tigard, announced Monday that his campaign won’t have enough signatures to qualify for the November ballot.
Unlike the major party candidates who paid a $100 fee to the Oregon secretary of state to run for Congress, nonaffiliated candidates have to collect signatures from 1% of the votes cast in their district during the last presidential election.
For Faler, that meant collecting about 3,500 valid signatures from registered voters in the Willamette Valley-based district and having them verified by the secretary of state before Aug. 25. Oregon law requires nonaffiliated voters to collect signatures or hold an assembly of electors, which would require Faler to gather signatures from more than 500 supporters in the same place at the same time.
With two weeks until the deadl…