John Kroger
SALEM, Ore. (Legal Newsline)-Oregon's Democratic nominee for attorney general has also won the Republican nomination, final election results show.
Democrat John Kroger, who handily won the Democratic nomination in Oregon's May 20 primary, also won the Republican nomination through write-ins, the state Elections Division said.
Since there was no official Republican candidate for attorney general, the secretary of state's office said they had to count the 13,043 write-in votes.
In the race for the Democratic nomination, Kroger beat out veteran state lawmaker Greg Macpherson, D-Lake Oswego, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.
In the write in count, he beat former Republican gubernatorial candidates Ron Saxton and Kevin Mannix.
"I am very pleased to win the Republican nomination. Winning this nomination shows that there is broad, bipartisan support for my agenda of tackling Oregon's meth crisis, improving consumer protection, and strengthening enforcement of our environmental laws," Kroger said in a statement.
Although Kroger, who teaches criminal law and jurisprudence at Portland's Lewis & Clark Law School,won both the Democratic and Republican nominations and is likely to be the Beaver State's next attorney general he could still face challenges from third party candidates.
In a post election interview with Legal Newsline, Kroger said he is taking nothing for granted, and plans to campaign hard for a general election win.
"We're going to fight very hard to wrap this up in November," he told LNL.
In his win against Macpherson, Kroger was backed by the state's largest labor unions: the Oregon Education Association, the AFL-CIO and the Service Employees International Union Locals 503 and 49.
From Legal Newsline: Reach reporter Chris Rizo by e-mail at chrisrizo@legalnewsline.com.