Baggage Claim: Cafero Won’t Run for Governor.

Oh Johnny! House Minority Leader Lawrence Cafero (R-Brown Rudnick) will take a walk on the race for the Republican nomination for governor, Daily Ructions has learned. Cafero will make an announcement today, though word of his decision, reached on a Caribbean vacation, is making its way around Republican circles.

Cafero was fatally damaged by his role in a federal criminal campaign finance scandal that included the Norwalk Republican’s video appearance in which he appeared to accept an illegal $5,000 cash contribution. It was returned and laundered into Republican campaign committees through stooge donors. Cafero denied knowledge of the scheme in a series of dramatic and shifting explanations.

The eleven-term House member’s dual role as legislator and lawyer at the Hartford office of law and lobbying firm Brown Rudnick has raised a series of questions about his judgment in the mingling of his public trust and private employment.