MELISSA BLOCK, HOST:
The table was set last week for Kris Hart to declare his candidacy for the Republican nomination for governor of Pennsylvania. The 34-year-old entrepreneur had recently returned to his home state from Washington, D.C., where he had owned a neighborhood grocery store, worked on a Senate staff and started a program to help the homeless. What better time to run for office?
Hart planned his announcement for last Thursday, but then he got a call from a reporter - a public radio reporter, in fact. Dave Davies, of our member station WHYY in Philadelphia, had a question for the prospective candidate. What about the residency requirement? Oh, that.
Turns out, the Pennsylvania Constitution requires candidates running for governor to have lived in the Keystone state for a minimum of seven years before the election. Having moved back home just last month, Hart was way, way short. But you can't keep a would-be-Paul (ph) down. Kris Hart now says he's considering a run for the U.S. Senate from Pennsylvania, an office that does not have a prior residency requirement. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
