Report: Coleman drops out of National Republican Senatorial Committee race

Roll Call, the Capitol Hill newspaper, is reporting Sen. Norm Coleman has dropped his bid to become of the head of the NRSC

A source familiar with the private deliberations among GOP Senators believes that Coleman would have had the votes to beat (Sen. LeRoy) Cornyn, had his re-election bid concluded satisfactorily in advance of next week’s scheduled Senate Republican Conference leadership elections.

Al Franken made Coleman’s interest in the job part of his own campaign, noting that the group — like its Democrat counterpart — is responsible for the type of negative advertising that Coleman repudiated at one point during campaign.