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Posted May 11, 2012, 1:40 pm

Dylan Smith TucsonSentinel.com

Sal Baldenegro is quitting the legislative race in the South Side LD2, he announced Friday afternoon. Baldenegro said he was ending his run for the state House to focus on his wife's CD1 congressional campaign.

"I have made the decision to leave in order to focus, 100%, on my wife Wenona Benally Baldenegro's historic congressional run," he said in an email.

Sal Baldenegro said he'd collected twice the signatures needed to qualify for the ballot, and enough $5 contributions to run as a Clean Elections candidate, but that he would nonetheless bow out.

"This is a critical time for our state and our country, and the people of Arizona have a very real chance to not only make history, by electing Wenona, but to bring to our our state the type of strong representation that we so badly need, at the federal level," he said.

Wenona Benally Baldenegro faces former U.S. Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick in the August primary in the 1st Congressional District, which stretches from Flagstaff down the eastern edge of Arizona to Oro Valley.

She would be the first Native American woman in Congress if she is elected.

Baldenegro's move leaves Andrea Dalessandro and Rosanna Gabaldon as the only Democrats seeking the two House seats in LD2.