“At this point, given sort of the landscape, my father advised me to not reconstitute this campaign, which when I really look at it, it would be best to do,” Ngalamulume said.

Earlier in the day, Ngalamulume said he intended to face off against incumbent Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Brighton, after the unofficial results of yesterday’s primaries and feedback from his supporters.

According to unofficial results, Ngalamulume had 26,341 votes.

Ngalamulume said his father is traveling in the south of France, and when he finally had a chance to talk to him Wednesday afternoon after his reentrance announcement, his father convinced him that it would not be a fair fight against Rogers.

“I’m at such a great disadvantage,” he said.

Ngalamulume said he plans to take the next steps to become a registered voter in Philadelphia — his previous city of residence — in order to remove his name from the Democratic ballot.

Once he becomes registered as a resident of another state, a special statute kicks in which creates a committee of the county chairs, treasurers and secretaries from the five counties within the 8th district to choose the next candidate, said Judy Daubenmier, Livingston County’s Democratic Party chair.

Aside from Livingston County, the 8th district includes Clinton, Ingham, Oakland and Shiawassee counties.

“There’s no particular time line, but of course you want to do it as soon as possible,” Daubenmier said.

Both the announcement that Ngalamulume reentered, and then withdrew again, left Lance Enderle, a 41-year-old East Lansing resident and MSU graduate student, speechless. After Ngalamulume dropped out in June, Enderle led an unsuccessful two-month campaign as a Democratic write-in candidate for Tuesday’s primaries.

“I don’t know what to make of it,” Enderle said.

Although Daubenmier could not speak for the other four counties, Enderle is the only person who has approached her with interest in being added to the ballot if Ngalamulume were to register in another state and negate his candidacy in Michigan.

“He will be considered, assuming he wants to be considered,” Daubenmier said. “We haven’t had any sort of organizational meeting to talk about what will happen.”

The Nov. 2 election will be historically important because of the current difficulty in finding jobs, Rogers said in an e-mail statement. He did not address Ngalamulume’s situation specifically.

“I am looking forward to laying out my solutions for getting government out of the way, so small businesses can create jobs and get Michigan families back to work,” Rogers said.

Prior to Ngalamulume’s second withdrawal, Bill Ballenger, editor and publisher of political newsletter Inside Michigan Politics, said Ngalamulume’s decision to restart the campaign was a “joke” and would not impact the race. Ballenger foresees Rogers having winning in November.

“(The Democrats) have just fumbled this and botched it from beginning to end,” he said.