SALEM – State Sen. Ben Westlund has the signatures to qualify for the ballot, a handful of high-profile donors and polling data that suggests he’s got the support from as many as 10 percent of voters.

But he no longer has the confidence he can win.

So Thursday, Westlund, a Tumalo agribusinessman and cancer survivor, pulled the plug on his long-shot bid to become Oregon’s first independent governor since the Great Depression.

”When we first launched this thing, we understood it was a long and rocky road, and I was clear that I wasn’t running to play a spoiler role,” he said. ”But that’s what I see now as the most likely outcome.”

He said the withdrawal won’t end his efforts to strengthen the state’s political center – and to advocate for goals such as improving access to health care, boosting literacy, enacting civil unions for same-sex couples and reforming the state’s fiscal structure.

His fiscal reform package includes one of Oregon’s most controversial issues: a sales tax.

”We have invigorated Oregonians from all walks of life to hold their government accountable to find – as John Kennedy once said – not the Democratic answer, not the Republican answer, but the best answer,” he said in a press conference.

Westlund, who was first elected to the Legislature in 1997, is a political moderate whose support of tax measures and civil unions put him at odds with the Republican Party.

He announced in February his switch to independent status – saying it was time to put ”people above politics” – and his gubernatorial campaign.

Despite his Republican roots, his departure seems more likely to boost the re-election chances for Gov. Ted Kulongoski, a Democrat.

Westlund’s campaign themes are closer to those of Kulongoski than to Republican challenger Ron Saxton, and that led to speculation Westlund would siphon more votes away from the governor.

Kulongoski, who spent much of the summer tagging Westlund as ”just another Republican and out of step,” offered different sentiments Thursday.

”At every level this election cycle is about the direction of Oregon’s future, and on many of the most important issues Oregonians care about, Ben Westlund and I want to move the state in the same direction,” Kulongoski said in a written statement.

”Ben has been a partner over the years in the Legislature and he remains a critical partner in the State Senate in our effort to create affordable health care, energy independence and continue growing our economy to provide living wage jobs to the people of Oregon.”

Saxton, meanwhile, countered that Westlund’s candidacy was a reflection of discontent with the current administration.

”I appreciate the commitment Ben has shown to educating Oregonians about the need for change, the need for leaders who are willing to work in a bipartisan fashion and the need for a new governor – and I now look forward to having a debate about Oregon’s future with the governor.”

Even with Westlund out, the race will still be crowded with three minor-party candidates who could attract voters from both the political right and left.

Constitution Party nominee Mary Starrett, a former television morning show host, is a conservative who opposes abortion. Libertarian Richard Morley is a former state auditor who is pushing for greater spending restraint. And Joe Keating, the nominee of the Pacific Green Party, is running an anti-war and pro-environment campaign.

Jim Moore, political science professor at Pacific University in Forest Grove, said polls signaled that Westlund was attracting four votes away from Kulongoski for every one he attracted from Saxton.

”He would have hurt Kulongoski much more, with the caveat that the campaign season hadn’t really started,” he said.

It seems likely that Westlund would have been a magnet for voters turned off by what will be a ”nasty partisan battle” this fall, Moore said.

Yet that discontent hasn’t reached a point where a nonpartisan candidate like Westlund becomes a major statewide player, he said.

”There is a growing frustration, but not a critical mass,” he said.

Westlund had received the endorsement of an association of prison workers and of Gert Boyle, the chairwoman of Portland-based Columbia Sportswear.

State Rep. Gene Whisnant, R-Sunriver, said Thursday he was surprised to learn Westlund dropped out of the race.

The two logged time together in recent weeks at the Black Crater Fire in Sisters and at the Deschutes County Fair, and Westlund was optimistic and upbeat, Whisnant said.

Political analysts said Westlund would have fared better if this fall’s campaign gave voters a repeat matchup of the 2002 governor’s race, when Kulongoski narrowly beat state Republican Party Chairman Kevin Mannix.

But Saxton earned the Republican Party nomination instead.

Rumors were circulating in recent days that Westlund had slowed his fundraising, which had sparked speculation that he would not formally file the signatures to qualify for the ballot by the Aug. 31 deadline.

He collected more than 49,000, he said, so he is certain he’s got more than enough to reach the necessary threshold of 18,368.

And that’s even after names are tossed out as duplicates or – as the result of a new law passed in by the 2005 assembly to make it tougher for independents – disqualified because signatures don’t count if the person also voted in the Republican or Demo- cratic primary in May.

Westlund said that law put him at a competitive disadvantage because he couldn’t step-up signature gathering and verification until after the primary.

Essentially, while the two major party nominees took off running and were able to seek major endorsements and financing, he was stuck at the starting line because he had to wait to start processing signatures.

”The question was not about the issues but whether you can get on the ballot,” he said. ”That’s not an endorsement interview, that’s a political calculus interview.”

Westlund estimated a gubernatorial campaign would have cost at least $2.5 million to run, and said he would have tapped some of his family resources to augment his fundraising.

”It was not a question of were we able, it was a question of how large the resources would be,” he said.

Ultimately, the motivation to withdraw was not financial, he said, nor was it health-related.

He worried it would hurt his fledgling centrist movement if he played a spoiler role.

”There is too much that I want to do for the state of Oregon to be saddled with that legacy,” he said.

He said his statewide campaign will morph into a political effort that will get involved in ballot measure campaigns, and that he will keep speaking out about the need to reduce partisanship in state government.

He also signaled in his press conference that he would publicly endorse one of the other candidates at a later date, but later seemed to back away from that prospect.

Each voter should listen carefully to the remaining candidates and make an informed decision this fall, he said.

Westlund will fight two measures on the Nov. 7 ballot that would cut state funding, and support a proposal to expand the state’s prescription drug bulk-purchasing program, he said.

Asked whether he will join the Republican or Democratic party now that his independent campaign is history, he answered: ”Absolutely not.”

Although he will be a politician without a party, he does not expect to be weaker politically when he returns to the Senate in January.

Senate terms are four years long, so he didn’t jeopardize losing his seat with his gubernatorial bid. He would have to run for re-election in 2008, although he would be barred from doing so if a term limits measure succeeds on this fall’s ballot.

”I look forward as always to working with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle,” he said. ”I am who I am, and I have always charted an independent course.”