Rep. Danny K. Davis on Friday dropped out of Chicago's mayoral race and threw his support behind Carol Moseley Braun.
"In unity there is strength. In strength there is success," he said, adding that he wasn't "dropping out of the race, but dropping into victory for Carol Mosely Braun."
His departure comes a little more than a week after Sen. James Meeks bowed out, and just days after the Rev. Jesse Jackson met with Davis and Moseley Braun to talk one of them into stepping aside.
The impetus? Improving the chances that an African American will be elected as Chicago's next chief executive.
"They know it's going to be difficult to get two candidates through the race. There will be two losers and no winner," Jackson said, according to the Chicago Tribune. "It's difficult to get one camel through the eye of the needle. It's impossible to get two."
Both Meeks and Moseley Braun were on-hand at Davis' announcement.
"We're here to stress unity. Unity is something our community desperately needs," said Meeks.
Moseley Braun earlier this week shrugged off any calls for her to drop out and the notion that her ethnicity was important.
"People don't just vote based on the color of their skin. People vote based on their interests, and I believe that I am speaking to the interests of all of Chicago," she said Wednesday. "The people of Chicago will give us a consensus candidate."
The other African-Americans still on the ballot include activist Patricia Van Pelt Watkins and community activist William "Dock" Walls.
Reaction from other candidates was swift:
