PHILADELPHIA — Senate candidate Sean Parnell suspended his campaign Monday, hours after a judge ruled against him in a custody battle that included allegations he had physically and verbally abused his wife and children.
“There is nothing more important to me than my children, and while I plan to ask the court to reconsider, I can’t continue with a Senate campaign,” Parnell said in a statement. “My focus right now is 100% on my children, and I want them to know I do not have any other priorities and will never stop fighting for them.”
His decision capped a rapid collapse for a candidate who, after being endorsed this summer by former President Donald Trump, was once viewed as the GOP front-runner in the nationally watched race to replace Pat Toomey.
The ruling Monday came after emotional testimony earlier this month that for the first time publicly aired his wife’s allegations of abuse and uncontrolled anger that led to the couple’s breakup. Judge James Arner said he concluded Parnell’s wife, Laurie Snell, was “the more credible witness” of the two and that Parnell had committed “some acts of abuse in the past.”
But the judge,said he did not believe Parnell had been abusive in the last three-and-a-half years. And he found that both parents were “equally capable of providing adequate physical safeguards and supervision of the children.”
In the end, the judge gave Snell primary physical custody and sole legal custody of the children, ages 8 to 12, and said Parnell will be allowed to have them three weekends a month. The parents until now had split custody.
Both parents were seeking primary custody in a private fight that drew national attention due to its potential impact on a critical race that could decide control of the Senate.
Riding Trump’s August endorsement, Parnell had been a leading GOP contender in the race to succeed Toomey.
But it quickly unraveled after rivals, and his wife, raised questions about his personal behavior. Parnell allies had hoped a favorable ruling in the custody case would help discredit the abuse accusations that he had denied under oath.
Snell, also under oath, had accused Parnell of choking her, pinning her down and screaming insults at her, and once leaving her on the side of a highway while she was pregnant with their first child. She also said he had violently struck their children while flying into rages.
In one incident, she said, he slapped one of the children so hard it left finger-shaped welt’s on the child’s back. Another time, she asserted, he punched a door in such a rage that it struck another child in the face, leaving a bruise.
Parnell flatly denied those incidents and cast himself as a loving, caring father.
Arner did not identify which of the abuse allegations he he believed were true, but said he believed Snell when she said Parnell violently struck their children.
“She could remember and describe the specific incidents about which she testified. She described many incidents. She provided factual details of each incident, including when they happened and what happened. She testified in a convincing manner,” Arner wrote.
By contrast, the judge wrote, Parnell was “somewhat evasive” and “less believable.”
“He was dressed very casually for his appearances in court, in blue jeans and untucked plaid shirts, which did not show respect for the seriousness of the occasion,” Arner wrote. “While testifying he looked mainly in the direction of this attorneys and toward members of the news media in the back of the courtroom, rather than at me.”
Still, Arner, a Clarion County judge brought in to oversee the case in Butler County, noted the time that passed since the incidents, and wrote that Parnell has “properly cared for the children” since then. He also noted that Snell’s agreement to allow Parnell significant time alone with the children, “indicates she does not view him as a threat of harm.”
Another major factor in the ruling, Arner wrote, is Parnell’s frequent travel because of his work as a public speaker, and additional travel required by his Senate campaign.
In a statement after the ruling, Snell’s lawyer said she was “grateful that justice prevailed” and she had been granted primary custody of the children. “She will continue, as always, to focus on their best interests,” said the lawyer, Jennifer Gilliland Vanasdale.
Pennsylvania’s U.S. Senate race is a nationally watched contest, one of a handful likely to determine control of the chamber. Parnell, a decorated veteran who received a Purple Heart after serving in Afghanistan, was a top GOP candidate after becoming a Trump favorite during an unsuccessful run for Congress last year.
