PennLive
PUBLISHED: JANUARY 8th, 2018
BY PAUL VIGNA

Joe Peters on Monday entered the Republican primary race for the open 11th Congressional District seat that U.S. Rep. Lou Barletta is vacating.

Peters is a former police officer, federal mafia prosecutor and top official in the White House Drug Czar’s office. His website says he’s pro-life and a lifelong member of the NRA.

Per his press release, Peters said: “The heroin-opioid crisis is consuming our society. Home grown terrorists have a grip on our communities. Police officers are being assassinated. And our vets are not being cared for when they return home. I’m running because Congress doesn’t need another businessman or another legislator … it needs someone who has been immersed in these problems their whole career.”

READ MORE: The crowded field that is the race for the 11th congressional district

Peters, 60, of Wyoming County, who hails from the northern end of the nine-county 11th District, also lived in the southern end of it, around Harrisburg and Carlisle, when he worked at the attorney general’s office as a spokesman and attended Dickinson School of Law where he earned his law degree. He ran unsuccessfully for the GOP nomination for attorney general in 2016 and in 2004, was the Republican nominee for auditor general.

He also graduated from King’s College in Wilkes-Barre.

Peters is the oldest of five children of Peg and former two-term Scranton Mayor Gene Peters and has a son, Max.