He did that on Monday at a news conference at Portland Public Library, where Mills appeared in the room on cue after he announced that he would help the Democrat win “in every way I can,” saying it was “abundantly clear” that Mills was the best candidate to unite Maine.

“I am not going to win this race,” he said. “Janet is going to win this race.”

Caron’s run for the Blaine House included an ambitious and detailed economic plan that involved transitioning the state to complete energy independence over the next 30 years, slashing government spending by 10 percent, and establishing a two-year loan plan for college and university students that could be forgiven incrementally each year a student chose to stay and work in Maine after graduating.

However, his candidacy never caught on. He pulled back in the final weeks of the race without running TV ads after he and his wife, Kristina Egan, made $725,000 available for the run. Caron’s name will appear on the ballot, but on Monday he told Secretary of State Matt Dunlap’s office that he would file a withdrawal notice with the state, which would notify voters at polling places that he withdrew and count any ballots cast for him as blank.

The most recent public poll of the race showed Caron with 2.3 percent of the vote, badly trailing Mills and Republican businessman Shawn Moody. The other independent in the race, State Treasurer Terry Hayes, also polled in single digits, although she was faring better than Caron.

Hayes, who is also a former Democrat, has been courting Republican and Democratic voters at different times during her race, but she has vowed to stay in until the end as Democrats have urged Caron and Hayes to drop out of the race, suggesting that the independents would siphon votes from Mills to potentially swing the outcome to Moody in a plurality race.