Signaling that its first attempt to boot Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. George Gascón from office was all but certain to fall short, the campaign seeking the progressive prosecutor’s recall said Thursday it would relaunch its efforts later this year.

The campaign — which struggled to attract financial support or collect enough signatures after an initial burst of enthusiasm in May — issued a statement Thursday morning announcing it would launch a new recall committee later this year in order to “restart the petition gathering effort and timeline.”

The group, which needed to collect the signatures of approximately 580,000 L.A. County voters by Oct. 26 to force Gascón into a recall election, had compiled just 200,000 with a little over five weeks before the deadline, according to a campaign spokesman.

In a statement, the committee tried to brand the decision as a strategic maneuver rather than a defeat.

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