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Washington, D.C. — Alaska Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski on Thursday praised Mitt Romney for choosing to end his struggling presidential bid and allowing John McCain to try to unite the party.

“I have to admire Gov. Romney for making this decision,” Murkowski said. “I think it took some statesmanship for Romney to say, at this time, that it’s more important for us as Republicans to start working in a united way on our national campaign.”

Murkowski endorsed the former Massachusetts governor a week ago as the best choice to lead the country in what she described as “this time of economic uncertainty.”

On Thursday, Murkowski said she originally picked Romney for his strong support of Alaska issues, specifically opening the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling and efforts to get North Slope natural gas to consumers in the Lower 48.

“His support for ANWR meant a lot to me,” Murkowski said. “He was focused on the economy and understood that economic development might mean different things for a state like Alaska.”

Romney bowed out Thursday after losing 14 of 21 states Tuesday.

Romney, 61, said he was ending his campaign to allow Republicans to prepare for the general election in November.

Murkowski said she was surprised by Romney’s announcement.

“It was clear that the trend was going toward McCain, but it wasn’t over yet,” Murkowski said. “But Romney understands that if he steps aside it will allow Republicans to get behind McCain and work on those issues where we can be united.”

Romney’s decision leaves McCain as the likely Republican presidential nominee.

The four-time Arizona senator, who was denied the party’s nomination in 2000, has been an outspoken critic of opening ANWR and of the Alaska delegation’s aggressive use of congressional earmarks.

McCain, 71, was one of the first in Congress to use the term “bridges to nowhere” in reference to the proposed bridge between Gravina Island and Ketchikan and the Knik Arm Bridge near Anchorage.

McCain’s position on those and other Alaska issues often put him at loggerheads with the state’s delegation.

A spokeswoman for U.S. Rep. Don Young said the Alaska congressman had no comment on Romney’s decision to step aside or on likelihood of McCain winning the Republican nomination. Young has endorsed former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, saying Huckabee is the most qualified to be president. He has said Romney would make a good vice presidential candidate.

Young, in the past, has said he wouldn’t support McCain.

“I will never work for John McCain. Ever. I may support Hillary Clinton if he gets the nomination,” Young said at a meeting of the Palmer Rotary Club in 2006, according to account that year in the Anchorage Daily News.

Huckabee remains in the race but faces an almost impossible task of catching McCain, who already has 714 of the 1,191 delegates needed for the nomination. Huckabee has 181 delegates.

Romney had 286 delegates.

Alaska’s senior senator, Ted Stevens, also had little to say about Romney’s withdrawal from the campaign. But he said he would work with whomever was elected.

“I have always supported the Republican nominee for president and fully expect to do so again in this election,” Stevens said.

Asked by reporters whether conservatives would rally around McCain, Stevens said “they have nowhere else to go. He knows what he’s doing.”

Murkowski said ANWR would be an issue for McCain in Alaska but that she would support his nomination.

“McCain will be, I believe, the nominee and I will get behind him 110 percent,” she said.

“ANWR aside, there’s a lot of things about McCain that I think Alaskans will like,” Murkowski said. “We’ve always liked the maverick who can get along with both sides.”

Much will also depend on who the Democratic nominee is, Murkowski said.

“I believe Alaskans will be true to the trend they’ve shown in past elections — and that’s supporting the Republican candidate,” she said.