Mehmet Oz, the celebrity physician and Republican Senate candidate in Pennsylvania known as Dr. Oz, said Thursday that he plans to renounce his Turkish citizenship if he wins the seat this fall.

“My dual citizenship has become a distraction in this campaign,” Oz, also a U.S. citizen who was born in Ohio, said in a statement from his campaign. “I maintained it to care for my ailing mother, but after several weeks of discussions with my family, I’m committing that before I am sworn in as the next U.S. Senator for Pennsylvania I will only be a U.S. citizen.”…

Dave McCormick, one of Oz’s chief rivals for the GOP nomination, had made the TV doctor’s dual citizenship an issue in the primary. Earlier Thursday, McCormick’s campaign hosted a conference call with Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, who raised concerns that Oz’s Turkish citizenship would limit his access to intelligence on foreign countries.

“My view is you need full access to all the intel that the intelligence agencies provide U.S. senators to do the job effectively,” Sullivan said on the call.