Local and vocal Never Trump Republican Ed Lyons wrote a fascinating and accidental expose of Charlie Baker’s otherwise under the radar SuperPac: Massachusetts Majority. For Ed Lyons, this PAC is a sign that Baker has taken the next step in his journey from infamous indifferencee to active resistance to the Trumpist takeover of his nominal party.
Lyons even views this PAC as proof that Baker is trying to create his own statewide third party, a prospect Lyons welcomes:
The rift between Baker’s donors and supporters and the MassGOP’s new leadership has made Massachusetts Majority necessary. Here’s how it works. Baker and those around him can vet candidates and decide who to support. The super PAC notices, and then it can help. The PAC has voter data, and has already done targeted mailings to help candidates. And there is an implicit platform or philosophy underpinning it all: Charlie Baker’s centrist governing philosophy. That platform, plus Baker’s donor network and his base of power — combined with Massachusetts Majority — add up to a political party, no matter how much people may claim it is absolutely, positively no such thing.
What Ed and I both find interesting about this new PAC controlled by Baker is that it is also donating heavily to Democrats.
The Democrats should be concerned as well, since Massachusetts Majority has also been supporting Democratic candidates. The Democratic Party does not have a lock on a majority of Massachusetts voters, and Massachusetts Majority may help non-progressive Democrats win without the backing of their party.
So who exactly is underwriting this PAC and what their political and financial interests might be? My own digging at OCPF has turned up a lot of construction and finance executives and their spouses. A Republican governor having his own campaign fund to influence municipal lawmakers in both parties is pretty unprecedented around here. It should be cause for concern for the Massachusetts Democratic Party and progressives across the state. Particularly those in urban areas.
So far the PAC has been most active in municipal elections:
In last week’s municipal elections it spent an unbelievable $267,000 on 15 candidates, of which 11 won. Four of the 11 candidates who won did so in close races.
The full list of candidates is here. Many of these names happen to be some of the same Democrats who endorsed Baker back in 2018. Now they are taking his money. David Bernstein seems to echo Lyons that Baker might be going fully independent of the GOP for his expected campaign for a third term in 2022.
While Bernstein and Lyons obsess over Baker and his relationship to the GOP, I find Baker’s deep political and now financial ties to prominent Democratic leaders more disconcerting.
I can tell you that Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno is a lunch-bucket Democrat who has exhibited tendencies to support Trump-like policies. He is very popular, but mediocre in effectiveness – his main asset is that he is a retail-level politician who knows exactly whose hands to shake, whose funerals to attend, and whose cause needs a donation (from his own campaign funds, obviously)
But ask anyone what he supports? No one knows. I don’t think even he does. They’ll just say “he really loves Springfield” – which is true, but hardly a position.
Sarno gained the ire of progressives when he invited Donald Trump to come to Springfield. or when he scheduled an appearance on Fox News (never ran) to decry flag burning at Hampshire College, or when he came out against the settlement of Somalians in Springfield, or when he sent his code enforcement department to give the white-glove treatment to a local church that was providing sanctuary to an undocumented immigrant.
Sarno is very much at home with the knuckle-dragging crowd that thinks that the way to solve homelessness is to be more cruel to the homeless and the way to solve crime is to be more cruel to the criminals – though I probably give him too much credit there, He frequently dog-whistles against “gang-bangers” and the “judges” who let them out of prison. He has implied that he thinks that people who are convicted of multiple (often petty) crimes should be locked up for good.
I think he supports that stuff because he thinks the public supports it (when really, it is just the cranky irate Facebook/internet commentators who love that stuff).
So I would say that Sarno is more likely politically Republican, but knows that he has to be a Democrat because he’s in Massachusetts.
The threadstarter suggests that there at least 15 self-identified “Democrats” for your last paragraph applies equally well.
I posted before I read the underlying article here. The article (or perhaps one of the comments) postulates that Baker represents a “progressive” vision of Republicanism (i.e. Rockerfeller Republican), describing the Trump crowd as more “Democratic” (meaning populist), but with the implication that they are reactionary, and perhaps not very outwardly reflective of policies (including being anti-tax).
In that context, then Baker’s attempt to perhaps craft a “new” Massachusetts Republican party doesn’t make a lot of sense, because he would be targeting the more “elitist” or “enlightened” (yet fiscally conservative) Democrats instead of the lower-brow Democrats who like or appreciate Trump.
He’s a DINO who has made very xenophobic statements and openly endorsed Republicans. He was not welcome at this year’s convention in his own city.
I always thought that the smartest thing Scott Brown could have done once elected was to have an epiphany and change parties. Had he done so, he’d still be a US senator, not that he’s anything to get exited about but he’s tall, good looking, and why not? I guess Baker feels the same way?
Baker and his band of merry Democratic Mayors have been around since his 2018 reelection, where several of them showed up in Bakers TV ads.
In terms of Baker bolting the party? First I think he loves the Governor’s job and would like another term. So if Trump (gulp) wins in 2020, I think Charlie could be concerned he’ll face to much anti-Trump headwind, bolts and runs as an Indy. If Trump loses, Charlie tries to reclaim the state party apparatus. If successful, he stays in the GOP. But if not successful in gaining control of the state party, after Trump is defeated…hmm, now that’s a pickle.
Either way, I hope the media and activists (calling into his monthly radio spot on Jim/Margery) get him to admit he won’t be voting for Trump again next fall.
Or he could run as a Democrat and suddenly this site will praise him like they did under eight years of Deval Patrick who was just as much an austerity minded governor who gave big tax breaks to big business while chronically under funding public services.
I think that’s more cynical than is merited, especially about this community.
I invite you to cite times when this site has so casually embraced a former Republican.