As we reported a while back, the special elections to fill the late Charlie Shannon’s state Senate seat will be on August 30 (primary) and September 27 (general). State rep. Pat Jehlen (D-Somerville) has announced the hiring of three staffers to run her campaign. From the press release:
Sean Carberry is a Democratic political strategist who recently served as a congressional campaign manager in New Hampshire. Prior to entering politics, he was a political journalist for WBUR, the Boston NPR station. Georgia Hollister Isman has run field programs for state and local races across the country including a recent Massachusetts State Senate special election. Last year she served as the Massachusetts volunteer coordinator for America Coming Together, and mobilized thousands of activists for the 2004 presidential election. Dan Cohen is a veteran of more than 25 campaigns around Massachusetts. Among Cohen’s victories last year was Carl Sciortino’s unexpected victory for State Representative in Somerville and Medford.
Carberry will be the campaign manager; Isman will be field director; and Cohen will be pollster/senior adviser.
The release contains a link to Jehlen’s website, www.patjehlen.org, but the site does not appear to have been updated in a while – in particular, there’s nothing on it about the special election. Well, it’s good for her newly-hired staff to have something to do.
In other news, there are rumors swirling that Somerville Mayor Joseph Curtatone’s sister Maria Curtatone will throw her hat into the ring, and that Somerville Alderman Sean O’Donovan’s bid for the seat may collapse before it ever got going. And there are scads of other local pols considering a run, including disgraced ex-Middlesex Register of Probate Robert Antonelli, who will presumably be running in hopes that not enough voters will remember that the Supreme Judicial Court threw him out of office in 1999 for abusing his authority in various ways.
The field is sounding suspiciously hack-ish.
Interesting that Curtatone’s sister may run, since I had heard Curtatone was putting together O’Donovan’s campaign. Dissension in the ranks?This shouldn’t distract us from Jehlen’s commanding popularity in Somerville. Whichever of the two of them ends up running, Jehlen’s voters will stay with her. Their rocky start certainly doesn’t bode well for any attempt to challenge her.(though these other candidates will probably add some extra voters to the mix).
When Maria Curtatone ran against incumbent Mayor Mike Capuano, she appeared clueless and ignorant. She also ran a campaign against immigrants, which is not smart in Somerville. I interviewed her for The Somerville Community News way back then — if she really decides to run, I’ll have to find that interview and post it somewhere.
Bob Antonelli wants in? Good grief who else is pondering a run…Andy Dick? Chris Eliot??This is hilarious anyone else out there recall his moribund 1990 primary campaign for Dick Kraus’ old senate seat?I do the man made no impression on the voters of Lexington Arlington and even his Native Woburn and he will do likewise and the same this time.He had his chance at te Registry and it blew it.
Maria Curtatone was anti-immigrant? I thought her parents didn’t even speak English. It might have been her in-laws or perhaps her mother was hard-of-hearing.
It looks like Winchester rep. Paul Casey is also in, according to the Somerville News. Talk about a free-for-all.
Yet another entrant. Geez, it’s getting tough to keep track.
Don’t forget Governor’s Councillor Mike Callahan of Medford. He is in. I think he and Casey will fight to be the moderate choice over the ulta liberal Jehlen. Callahan is good speaker but this is not governor’s council race. He may not be able to keep up pace and he doesn’t have grasp of issues and it will show. But he will be legitamate contender.I think any other of the other somerville candidates besides jehlen are not going to get far. But many will come out to vote against her. Believe it or not.In the end I think it will come down to Casey and Jehlen with Casey squeaking bye.
Don’t forget Governor’s Councillor Mike Callahan of Medford. He is in. I think he and Casey will fight to be the moderate choice over the ulta liberal Jehlen. Callahan is good speaker but this is not governor’s council race. He may not be able to keep up pace and he doesn’t have grasp of issues and it will show. But he will be legitamate contender.I think any other of the other somerville candidates besides jehlen are not going to get far. But many will come out to vote against her. Believe it or not.In the end I think it will come down to Casey and Jehlen with Casey squeaking bye.
The Somerville News pulled that story about Robert Publicover’s announcement off the site. Not that he would have been a viable candidate to begin with, but one wonders where the story came from. They seem to be jumping the gun on a lot of non-stories lately.
Sigh… not the kind of special election I look for…if Jehlen wins the state senate seat, then we need to find someone supportive of marriage equality to fill her seat…plus, this means one less vote in support of marriage equality when the amendment comes back up… luckily we don’t need a certain amount of votes to defeat the amendment to be a majority… just less than 101 votes (preferrably with a more comfortable margin than that, of course) that vote for it.Sigh… it never ends…
No one said it would be easy working for God.
we need to find someone supportive of marriage equality to fill her seat…In Somerville? I wouldn’t say that you have your work cut out for you. If Casey voted against gay marriage, the ideal case would be that he moves up to the Senate, realizes he’s representing an overall more liberal constituency, and switches his vote because “we’ve had a year of marriages and nothing bad has happened” but he really he doesn’t want to needlessly piss off anyone from one of the much larger population bases.I know, it’s a fantasy.In any case, should either Rep. win, the Con Con will be held before the special election to fill their seat in the House.
So you are a one issue voter, brittain?
Depends on how you define a “one issue voter.” You can make up scenarios where it’s a deciding factor for my vote, but it’s not the only thing I care about. Also, it’s only an issue for certain levels of government. I don’t intend to quiz my alderman about it, and while I think it’s nice that my mayor supports gay marriage, it has zilch to do with his job. Similarly, I don’t expect any Democrat running for President to support gay marriage, but I’d still vote for him. For state legislative candidates, it was a big issue last year and it will be a big issue this year. After that, no one’s going to care.Another factor is how much supporting gay marriage and gay rights in general correlates with other issues I support. So, yes and no. Does that answer your question?
Another thing: if I lived in Tim Toomey’s district, I would have voted for him over Avi Green based on his endorsements from the gay marriage groups. So, in the case of state legislative primaries at the current time, I’m a single-issue voter.
That’s a yes, i guess
In any case, should either Rep. win, the Con Con will be held before the special election to fill their seat in the House.=======================================Do you know that for an absolute fact?If not…======================================If Casey voted against gay marriage, the ideal case would be that he moves up to the Senate, realizes he’s representing an overall more liberal constituency, and switches his vote because “we’ve had a year of marriages and nothing bad has happened” but he really he doesn’t want to needlessly piss off anyone from one of the much larger population bases.=====================================sorry, but this doesn’t reassure me
I know that the election for the Senate seat isn’t until September 27th or thereabouts, and the Con Con is said to be taking place this fall. If one of the reps wins, the special election wouldn’t be until 2006.There’s really no point in worrying about the impact on the Constitutional Convention. Almost all outcomes for this election are either neutral or positive for gay marriage. We’ve got months to go before the race gets underway.
if you are counting in terms of one vote and the date of the con con is important, isn’t the date set by the Speaker of The House, or Senate President. And arent both of them with you on this. so the con on will be called at a date most advantage to gay marriage?
Travaglini gets to call the date and preside. DiMasi is with us, Travaglini not really, he’s still maybe looking for a compromise. They want this to come up at a time when it’s least likely to become a zoo, probably. In any event I read recently that Travaglini was looking to have the convention this fall.I don’t think the status of the House and Senate seats within this district has enough of an impact on the vote totals to influence the schedule.
Casey won’t be changing his vote on equal marriage if he goes to the Senate. I don’t think he’ll ever change. So, lets just work hard to elect Pat Jehlen to the Senate. It will be easy to fill her seat with a pro equal marriage candidate later.
I didn’t know much about Casey before this race began. But, some friends of mine met him when he was knocking on doors in Medford last week, and from what they said, I think he’ll be a real contender come August.