Big story from State House News:
SWIFT AIDE BACKS UP (MOST OF) REILLYS CLAIM ABOUT 9/11 ELECTION DECISION
By Jim OSullivan
STATE HOUSE NEWS SERVICE
STATE HOUSE, BOSTON, SEPT. 12, 2006 .Attorney General Thomas Reilly was with Acting Gov. Jane Swift in a blast-proof Framingham bunker on Sept. 11, 2001, when the issue of whether to move forward with that days special primary election, with the nation under attack, was decided.
While Swift is generally credited with determining that voters would go to polling places as usual, Reilly, now running for governor, said during a Democratic debate in Cambridge last week that he had ordered that it would go forward.
Reillys campaign backed off that assertion yesterday, acknowledging that the ultimate decision was Swifts. And Swifts chief of staff said today that Reilly did not give the final word for voting to continue, but credited him as the unsung hero, and said Reillys role has never been fully publicized.
To say he ordered the elections to go forward may not be the right interpretation, but he actually had a very significant role in moving those forward that has never really been reported or told, said Peter Forman, now head of the South Shore Chamber of Commerce and a former state representative and Plymouth County sheriff.
big stuff, especially considering some of the questions surrounding Reilly’s 9/11 claims made last Thursday.
alexwill says
anyone doubted the accuracy of the claim, but I found it hilarious that Reilly would brag about such a bad decision. I remember watching it and being like “Oh, that’s why Steve Lynch endorsed him!”