While most reorganization of state parties takes place following the election of state committee members on the presidential primary ballot, state law requires that chairpersons be elected following the November election. Presumably this is to avoid having a new chair take over in the middle of an election calendar. Incumbent Chair Gus Bickford is seeking re-election, but he has two challengers: Mike Lake, who sought our nominations for Auditor in 2010 and Lt. Governor in 2014; and Bob Massie, who was our nominee for Lt. Governor in 1994 and sought our nomination for Governor in 2018.
Please share widely!
Howard Parker says
Seems like an interesting race. Certainly one to watch closely.
bob-gardner says
A contest may shed light on the sketchy actions of the state party during the Richard Neal race.
Howard Parker says
This is about how they got that overblown story to spread about him right? Just trying to jog my memory.
Christopher says
It was overblown, but that was thanks to the Intercept and a couple of College Dems, not state party leadership.
bob-gardner says
A lot of incoherence in fewer than 20 words. The actual story is this: A few weeks before the primary, Richard Neal’s opponent was accused by some UMass students of being some kind of sexual predator. It is alleged that the students got help making this charge, from the state Democratic party.
From the information that has come out so far, it seems that the original story about Neal’s opponent was overblown to the point of being untrue–ie a smear.
The state party, I believe. has stopped commenting about their role, whatever it was, with the college Democrats. There seems a distinct
possibility that the state party leadership is hoping this story will blow over. But that’s not the same as overblown.
Christopher says
The students received some advice about how to address the issue from Jim Roosevelt, the party counsel. Nobody in party leadership was out to get Morse, certainly not for homophobic reasons. Would people prefer the state party not be responsive to the allegations? I blame the College Dem officer who wanted to help Neal and the Intercept which practiced some of the shoddiest journalism I have seen. This has been a textbook case of innuendo, second-guessing, anonymous sources, inappropriate leaks, jumping to conclusions, and intramural politics of the worst sort. Count me among those who hopes this blows over and believes the mountain/molehill ratio is pretty extreme on this one. It’s fine to say you may have handled it differently, but I’m absolutely confident that party leadership acted good faith and am not convinced ignoring the allegation is a preferable option. FWIW, I also don’t believe there is anything to the allegations against Morse. The best result would be to create a clear policy about how to handle similar situations in the future.
bob-gardner says
Christopher, you seem to have no direct knowledge of what happened, but are brimming with confidence about the party leadership.
After the election, airing the facts about this entire incident should be a priority for anyone seeking to lead the state party.
I’ll take the journalism of the Intercept over your faith-based wish that the whole thing would just go away.
SomervilleTom says
Bob, I hope you’ll share your direct and first-hand knowledge of what happened. You’re the one making the accusations here — or perhaps “snide insinuations” is more accurate. The onus is therefore on you to share the basis for your caustic comments.
What is your direct knowledge of what happened?
bob-gardner says
My accusation is that state party officials had some involvement in the smearing of Richard Neal’s primary opponent. That it was a smear seems to be generally agreed on at this point.
That smear did a lot of damage to the challenger, Morse. It also, I would guess, effectively ruined whatever careers the UMass College Democrats had.
We know that state party officials had some role in this. All I’m asking is that there is a clear transparent explanation at some point. What’s your problem, Tom?
Christopher says
Only to advise how to handle it. They did not themselves smear Morse nor encourage others to do so. There is an investigation which I see as entirely unnecessary.
SomervilleTom says
Do you have “direct knowledge of what happened” to support your accusation? You haven’t yet cited that knowledge if so. You are “brimming with confidence” that you know what those state party officials did, yet you haven’t offered even a claim of direct knowledge.
My “problem” is that you are once again holding others — in this case Christopher — to a standard that you don’t come close to meeting yourself.
You harshly attacked Christopher for speaking without “direct knowledge”, yet as far as I can tell you’ve got even less knowledge about what happened than Christopher.
I share Christopher’s assessment that this is a nothing-burger — yet another red-herring tossed into an unrelated thread by you.
bob-gardner says
I want an explanation because I don’t know exactly what happened between the UMass College Democrats and the state party. Neither do you.
Christopher claims to know that nothing untoward happened. Why?
And you share Christopher’s assessment, based on what?
There is a world of difference between asking for a full explanation and demanding that nobody ask any questions because you have inside information and know the answer.
SomervilleTom says
I share Christopher’s assessment that whatever did or did not happen is not worth worrying about.
That’s not how I read his commentary. I read his commentary to mean that the shoddy journalism of The Intercept obscures more than it reveals. Christopher describes the investigation that the Party has begun, and expresses a personal opinion about its importance.
Christopher’s opinion may differ from yours. His opinion not infrequently differs from mine. That’s why sites like BMG exist.
I see no evidence that Christopher “demanded” that “nobody ask any questions”, nor do I say any claims that he has “inside information” or “knows the answer”.
What I see instead is that Christopher has a different opinion than you about this matter.
Christopher says
Which is why I haven’t blabbed to the press like the Intercept’s “sources”. I do have direct knowledge of how state party leadership operates and their scruples. Even a careful read of the Intercept’s reporting shows which parts stand up to scrutiny and which don’t.
Pablo says
I was hoping we would get a coupon for a free breakfast at Bickford’s when we paid to attend the state convention. Buy a convention seat, get a free omelette!
Even without the omelette, I haven’t seen much from Gus Bickford that makes me want my state party folks to re-elect him. My instinct is that Massie would probably do more to more the party forward.
Christopher says
He has been a very good chair, both operationally and politically.
Pablo says
In what way? I haven’t noticed much of anything around my part of the world (Fourth Middlesex senate district) with the exception of one meeting in Lexington (at the beginning of his term) and the worst possible seats at the Democratic State Convention in 2018.
Christopher says
He has done a much better job at communication than previously and we have had a very good track record of recruiting candidates and flipping seats. The conventions have been well-run for the most part both IMO and the consensus I’ve heard from delegates, compared to previously. I’m sure there’s always room for improvement on all counts, but Gus has definitely steered the party in the right direction.
Pablo says
You mean, like the 2018 race for governor?
SomervilleTom says
Do you blame Gus Bickford for the 2018 outcome?
What, specifically, do you think Mr. Bickford should have done and failed to do? Is there someone else who you think would do better?
I get that you’re unhappy with the 2018 outcome — so am I. I also get that you’re unhappy with the role that official state Democratic Party organization plays in state politics — so am I.
You apparently see this as a personal failing of Mr. Bickford, and so you apparently feel that simply replacing Mr. Bickford with some unspecified different figure would change whatever it is that you’re unhappy about.
I see the 2018 outcome as emblematic of a failure of the values and priorities — the culture — of the state organization. I’ve written here before that I think the “Democratic” brand is at best meaningless and at worst downright deceptive here in MA. I think that changing the top of the organization chart without changing the organization is just one more meaningless bit of churn.
This, by the way, is the same reason why I oppose term limits.
I think that when an organization is broken, then the organization must be fixed. I think that sometimes the repair is best led by somebody already in and familiar with the organization — and sometimes the repair is best led by an outsider with no stake in the current organization.
I think the challenging part of the task is to identify and enumerate the aspects of the organization that need to change. I think that the selection of how to carry out that change can only be done AFTER the needed change is understood.
It sounds to me as though you’re advocating the following venerable strategy so often advocated by passionate advocates of “change”:
I’ve seen that strategy pursued countless times. I’ve yet to see it accomplish the desired outcome.
Christopher says
Running against Baker in 2018 was always going to be like running against Weld in 1994 or Reagan in 1984. Sometimes when an incumbent comes across as a decent and competent person there’s not much you can do. I was referring to legislative flips, which I suspect we will add to next week.
Ryan says
After what happened in the Neal/Morse race. Bickford needs to go.
The state party had no business being involved in this at any capacity. Not to “advise” College Dems helping Neal, or anything else.
There should be zero involvement in any primary. Homophobia spread because of the actions taken in this campaign.
Whether this failure was by design or ineptitude, it is a failure nonetheless. Bickfford should have resigned.
Christopher says
The alternative was to ignore the allegations which would almost certainly prompt complaints and possibly accusations of hypocrisy. Gus acted in good faith and certainly not from homophobic motivations. This was blown out of all proportion and the Intercept’s reporting on this is about as credible as the New York Post’s about Hunter Biden’s laptop.
Ryan says
The choices for the state party were a binary do exactly what they did, or do nothing?
Nah.
The state party didn’t even try to have a serious, independent investigation of what happened before taking actions. This is especially significant in a case where no specific allegations were made — just innuendo, innuendo that was backpedaled so fast and hard I felt whiplash.
Independent investigations are the *bare minimum* for acting in good faith.
Homophobic whisper campaigns are a danger to all LGBTQ people. This is not “blown out of proportion.”
Far from it.
All allegations should be taken seriously and investigated, but no one’s an “ally” if they bury LGBTQ people at mere whispers and innuendo.
Christopher says
I agree about the innuendo part and felt the same whiplash you did for the same reasons. What it seems the party leadership did is advise on how to proceed while deliberately not weighing in on the merits. There are those who would complain if they did investigate and some would call it meddling. Maybe your idea to address it would make sense and reasonable people can disagree on the best course of action. I hope this leads to a policy for addressing similar allegations in the future. However, the objectionable part to me is what I see as a knee-jerk off-with-their-heads attitude toward party leadership. The College Dems are the ones most to blame for the whisper campaign, along with the Intercept for making it louder than whispers.
BTW, I never found the accusations against Morse credible, but also motivated more by politics than homophobia. We never heard from the supposed victims of his alleged behavior as far as I know, but the CD leader wanted to get in good with Neal. However, it would be just as easy to level such a charge against a young straight man vis-a-vis female students and the idea that anyone involved is homophobic just doesn’t pass the smell test.