In the cobalt blue states of Massachusetts and Rhode Island, it was a great election day for incumbents, almost all of them Democrats.
The exception for Republicans was the expected and overwhelming victory of the moderate, anti-Donald Trump Gov. Charlie Baker. Liberal Democratic U.S. Sens. Elizabeth Warren in Massachusetts and Sheldon Whitehouse in Rhode Island cruised to easy victories over more conservative Republicans. Warren heads into her second term and Whitehouse won a third term. The congressional delegations in both states remained firmly in Democratic hands.
With Democrats projected to take back the U.S. House of Representatives, Democrats in the Massachusetts and Rhode Island delegations will have more clout.
In Rhode Island, progressive Democrats continued to make inroads in the General Assembly, particularly in the House, where House Speaker Nick Mattiello, D-Cranston fended off a vigorous challenge from Republican Steve Frias to win reelection in his western Cranston district. Mattiello is expected to call a Democratic caucus Thursday night to seal his victory and reclaim the speakership, Rhode Island’s most powerful legislative post.
The progressive victories mean that the number of women in the Rhode Island Assembly will increase from 36 to 46 in the legislature that convenes in January.
“Today’s results prove that a $15 hour minimum wage, protecting a woman’s right to choose and Medicare for all are mainstream values in Rhode Island and good politics all around,” Said Georgia Hollister Isman, state director of the Rhode Island Working Families Party, a progressive group.
For Rhode Island Republicans, it was a dismal election evening. The party’s gubernatorial candidate, Cranston Mayor Allan Fung, went down to defeat and no Republican won a statewide office. State GOP Chairman Brandon Bell lost his quest for a state representative seat in Cumberaland. Republican incumbents Antonio Giarusso of East Greenwich, Robert Lancia of Cranston and Ken Mendonca of Portsmouth all went down to defeat. And Republicans failed to keep the seat vacated by former House Minority Leader Patricia Morgan of West Warwick. Morgan left the seat to run unsuccessfully for the GOP gubernatorial nomination.
One Democratic state rep who lost was Cale Keable of Burrillville. Keable was chairman of the influential House Judiciary Committee but he was accused of sexual harassment by an East Providence Democratic colleague, Rep. Katherine Kazarian. Republican David Place replaces Keable. Another bright spot for Republicans on a dim night was a victory in a state Senate seat in North Smithfield and Burrillville, where newcomer Jessica Dela Cruz won the seat vacated by Democrat Paul Fogarty.
“Today’s results prove that a $15 hour minimum wage, protecting a woman’s right to choose and Medicare for all are mainstream values in Rhode Island and good politics all around.”
But it was a Democratic sweep in major Rhode Island races, including the Providence mayoral contest, where incumbent Jorge Elorza crushed independent Dianne “Dee Dee” Witman. Witman outspent Elorza but in debates and public appearances appeared woefully unprepared for questions on specific policies. At times she was reduced to saying little more than pledge to work cooperatively with the business and political community to try to solve problems.
In Warwick, Democrat Joseph Solomon cruised over Sue Stenhouse. That is a switch of the mayor’s office from Republican to Democratic. The post was held for many years by Republican Scott Avedisian, a well-liked moderate who left the job to become head of the state’s public transit agency. Solomon was city council president and took over when Avidisian left.
Raimondo’s campaign had a simple, albeit relentless message: that she was a fulcrum of a better economy. It was one that every incumbent governor uses when jobs are up and unemployment is down. Her other theme: That she opposes Trump and that her principal opponent, Fung, was a Republican Trump acolyte. A prodigious fund-raiser, Raimondo was able to drive those topics with nearly $8 million in campaign spending, far more than Fung had.
Raimondo also touted investments in infrastructure, particularly road and bridge repairs that had been long neglected. Still, while unemployment is near historic lows, things aren’t great for all Rhode Islanders. As University of Rhode Island economist Leonard Lardaro points out, the number of employed Rhode Island residents remains about 7,000 fewer than in 2007, just before the cloud of recession burst over the state. And the Providence metro economy pales in comparison to the innovation blush that is forging Boston’s world-class economy.
Indeed, much of the state’s progress in reducing unemployment has been due to the national economic rebound and the accident of geography – living next door to Massachusetts, a national leader in workforce education and 21st Century innovation.
The state’s first woman governor also underscored her initiatives in developing a better-educated workforce, including the landmark measure that grants two years of free tuition to Rhode Island high school graduates at the Community College of Rhode Island, the state’s public junior college.
Raimondo was able to skirt or tamp down other criticisms of her administration, including the UHIP computer benefits fiasco, which was mentioned often by Fung. When she became governor, Raimondo said she didn’t want the Pawtucket Red Sox to leave the state on her watch. But they did, with the ownership taking the Boston Red Sox top minor league team to Worcester, after Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker and the Worcester City Council put together a bigger taxpayer subsidy than Rhode Island could muster. In the end, Raimondo laid the blame on House Speaker Nick Mattiello, D-Cranston.
From the outset, Raimondo had another advantage – the schism in Rhode Island’s tiny Republican Party. Rhode Island Republicans once elected such statewide candidates as Sen. John Chafee, Congresswoman Claudine Schneider, Congressman Ron Machtley, Secretary of State Susan Farmer and such governors as Lincoln Almond and Don Carcieri.
While Fung easily won the GOP primary against Rep. Patricia Morgan, R-West Warwick, she refused to endorse him in the general election. Instead, Morgan backed Republican-turned-independent Joe Trillo, a bombastic former Warwick state representative and chairman of Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign in the Ocean State. Trillo is known for his blunt, take-no-prisoners style and the withering anti-immigrant rhetoric that Trump favors.
But Trillo turned into a nightmare for Fung. Public opinion polling done by both WPRI television and the Providence Journal, ABC6 and The People’s Radio showed Trillo draining conservative votes from Fung. Raimondo even waded into the Republican split by having her Democratic Party sponsor a mailing to registered Republican voters touting Trillo’s close links to Trump. At the same time, the governor’s campaign launched negative ads against Fung, tying Fung to Trump. One disingenuous Raimondo ad depicted Cranston as a dystopian Third World country under Fung’s leadership, when no such thing is remotely true. Fung was given high marks as mayor; he won reelection with 68 percent of the vote in his most recent reelection.
In the end, Trillo’s candidacy was little more than a joke, as he harvested less than 5 percent of the vote. All along, he disputed polls that showed him as little more than a spoiler for Fung’s chances, at one point asserting that he something called “an internal poll” that put him at about 30 percent.
Except for giving Republicans headaches, Trillo wasn’t a factor at all in the gubernatorial campaign. His meager vote total was far less than Raimondo’s comfortable margin over Fung.