Matt Lesser has his eye on taking on an existential challenge — the “crisis of democracy.”
“It’s easy to forget how close we came in the last election to losing our democracy,” he said, referencing efforts to overturn the presidential election results that culminated in the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol. “It would be nice to pretend it can’t happen here.”
But it can, he argued, which is one reason he has laid the groundwork to run for the Democratic nomination for the state’s top elections post, secretary of the state.
Lesser, a 38-year-old Middletown state senator with 14 years in the legislature, has formed an exploratory committee through which he has raised over $30,000 for an eventual campaign. A crowded field of Democrats this year is looking to succeed retiring incumbent Denise Merrill, along with several Republicans.
“I know what we need to do to get our house in order” in running elections better while waging “the big fight: sell[ing] the idea of democracy,” Lesser said during an interview about his candidacy Tuesday on WNHH FM’s “LoveBabz LoveTalk” program. (Click here, here and here to read about some other official and “exploratory” candidates for the post.)
Besides overseeing elections, the secretary of the state is in charge of business filings and maintaining the commercial registry.
The secretary of the state also proposes and lobbies for new election laws. Lesser argued that his experience crafting and promoting passage of laws in the legislature has prepared him to fill that part of the secretary of the state’s role.
In the Connecticut Senate, Lesser, a member of the legislature’s Black and Hispanic Caucus (he has Argentinian roots), has sponsored a voting rights bill that would facilitate challenges at the state level to municipal redistricting or the local handling of elections. He helped lead the charge for Connecticut to join the “national popular vote” compact, in which states agree as a group to abide by the popular vote in presidential elections when it comes time cast electoral votes. (Read more about that here.) He also helped lead a successful effort to expand state health care insurance for children of undocumented immigrants.
Like other Democrats seeking or potentially seeking the secretary of the state nomination, Lesser embraces efforts to create early voting and no-excuses absentee balloting in Connecticut.
One issue that has divided the Democratic pack is whether to institute ranked-choice voting. (Read more about that here.) Lesser has cosponsored a so-far-unsuccessful bill to create a study of how that might work in Connecticut. In Tuesday’s interview, he didn’t take a firm stand on whether he would ultimately back ranked-choice voting. He acknowledged some concerns raised about it, while concluding that “if New York City can figure it out, I think we can solve it. It’s a process.”
Click on the video at the top of this story to watch the full interview with secretary of the state candidate Matt Lesser on WNHH FM’s “LoveBabz LoveTalk” program.