Vowing to “fight for your jobs!” a hoarse Ned Lamont made his final argument to voters on the same block where he opened his Democratic campaign for governor: in the battleground city of New Haven.
Tom Petty (via loudspeakers) and throngs of pumped-up Lamont volunteers (in person) filled New Haven’s Pitkin Plaza at dusk for a final 20-minute rally Monday, hours before polls open at 6 a.m. Tuesday.
Lamont is facing Dannel Malloy in the primary for the Democratic nomination for governor. The race is too close to call. It pits a self-proclaimed outsider job-creating businessman (Lamont), who has pumped $8.6 million of his own money into the campaign, against a former seven-term Stamford mayor (Malloy) running as a publicly financed champion of “experience money can’t buy.”
In Pitkin Plaza, three doors down on Orange Street from where he opened his statewide campaign office in March, Lamont offered the traditional “closing argument” speech to voters, a pitch that by tradition remains short, emphasizes themes over policy arguments, and ends with a call to get out the vote.
Click on the play arrow to watch highlights of Lamont’s speech, as well as remarks by one of his earliest and most prominent supporters, New Haven Mayor John DeStefano.
The theme of Lamont’s speech was jobs, the main concern of Connecticut voters in this recession.
The refrain of the speech: “We’re gonna be fighting for your jobs!”
Teachers. Machinists. Social-service workers “taking care of the most vulnerable in the state.” Transportation engineers. Crowds lining up for temporary work. Those were among the people whose jobs Lamont promised to fight for.
Paul Bass Photo
Lamont and running mate Mary Glassman bask in last-minute cheers.
Without mentioning Malloy, he offered a fleeting rationale for choosing him — the need for an outsider to challenge “special interests.” Lamont evoked his 2006 Democratic primary victory over U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman to emphasize the need to pull voters to the polls and to characterize himself as the man who takes on the party establishment. “It was about four years ago, a hot day in August,” Lamont reminded the crowd. “We challenged the special interests. We challenged the status quo. We challenged the political establishment.”
Since early this year New Haven has proved a bedrock of Lamont’s support. DeStefano and leaders of the city Democratic Party, Connecticut’s largest, lined up behind him.
The city has now proved a battleground. Malloy has made inroads in recent weeks with Democrats, especially some African-American elected officials and activists, independent of the party machine. He started showing up regularly in the city in the final weeks.
A lot’s at stake. In the 2006 gubernatorial primary, when Malloy ran against DeStefano, New Haven provided DeStefano with about a 5,000-vote margin of victory. That was more than the total number of votes DeStefano won by statewide, and enough to help him squeak by Malloy for the party’s nomination.
This time, without a hometown mayor running in the primary, New Haven isn’t expected to offer that big a margin. Both candidates are working the city with vigor. Lamont campaign manager Joe Abbey estimated he’ll have 250 volunteers pulling votes in the city Tuesday. Malloy campaign advisor Roy Occhiogrosso said he’ll have 125 – 150 vote-pullers on the ground here.
Lamont needs 65 percent of the New Haven vote to help assemble a margin of victory statewide, Occhiogrosso estimated Monday night. “We don’t think he’s going to do that. We just want to keep it close in New Haven. We have more support there than we did last time.”
Lamont’s two storefronts on Orange Street and upstairs suite of offices have been filled with young volunteers working the phones and grabbing canvassing assignments to take to the streets. They brim with idealistic enthusiasm.
What drew them to what they see as a crusade?
“It was just the summer. I didn’t have anything to do,” Wilbur Cross High School rising senior Alan Williams said as he waited for the rally to begin. “It was an introduction to politics.” Then the campaign grew on him. Especially the candidate. “He’s very understanding. You can tell he cares about the people. His policies cater to people who don’t have everything. He’s trying to get everybody to get on their feet.”
For Raymond Sizemore (at right in photo, beside Williams), too, the inspiration was the candidate, not a set of positions.
“Ned’s not a career politician. I hate career politicians. Ned cares about the people,” said Sizemore, a 14-year-old Metropolitan Business Academy student who caught the politics bug during the 2004 John Kerry presidential campaign. (Yes. He was 8 at the time.)
Earlier this year Sizemore signed up to help Susan Bysiewicz run for governor, when she was still running for governor. Does he define Bysiewicz — who has served as secretary of the state for 12 years after a career in the state legislature; and who now has her eyes on higher office — as a career politician?
“There are differences,” Sizemore replied. “Most career politicians just care about the title. She cares about the people.”
The Lamont rally also had a “Line B” feel. The other candidates for statewide office who showed up — Secretary of the State hopeful Gerry Garcia (at right in photo), Comptroller hopeful Mike Jarjura (at left) — are, like Lamont, appearing on the second line of the ballot Tuesday, the line for candidates not endorsed at the May state party convention.
Technically, each candidate (except for the gubernatorial and lieutenant governor candidates) is running independently of other candidates, rather than as a team. However, some in New Haven have promoted a Line B coalition. Latino supporters of Garcia, who’s seeking to become the state’s first Hispanic statewide official, were hoping their endorsement of Lamont would lead some of his millions to trickle down to their campaign, for instance. And New Haven helped hometown candidate Garcia secure a spot on the primary ballot at the convention by uniting with the Waterbury delegation to back Jarjura (who’s currently that city’s mayor).
New Haven Mayor DeStefano chose his words carefully from the rally stage as he recognized those two candidates.
He openly endorsed Garcia. “We’re going to elect a new secretary of state from New Haven,” DeStefano shouted: “Gerry Garcia!”
He was more circumspect in his shout-out — or calm call-out — to Jarjura, whose alliance with the anti-gay Family Institute and the Tea Party movement have some DeStefano supporters wondering how a liberal New Haven party establishment ended up on his side.
“I want to acknowledge my friend the mayor of Waterbury,” DeStefano remarked with a toastmaster tone. “It’s always good to have you here, Michael.”
A Positive Coda
After weeks of pummeling Malloy with TV ads and flyers characterizing him as a crook and a liar, Lamont returned to the positive at the rally.
“I don’t want you voting against anybody,” he said. “Mary and I want to give you something to vote for.”
He was asked afterwards how he felt about spending millions of dollars to trash Malloy. Lamont had declared he wanted to avoid negative ads — but would respond if Malloy started televising attacks. Malloy did, and Lamont dug deep into his pocket to fire back, and then some, not just with responses to Malloy’s attacks, but with a litany of attacks on Malloy, too.
“I didn’t like it,” Lamont said. “I wanted to give people something to believe in.”
But he said he had no choice but to defend himself.
“We got hit. We got hit hard,” he said. “We responded.”