Cristina Costantini Photo
While being intermittently drown out by blaring reggaeton music from passing cars, Latino advocates from around state gathered outside a bilingual school in Fair Haven to back the gubernatorial candidacy of Dan Malloy.
The Connecticut Democratic Hispanic Caucus held the announcement, followed by a meet-the-merchants walk, on Sunday in the predominantly Latino neighborhood near the Christopher Columbus Family Academy on Grand Avenue in order to endorse Malloy, the Democratic gubernatorial candidate. The same group had endorsed Malloy’s vanquished opponent, Ned Lamont, in the Aug. 10 Democratic primary. The group said their top concern in backing Malloy in the general election is to put a Democrat in the governor’s office for the first time in 20 years in order to focus policy more on poor and working families.
Asked about two issues important to Fair Haven and the Latino community, Malloy came out in favor of the principles behind the DREAM Act before Congress but hesitated to back New Haven’s controversial immigrant-friendly ID card.
Malloy and running mate Nancy Wyman both gave short addresses to the crowd, for the most part in English. Though Wyman gave Spanish a shot.
“Let me do my whole Spanish thing,” said Wyman. After a dramatic pause, she exclaimed “Muchas gracias!” to the amusement of the audience.
Malloy’s speech centered on his dedication to job growth and education reform in Hispanic communities. He also stressed increased diversity in state jobs.
“I’ve said it for a long time, and I say it everywhere I go: It’s time that the government of Connecticut starts looking more like the people of Connecticut,” said Malloy.
Health care reform advocate and former gubernatorial candidate Juan Figueroa, Hartford Mayor Pedro Segarra, and New Haven Mayor John DeStefano were present to offer endorsements of their own.
“Bienvenidos a New Haven! Yo soy Alcalde DeStefano, y yo represento the Italian American Branch of the Latino Caucus,” joked DeStefano.
Translation: Welcome to New Haven! I am Mayor Destefano and I represent the Italian American Branch of the Latino Caucus.
“The things that will effect the lives of the people on these streets, the matters that will determine the future of our kids, have everything to do with electing Dan Malloy and Nancy Wyman. We have great stakes in that,” DeStefano then said in English.
Other political leaders endorsing Malloy included Gerry Garcia, who ran for secretary of the state in a Democratic primary this August, and former New Haven Board of Alderman President Tomas Reyes.
Popping in on Grand Avenue merchants like Orlando Rivera after the event, Malloy found he was following in the footsteps of Republican U.S. Senate candidate Linda McMahon, who’d been at Rivera’s Italy’s Best pizzeria on a similar tour last Thursday.
Rivera was most vocal about school reform and tax assessment problems when Malloy entered his pizzeria.
“I’m voting for Dan Malloy,” Rivera said after Malloy left. “Compared to the other candidates he’s more in tune with the Hispanic community because his town [Stamford] is full of Hispanic people. Unlike the other people who are starting to come up in the races, who have no experience. They have good intentions, but the experience is not there. But I think Malloy will do very well,” said Rivera. Malloy is Stamford’s former mayor.
Referencing McMahon’s visit days earlier, Rivera described “her experience with the politics” as “very novice”. “She might be a good entertainer, and say the right words, but to be politically involved and to get your hands dirty, she just doesn’t have the experience,” he said.
Orlando Rivera greeted Dan Malloy and Nancy Wyman.
During her visit last week, McMahon was asked about the immigrant-friendly Elm City Resident Card and the DREAM Act before Congress, which would provide a pathway to citizenship for children of illegal immigrants. McMahon said she didn’t know about either act.
Rivera heard about that. “I was not a witness to the fact. But I heard the rumor going around that she did goof on that. Maybe they pronounced it wrong, maybe they pronounced it right. Like I said she’s very novice when it comes to politics.”
While gubernatorial candidate Dan Malloy has heard of the Elm City Resident Card, he’s not a huge proponent of it.
“As the mayor of Stamford for 14 years, I never felt that we were in the position to vouch for somebody’s identity, so we didn’t go in that direction” he said when asked on Sunday. After some reminding of exactly what the DREAM Act is, Malloy said he does support some ideas behind it.
“After patrolling our borders, and allowing for appropriate levels of immigration, we need to give people roads for citizenship or permanent status, and that should begin with children. The people who were brought to this country at a very young age can document their lives in this country very easily. Lets start moving that population on a road towards citizenship,” he said.