Massachusetts has a primary election next Tuesday; a number of races will effectively be decided that day, because they have more than one candidate in the Democratic primary, and no other-party candidates for that office.
I'm in Middlesex County and the 7th Congressional district, so the relevant races for me include Congress (Capuano or Pressley) and district attorney.
DA is the easy one, for me: I'm supporting
Donna Patalano, who I heard about via the ACLU's What a Difference a DA Makes campaign.
Reasons to vote for Patalano:
- She promises to immediately end cash bail for nonviolent offenses (that would be enough, imho); she promises to change the approach to road safety, to remove the assumption that a cyclist or pedestrian is at fault when hit by a car, and the driver is not;
- She wants the state to repeal mandatory minimum sentences as a way to fight mass incarceration;
- She supports "presumptive discovery," meaning the prosecutor turns over all evidence to defense attorneys unless there are specific (narrow) reasons not to. She says she'll lobby for a bill requiring that throughout the state, and practice it in her office in the meantime.
- She says sensible things about conviction integrity, whereas I am unhappy with the incumbent (Ryan)for dragging her feet on setting aside known-tainted convictions after the drug lab scandal. (I made numerous calls to her office about that; they clearly weren't prepared for calls saying they should set aside all the convictions, rather than asking about the procedure for getting a specific conviction dropped.)
I'm undecided on the congressional race, because there doesn't seem to be much difference between the incumbent, Mike Capuano, and the challenger, Ayanna Pressley. Capuano's campaign flyer is about how strongly he will resist Trump; Pressley's talks about bold leadership and says she will promote Medicare for all, gun-violence reform, and "get[ting] money out of politics." Capuano seems pretty sound on the issues I care about, if less visible in the press than (say) Katherine Clark, who represented me when I lived in Arlington.
Similarly, with governor: I will be voting for the Democratic candidate in November, because both Gonzalez and Massie are a lot better than Gov. Baker, let alone the gay-bashing pastor who is running against Baker in the primary. However, there doesn't seem to be a lot of policy difference between Gonzalez and Massie; Gonzalez is the one with significant previous government experience, and Massie is an activist/lobbyist. If you know of any substantive reason to support one over the other, please tell me.
Similarly, I'm looking for opinions and information on the Secretary of State election (Galvin is the incumbent, Zakim is challenging him) and Lieutenant Governor (Palfrey, who identifies himself as a former assistant DA, vs. Tingle).
If the election was today, I'd be voting for Gonzalez, because I apparently am still annoyed at Massie for standing with a large number of supporters right where the Pride Parade route fed into City Hall Plaza, and it felt like he was trying to make Pride into a Massie rally. (Lots of politicians marched, also with supporters, but seeing them walk past me felt different than walking past that crowd right at the end of the parade.) I realize this is basically a style point; Gonzalez was there shaking hands as I waited to enter the State House for a rally in support of the $15 minimum wage a few weeks earlier.
(My incumbent state legislators, both of whom I am quite happy with, are unopposed, as is the Middlesex County Register of Deeds; Senator Warren will have a Republican opponent in the general election. The only office the Libertarian Party has a candidate for is Auditor; that will be a three-way race in November.)
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