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Shelton Mayor Mark Lauretti and local developer Robert Scinto are friends again. The two are leading sponsors of an October 14th fundraising event for Republican gubernatorial candidate Bob Stefanowski.

Scinto supported Republican David Walker, who was eliminated at the May nominating convention when he failed to win 15% of the delegates on any ballot. Lauretti also missed the 15% requirement and was unable to collect enough signatures to appear on the August primary ballot. The longtime Shelton mayor, also known as Public Official Number One in a document no one ever wants to appear in, pondered a run for governor as a petitioning candidate. Scinto went to prison for six months in 2011 for his part in the Shelton corruption scandal that occurred under Lauretti’s watch.

The event invitation includes legislative leaders and Stefanowski’s four vanquished primary opponents, including one referred to as “David Stemmerman.” Cassetta becomes Casssettta. Are there no proofreaders left in fundraising?

Greenwich Democrat Ned Lamont is adding $5 million to his gubernatorial campaign coffers. Lamont will show $5.5 million in the bank when he files his next campaign finance report on or before October 10th. Daily Ructions has learned that may not be the last hefty transfer of cash from the Lamont exchequer into his campaign.

Republicans are awaiting for their candidate, former pawn shop executive Bob Stefanowski, to boost his campaign with some green stuff that folds. Stefanowski was a self-funder during the party nomination campaign but has not been as eager to contribute since the August 14th primary.

Lamont’s largesse will allow him to overwhelm Stefanowski on the airwaves. The Republican’s as busy have been puny compared to what Lamont can purchase. Stefanowski, who was a Democrat last year, can expect some unflattering portrayals in the next round of Lamont ads.

Self-financing is a campaign finance method that used to offend perennial candidate and Lamont running-mate Susan Bysiewicz. No word on her objections to the advantages of the wealthy in politics being used to her benefit.

This is what panic looks like. Speaker of the House Joseph Aresimowicz is drafting lobbyists to head for his Berlin district October 7th to knock on doors. Members of the permanent government will receive their assignments at noon, campaign until 4 p.m., and then drink beer at Sliders while watching football and assuring Aresimowicz everything is fine, just fine.

When the lobbyist army completes its assignment, it will gather for alcohol and football. This may not be the best week for a campaign to highlight the consumption of beer by a high ranking public official.

Aresimowicz relied on union members to hit the ground in his too-close-for-comfort 2016 race. Prizes were offered to attract volunteers. Presiding over crumbling state finances may be making it harder for the union employee and speaker to re-sign local recruits.

The summons to campaign came from Aresimowicz spokeswoman Elizabeth Connelly, who helpfully included the names of all recipients in the message.

Five weeks until Connecticut elects a new government remains the state’s marquee news story. The campaign–particularly on a debate day–may overshadow a crucial story unfolding at the Capitol. The Committee on Children will hold a hearing today at 11 a.m. on the death of 16 year old “Destiny G.” on June 28, 2018, while in the care of the Department of Children and Families (DCF). Committee members will hear from Sarah Eagan, head of the Office of the Child Advocate (OCA).

OCA investigated the treatment and death of Destiny G., who was scheduled for release the day after she committed suicide. The Solnit Center (previously known as Riverview) will require the attention of the state’s next governor after many years of neglect within the executive branch. They should be paying attention today. The Solnit Center ought to be subject to independent oversight and also provides some opportunity for cost savings by engaging the services of probate providers. You can  find probate attorneys here!

Petitioning gubernatorial candidate Oz Griebel will join Democrat Ned Lamont and Republican Bob Stefanowski on stage at the September 26th WFSB/UConn debate. Griebel and Lamont participated in the first post-primary debate. Stefanowski skipped that one. Griebel was not included in the two subsequent debates. The debate will be broadcast live on WFSB from 7 p.m.-8 p.m.

This debate will be the most important opportunity Griebel will have in the campaign to insert himself as a factor in the campaign. He’s done if he cannot improve on his rambling debut at the University of Saint Joseph at the beginning of September. There is considerable dissatisfaction with the two major party candidates. Connecticut voters have been receptive to independent candidates. They elected Lowell Weicker governor in 1990 and returned Joe Lieberman to the U.S. Senate in an epic 2006 contest. As long ago as 1970, U.S. Senator Thomas Dodd placed a respectable third after he was repudiated for renomination by his fellow Democrats, opening the way for Weicker to win his first term in the Senate.

Griebel’s runningmate, Monte Frank, will join Democrat Susan Bysiewicz and Republican Joe Markley on September 27th at a WFSB debate that will be streamed online. Parts of it will be featured on the following Sunday’s edition of Face the State. Do not be surprised if this is a more interesting encounter than the gubernatorial debate the day before.

Former Rowland and Rell administrations official Jennifer Aniskovich is the first name on the alphabetical list of women vouching for the character of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh. The September 14th letter is signed by 65 women who knew Kavanugh in his youth in suburban Washington. It was a response to first reports that a woman who also knew Kavanugh while he was in high school had been assaulted by him at a party in the early 1980s.

Events overran the highly-publicized testimonial on Sunday when Christine Blasey Ford stepped forward to begin to tell her story. Her lawyer, Debra S. Katz, revealed Monday morning that Ford is willing to testify in public about her experience with Kavanuagh.

Aniskovich was appointed Executive Director of the Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism by John Rowland. She served until the end of 2006 when Rowland’s successor, Jodi Rell, accepted her resignation. Aniskovich is married to former Republican state Senator William Aniskovich, a prominent Rowland defender, who served in the Senate from 1991 until 2005.

Five and a half million dollars is a lot of money for an eight acre parcel of vacant land that sold for $500,000 three years ago. Jon Lender has the story and there seems to be no convincing explanation for the price the State of Connecticut paid for the land in Orange–other than some hefty political donations to state Democrats.

All she had to do was unsubscribe. Instead, UConn instructional designer Betsy Guala responded to a routine campaign email from state Representative Melissa Ziobron–who is seeking a promotion to the state Senate–with a vulgar message featuring the ugliest profanity. The September 12th message is posted above.

Guala is “an Instructional Designer/eLearning Developer at the University of Connecticut, in The Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL),” according to her online profile. She was paid $64,128.13 in FY 2017 and received an additional $32,423.33 in benefits. She appears not to be tolerant of divergent points of view in her quest for excellence. Basic civility must be covered in some other branch of the state’s premier public university. Guala claims on her resume to possess “excellent communication skills and experience working within a global community.” The Portland Democrat may be overstating her communications skills.

Ziobron has served three terms in the House and is the Republican nominee in the 33rd Senate District, the seat currently held by Republican Art Linares, who did not seek re-election.

Self-funding Republican gubernatorial candidate Bob Stefanowski is running low on dough. His campaign reports that on August 31st, two weeks after his primary win in a field of five candidates, the payday loan and pawn shop executive had $153,000 on hand with $39,000 in unpaid bills.

Stefanowski has been busy working the phones for contributions and fundraising event sponsors. Follow-up has been a challenge for the lightly staffed campaign. Stefanowski ran his primary race as an outsider dismissive of the party organization. Some of those sentiments may be causing reliable Republican givers to concentrate their efforts on winning the legislature.

The campaign continues to carry a $2,250,000 loan to the candidate.

The Stefanowski campaign appears to understand the damage the finance report may do. It was filed at 11:58 p.m. Thursday, two hours before the deadline to submit it.

Democrat Ned Lamont, who has spent tens of millions of his fortunes on two previous campaigns, had $396,000 in the bank. The Greenwich millionaire is expected to continue fueling his campaign for governor.

Petitioning gubernatorial candidate Oz Griebel has lost his campaign manger to a larceny in the first degree charge. Kyle Lyddy, who was defeated in 2016 by Eva Bermudez Zimmerman for the 2016 Democratic nomination for state representative from the 106th district, was arrested Monday for allegedly taking $500,000 from his Norwalk employer. The complaint was made to Norwalk police on August 1st and claimed Lyddy had misappropriated funds for two years.

Of Griebel’s campaign, Lyddy told the Washington Post in an article dated August 31st, “If there’s a time to do this, this is the time in Connecticut to make this happen.” That task will now fall to Chris Cooper, who will serve temporarily as campaign manager. He’l be assisted by Chris DuPont, who recently worked on his father’s unsuccessful campaign for Congress as a Republican in the 5th CD. Cooper and DuPont are veterans of various Mark Greenberg campaigns.

Griebel has been polling in low single digits. Fundraising has not been robust.