Democrat Tyler Mack is showing cash to get cash in the sprint to qualify for public financing in the 22nd district state Senate Democratic primary. Mack placed first among the five candidates competing at the convention contest with 16 votes, far from the 30 delegates he needed to win the party endorsement. Mack’s unexpected poor showing at the convention came after Lieutenant Governor Susan Bysiewicz made calls attempting to snag some delegates for the member of the Bridgeport City Council.

The Bysiewicz intervention was a reminder to potential rivals that longevity alone may not be advantage the Middletown Democrats expects it to be as she mounts her fourth bid for the Democratic nomination for governor.

Mack’s Facebook post says he is halfway to the $17,300 he will need to qualify for $109,500 in public funds for the August 13th primary. The 22nd is considered a district in which one party dominates, as measured by party registration. There are no Republican dominated districts in Connecticut.

Shante Hanks has withdrawn from the field, leaving Mack to face Sujata Gadkar-Wilcon, Bill Finch and Scott Burns.

Published June 4, 2024.

A Dear Lobbyist message from Rebecca Terricciano seeks donations and sponsorships from businesses to underwrite delegate expenses to the Republican National Convention next month. The party that rails against the swamp dives in when it needs money to pay for meals, accommodations, and entertainment for five days in Wisconsin. Terricciano, the Program Coordinator of the CT Milwaukee Delegation Program, wrote on May 30th, “We have crafted a variety of sponsorship packages designed to provide maximum visibility and engagement for your clients or business. These opportunities not only include branding and promotional benefits but also offer potential for guest passes to attend the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee. It’s a perfect blend of business and excitement, allowing you to connect with key influencers and decision-makers.”

“Key influencers and decision-makers” will be thin on the ground whenever the Connecticut delegates gather. The highest ranking official is a former Nikki Haley supporter, state Senator Steve Harding, the leader of the dozen members of his caucus.

For $7,500, a donor gets to sponsor the reception welcoming Connecticut delegates, alternates and guests to Wisconsin. A check for $15,000 purchases sponsorship of a pizza reception after Tuesday’s evening of rants and grievances. The hardest sell may be the $20,000 sponsorship of a Northeast Summer Party. It will include delegations from Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maryland and Washington, D.C. Those six states send no Republicans to Congress. Maryland’s Republican Senate nominee, former Governor Larry Hogan, was excoriated by Trump campaign senior advisor Chris LaCivita, for asking Americans to respect the rule of law in the aftermath of the conviction of Donald Trump on 34 charges of falsifying business records to conceal campaign contributions. Lara Trump, the convicted defendant’s daughter-in-law and co-chair of the Republican National Committee, called Hogan’s appeal to reason and the rule of law “ridiculous.” She told CNN,  Hogan “doesn’t deserve the respect of anyone in the Republican Party at this point, and quite frankly, anybody in America, if that’s the way you feel. That’s very upsetting to hear that.”

The convention begins Monday, July 15th, four days after Trump is sentenced. Trump defense lawyer Todd Blanche requested a mid-July sentencing date and agreed to July 11th.

Lobbyists know what they will be aiding with their sponsorships–and so will the people they do business with. See the details of what’s on offer here. Donors should note that gift certificates for courses at Trump University, Trump steaks and made-in-China Ivanka Trump fashions are no longer available.

Published June 4, 2024.

Delegates to the 124th District of the House of Representatives put the Bridgeport absentee ballot scandal on the August 13th primary ballot when they endorsed Eneida Martinez over incumbent Andre Baker for the seat. Martinez received nine votes to Baker’s three, Brian Lockhart reports.

Martinez asserted her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination during a trial over absentee ballot fraud in last summer’s Democratic primary for mayor. Judge William Clark found enough evidence in the three day trial to conclude that Martinez and fellow Democrat Wanda Geter-Pataky had mishandled so many absentee ballots that it was impossible to determine who had won the primary between incumbent Joseph Ganim and challenger John Gomes.

Martinez, who serves on Bridgeport’s city council, also faces a trial for allegedly violating pandemic restrictions at a Bridgeport club she was managing in 2020.

Baker is seeking a sixth term. He’s likely to repeat often Martinez’s assessment of his work in the East End district. “He’s done a good job,” Lockhart reports Martinez as declaring more than once on Tuesday.

Bridgeport Democrats will be among the few in the state to have overlapping primaries for the House of Representatives and State Senate this summer.

[@MikeCerulliCT of WTNH attended the convention and posted the photo above pf Martinez on X.]

Published May 29, 2024.

Incumbent Leora Levy and Annalisa Stravato will face each other Tuesday for the spot reserved for a woman from Connecticut on the Republican National Committee. The contest has become a proxy battle among the shrinking factions of the state party.

Levy dismayed fellow members of the party establishment when she defeated convention-endorsed U.S. Senate candidate Themis Klarides in a 2022 primary. Levy defeated Klarides by a wide margin, suggesting delegates at the party’s nominating convention were out of touch with rank and file members. The Greenwich Republican’s apostasy has not been forgotten. If Team Klarides had exerted as much effort to defeat Levy in 2022 as it is in blocking her re-election to the RNC, that landslide primary defeat might have had a different result.

Levy has been an effective and reliable fundraiser in a party that finds itself chronically short of dough. She has rescued the party’s parlous finances more than once. Levy’s also engaged in some significant shapeshifting since the annus horribilis of 2016, going from Donald Trump critic to cheerleader. Trump nominated Levy in 2019 to serve as ambassador to Chile. The Senate did not act on her nomination.

Committee members received an extensive email from Levy on Sunday. It attempts to refute the accusation making the rounds that her 2022 Senate candidacy sank George Logan’s bid for the U.S. House from the 5th CD. Levy was an effective fundraiser for Logan in 2022 and sponsored an event for him at the start of his current campaign. It featured James Comer, the deluded House chair of the Judiciary Committee.

Stravato served as the state party committee’s vice chair from 2015 to 2017. She dropped her bid for a second term when she appeared likely to lose. She currently serves as one of Wilton’s two Registrars of Voters. She is also a member of the state party committee, though online campaign finance records show she made no contribution to the Logan campaign.

Levy received a video endorsement from U.S. Senator Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas). She has, Cotton explained, supported him from his first campaign for the House of Representatives in 2012.

Stravato has the support of party chair Ben Proto. She also received an endorsement from Sid Holbrook, who pointed out in his message that he served as a chief of staff to a governor. That was felonious former governor John G. Rowland, who resigned the office 20 years ago next month. Rowland greeted Stravato at this month’s party nominating convention.

The party committee is comprised of 74 members, two each from the state’s 36 state senate districts, a member of the College Republicans and a member of the Young Republicans.

The RNC seat reserved for a man will go once more to John Frey.

Published May 28, 2024.

Republican donors were startled to receive an incendiary email from party-endorsed U.S. Senate candidate Gerry Smith that claims President Joe Biden and other Democrats “are burning crosses in my front yard.” The burning cross is one of the most powerful images of racial hatred and violence. No one is burning crosses on Smith’s front yard.

As Smith points out in deranged fundraising appeal, “It’s disgusting” — but not for the reason Smith claims. The first selectman asserts that as the only Black Republican running for the Senate, “I’m their greatest threat.” He is not. Few in Connecticut know who Smith is. In Washington, Smith may briefly rise to an afterthought.

Smith entered the race to challenge incumbent Democrat Chris Murphy in February as a calm Republican with a clear path to his party’s nomination. The late entry of 2018 nominee Matt Corey upended Smith’s saunter to the general election campaign. Corey won 30% of the delegates at the May 13th nominating convention and confirmed there will be an August primary.

Smith’s race-based fundraising appeal suggests he sees no advantage in highlighting his differences with Corey. Smith has won four terms as first selectman in Beacon Falls. The Manchester Republican has often run for office but never won an election. Corey sides with servitude over freedom. He opposes aid to Ukraine and would abandon millions of free people to murderous dictator Vladimir Putin.

Smith is the choice of what is left to the Republican party organization establishment. The ragtag troupe has concentrated its diminishing energy on heaving Westport Republican Annalisa Stravato over the finish line against incumbent Leora Levy in their contest for a seat on the Republican National Committee. The May 28th vote by the state party committee is the passion of chairman Ben Proto. Levy was the 2022 U.S. Senate Republican nominee, defeating party-endorsed candidate Themis Klarides by a wide margin in a primary.

As party leaders devote their full measure to the national committee contest, Republicans face tumbling into single digits in the state senate.

Published May 25, 2024.

In a March 15th letter to Western Connecticut State University Interim President Manohar Singh, the New England Commission on Higher Education (NECHE) informed the school it has issued “a formal Notice of Concern to Western Connecticut State University that is in danger of not meeting the Commission’s standards on Organization and Governance, Institutional Resources, and Educational Effectiveness.”

The nine-page letter states that while WCSU continues to be accredited it will “undergo a focused evaluation in Fall 2025.” The university is expected to address governance, transparency, communications and accountability issues. It must improve the stability of its leadership and finances, “achieve its enrollment and retention goals,” address staffing levels, develop measurements of learning outcomes, and “achieve its goals for diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI).”

WSCU remains accredited. NECHE expressed concern about a report by a visiting team of evaluators about the “heightened level of uncertainty, confusion, and distrust” in the administration of the public university. The letter notes enrollment has declined.

The letter concludes, “You are encouraged to share this letter with all of the institution’s constituencies. It is the Commission’s policy to inform the chairperson of the institution’s governing board and the head of the system of action on its accreditation status.”

The Notice of Concern comes as particularly bad news for system Chancellor Terrence Cheng. A Notice of Concern by an accrediting authority is humiliation, particularly for a state that lavishly finances its bloated public higher education bureaucracy.

The Board of Regents will need to explain at its meeting tomorrow, May 23rd, what it has done since receiving the letter more than two months ago. It appears not to have shared the Notice of Concern with members of the legislature during the recently concluded round of budget adjustments.

Published May 22, 2024.

East Hartford Police Chief Mack Hawkins will have to decide if he is to abandon the department’s rules in deciding to impose appropriate discipline on Lieutenant Joseph Ficacelli. A former internal affairs investigator, Ficacelli is facing a charge of operating a vehicle under the influence of alcohol arising from a bizarre incident early this year.

The video was first posted on Daily Ructions and can seen here.

Ficacelli admitted in a Superior Court appearance to switching from the driver’s to the passenger seat in his vehicle when it appeared police would pull him over. Ficacelli was argumentative and claimed to be suffering from a heart attack when he realized police had discovered the switch. An ambulance took Ficacelli to a local hospital.

An audio recording of the East Hartford police veteran revealed he had become more disputatious with police at the hospital. Curiously, Ficacelli refused treatment for his chest pains. He also threatened to embarrass the three officers who appeared at the hospital to complete their paperwork.

As a member of the Office of Professional Standards, Ficacelli was called upon to apply a simple standard to the behavior of officers he investigated. In several instances Ficacelli concluded that a fellow officer had violated Section 4.3 of the East Hartford Police code of conduct. It states that “[n]o Officer shall engage in any personal conduct or act which, if brought to the attention of the public, could
result in justified unfavorable criticism of that Officer or the Department. No Officer shall be
involved personally in disturbances or Police incidents to his/her discredit.”

It does not require a talmudic scholar to conclude that by his own admission Ficacelli engaged in egregious conduct that violated Section 4.3 of the department code. The only question that remains is whether Chief Hawkins will bring discredit on himself and add to the damage Ficacelli has inflicted on the department.

Posted May 17, 2024.

Paragraph 96 of the indictment in the matter of United States of America v. Kostantinos Diamantis includes an extraordinary invitation allegedly sent by Diamantis on January 9, 2021, to Salvatore Monarca and John Duffy of Acranom (Monarca spelled backwards) Masonry. The invitation was to dinner and drinks at a favorite Diamantis restaurant, Cava, located in Southington.

The purpose of the dinner, according to the invitation or command, depending on one’s point of view, was to raise the $28,000 tuition for a Diamantis daughter to continue to attend the exclusive Renbrook School in West Hartford. Diamantis, according to the indictment, told Duffy and Monarca that their checks could be made payable to him, his daughter, or Renbrook.

By January 9, 2021, Diamantis had been the state’s deputy budget director (and still the head of school construction). He held a dinner to collect $28,000 for his daughter and nobody seems to have noticed. If the invitation was a ruse to squeeze more dough out of Monarca and Duffy, Diamantis’ former brother in law, then no one else would have been invited. But if the event was held, who else was invited, attended and contributed?

The invitation to the two targets of Diamantis’ alleged extortion scheme to make their checks payable to his daughter seems reckless, putting her in danger of one day having to answer probing questions about where she got the money.

Diamantis, paragraph 84 alleges, was invited to accept a payment from Monarca in the basement of a Middletown restaurant at 5 p.m. on January 15, 2020. Not good enough. Diamantis replied, “5 pm cap grill with card[.]” That last order likely refers to someone other than Governor Ned Lamont’s deputy budget chief bringing a credit card to pick up the tab for Diamantis’ tony culinary taste.

Before that dinner, Monarca cashed an Acranom check for $5,000, “and then gave all or a portion of that cash to Diamantis,” the indictment states in paragraph 85.

Diamantis is also said to have enjoyed meeting with state contractors at Piccolo Arancia in Farmington. He was not the only state official to attend some of those dinner meetings.

Diamantis may not have reserved alleged cash drop-offs to expensive restaurants. The week began with rumors that one of the defendants who entered a guilty plea admitted to making at least one payment by putting cash in a paper bag and handing it over at a Dunkin’ Donuts. If true, the use of a crime cliché should be considered an aggravating circumstance for sentencing purposes.

Published May 17, 2024.

Once in a while showing up and stepping up is all it takes. The 94th House District Democratic nominating convention was held with an air of bewilderment. Delegates from New Haven and Hamden gathered at the Parrish House on Kimberley Avenue Wednesday evening without any clear indication from incumbent Robyn Porter that she was a candidate for re-election.

Once in a while showing up and stepping up is all it takes. The 94th House District Democratic nominating convention was held with an air of bewilderment. Delegates from New Haven and Hamden gathered at the Parrish House on Kimberley Avenue Wednesday evening without any clear indication from incumbent Robyn Porter that she was a candidate for re-election.

Porter did not attend. A Hamden delegate placed Porter’s name in nomination. A long silence followed, interrupted by calls for a second. None was forthcoming. Instead, the delegates looked around the room and nominated former New Haven alder Steve Winter.

Winter enjoys a reputation as a diligent campaigner. A virtue in any campaign but not an essential one in the overwhelmingly Democratic 94th.

Published May 15, 2024.

A late campaign to deny Matt Corey enough delegates to primary endorsed Republican U.S. Senate Gerry Smith failed Monday. Party leaders spent the day frantically seeking to chip away at Corey’s delegate support to below the 15% support required for an August primary challenge.

Corey and delegates embarrassed the party’s leadership by winning 261 delegates to Smith’s 610. Corey’s 29% total came as delegates were pelted with messages urging them to reject the “Matt Corey Tax”–the cost, the messages claimed, of local governments administering a primary. The message called the traditional exercise in democracy “an ego-trip primary.”

The message urged delegates to tell Corey that delegates “can be trusted to make the best decisions for our party.” Nearly 30% of the delegates declined to buckle and voted for Corey, the party’s 2018 candidate for U.S. Senate.

Smith, the first selectman of Beacon Falls., entered the contest to face Democratic incumbent Christopher Murphy in February. He reported raising $43,483.86 in his first quarter finance report. Corey, a late entry to the race, has not yet filed a report.

The two Republicans will meet in an August 13th primary.

The Republicans had some trouble with their numbers. Party officials announced before voting began that there were 777 credentialed delegates in attendance. The final tally showed 892 delegates casting a vote.

Published May 14, 2024.