Absentee ballots from Connecticut’s urban areas provided incumbent Democrat Denise Nappier with a 7,000 vote margin over Republican Tim Herbst in their battle for state treasurer. The additional votes, made known Wednesday in the state’s chaotic election process, mean Nappier is not expected to face a recount.

Herbst, who ran a spirited campaign, will hold a press conference in Trumbull at 4 pm.

Republican Tim Herbst believes he has fallen fewer than 1,000 votes short in his bid to defeat incumbent State Treasurer Denise Nappier. Herbst sent an email to supporters and others early Wednesday afternoon alerting them to a possible recount. That’s a labor intensive task  and the Trumbull first selectman is seeking help from local party activists. A recount will entail looking at a lot of ballots and running them through a voting machine.

UPDATE: The Nappier camp thinks the erratic incumbent has a lead of more than 7,000 votes.

There are unusual things flowering in the woods of New Milford: Republican campaign signs. Those signs, local loyalists say, had been placed at a polling place before they were discovered in the woods.

Police have assigned the case number 14-44775-OF. Maybe they will find missing voter lists from Hot Mess Hartford.

Don’t let it divert your attention from Bridgeport.

Monday’s Wall Street Journal distilled into a few lethal sentences the choice facing Connecticut voters on Tuesday. The editorial featured this:

Take Connecticut’s Dannel Malloy, who rode into office by less than one percentage point in 2010 after promising not to raise taxes but soon was calling himself the “anti-Christie,” a reference to the Republican Governor in nearby New Jersey. He’s lived up to his self-billing, as Hartford pushed through 77 separate tax hikes that comprised the largest increase in state history.

The average Connecticut household now pays taxes of $11,639, or one of six dollars of earnings and a jump of $2,839 over 2010. The state and local tax burden per capita is the country’s third highest, after New York and Maryland, according to the Tax Foundation, which also ranks the state 42nd on its 2014 business tax climate index.

Connecticut’s economic growth rate in the Malloy era: minus-0.9% in 2011, 1% in 2012, and 0.9% in 2013, according to the federal Bureau of Economic Analysis.

Mr. Malloy is in a tight race with GOP businessman Tom Foley, who favors tax reform after a “comprehensive review” to make Connecticut more attractive for business investment and reduce the cost of living. When Mr. Malloy was asked at a recent forum how Connecticut could make housing cheaper for the shrinking middle class, he replied that “I don’t have a magic wand.” It’s more accurate to say he doesn’t have a clue.

republican Tom Foley’s campaign has claimed a late advantage with independent candidate Joe Visconti’s departure from the race for governor Sunday morning. Event happened during a Foley bus tour stop in Brookfield.

Kie Westby campaign consultant Ronald Wilcox disclosed in a Friday afternoon email that he will return a controversial $285,000 consulting fee to the Westby campaign, Daily Ructions can report. Claims that the payment, first disclosed here, was an error, were not true.

Wilcox, who had been receiving $1,000 a month from the Westby campaign until it qualified for public financing late in the campaign, is said to be some sort of fiscal conservative. Government money does things to people. Here’s his email to Republican functionary Gary Schaffrick, who in a message to Wilcox noted that he receives Social Security Disability payments and $950 a month from the state party. You can also hire social security disability law firm, if you need disability advice from lawyers.

Gary,

This is to advise you that We are in the process of  filing  an amended report to the State. I have returned the full amount of $285,000 to the Kie Westby for Attorney General Campaign.

I have worked extremely hard to help build this party and I think there are many who appreciate my efforts in this endeavor. I have also worked extremely hard on Kie’s campaign and the results speak for themselves.

Kie is very close and we have all worked very hard to get him where he is. I do not feel it benefits our party or any of our candidates to have made this the issue it has become. If you or anyone felt this fee was excessive or perhaps our filings were in error I think the appropriate thing to do would be to bring it to our attention and work out a resolution rather than make it public.

In any event I want to do what is in the best interest of everyone, and as such, as stated I have returned the full amount of $285,000. And we are in the process of amending our filings.

I would also ask that you forward this to anyone who you may have BCC this to.

Time to GOTV

Thank You

Ronald E Wilcox

Congressional Coordinator

CTGOP

House Republicans will hold a caucus on Thursday to select a new leader. Before they cast their secret ballots, new and returning members will want to confirm from the incumbent team seeking promotion that more than $22,000 in legal fees paid by campaign committees produced all the documents federal law enforcement officials requested. It’s easy to misplace a receipt for, say a limousine ride in sunny Florida, but it’s impossible to provide one if the swank service was paid for by someone else.

Some members are beginning to understand that it is better to get answers to probing questions now than to allow unhappy events to force a second leadership vote next year.

Republican candidate for attorney general Kie Westby may wish he had remained obscure. Party leaders are fuming that after helping the Thomaston lawyer qualify for public campaign funds this month, Westby handed $285,000 to campaign manager Ronald Wilcox. The expenditure is likely to prompt questions in other circles after Westby takes a thumping Tuesday from incumbent Democrat George Jepsen.

Westby’s October 30th filing includes the hefty payment to Wilcox. His previous filing does not include it as an expense incurred not paid. Wilcox appears to have been receiving $1,000 a month from Westby as a consultant until the public financing bonanza arrived in October. That suggests Wilcox was making nearly $100,000 a month in August, September and October, a hefty boost from his previous compensation. The deal is likely to attract the attention of the state’s election enforcement agency. Payments of public funds by a campaign are expected to have some relationship to the work performed.

Danbury mayor and bitter Republican two-time gubernatorial hopeful Mark Boughton will join Democratic Governor Dannel P. Malloy this morning in an announcement in the Hat City. Malloy has been appearing in Connecticut cities this week dropping millions into cities and towns in an expensive tour of the state. In Groton, Malloy larded prosperous General Dynamics with $10 million to buy property from Pfizer, another company that enjoys billions in profits.

Boughton, the 2010 Republican nominee for lieutenant governor, abandoned his bid for the Republican nomination for governor this year when his second running mate of the campaign failed to qualify for the August primary ballot.

Boughton’s relationship with his former running mates–Foley in 2010 and Heather Bond Somers this year–is frosty on its best day.

Republican state treasurer hopeful Tim Herbst has edged closer with this attack mailer to blurting out what insiders in both parties have been commiserating about for years. Incumbent Democrat Denise Nappier might regret dragging Herbst’s father into the campaign. These things escalate.

Pity the Democratic operatives on Nappier watch today. They are earning whatever the are making on this one.