MAGA gun PAC seems to have lost EVERY Democratic primary
By Will Collette
EDITOR'S NOTE: Am having tech problems with graphics. So in the absence of that, check out this one Tina posted on Xitter yesterday: Tina Spears on X: "Are you HOOKED on civic engagement??? 🎣 I know I am! Early voting wraps up today, and tomorrow is your last chance to CAST your ballot. Make your voting plan and REEL in that vote! https://t.co/ep8qJXDxDZ" / X
Well, the top story for Charlestown is our respected state Representative Tina Spears absolutely crushed her opponent, sex crime defense lawyer Leah Boisclair, by a margin of 82% to 18%, despite a ton of money poured into Boisclair by the ultra-rightwing League of Rhode Island Businesses, and the gun lobby.
Based on the posted results as of 9 PM, Tina’s margin of victory is
the highest for a Democrat facing a LORIB-funded challenger.
Since Tina has no Republican challenger in the General
Election unless LORIB boss Dave Levesque wants to spend more money running a
write-in campaign. Otherwise, Tina wins a third term as Charlestown’s Rep.
State Senator Alana DiMario, representing neighboring South
Kingstown and Narragansett, beat her LORIB challenger Mark Mesrobian by 72% to
28%. She also has no opponent in the General Election.
Bob Craven Jr. won his primary to replace his dad as state Representative
for North Kingstown by 74 to 26 beating LORIB-backed Kevin Hoyle.
LORIB lost all six of the Democratic primary challengers
they paid for upstate: three in the Senate and three in the House. Only two of
those races had margins of less than 10 points.
There will be a second chance for LORIB in November when its
remaining clients, all running as Republicans, attempt to beat Democratic
incumbents. We have many of those in South County where LORIB is going to try
knocking out Charlestown’s state Senator Victoria Gu by backing a guy Victoria
has already beaten twice.
In South Kingstown, Rep. Carol McEntee also faces a loser,
Jessica Drew Roy, who also lost twice. Rep. Kathy Fogarty will face Jennifer Nerbonne
whose main political experience was as a Donald Trump delegate at the 2024 GOP
Convention.
Rep. Megan Cotter will face climate-change denier and Moms
for Liberty maven Jasmine Roy.
The most peculiar LORIB challenge is an effort to unseat
Westerly state Rep. Sam Azzinaro, funding his opponent developer Christopher
Stanton.
The November race that may be the most high drama is the
effort by Richmond Town Council President Samantha (Sam) Wilcox to finally rid
South County of the embarrassing MAGA nut, Sen. Elaine Morgan who represents
the top half of Charlestown and is backed by LORIB. Go, Sam, go!
Cold consolation
While Dave Levesque ponders where all his money went while
crying into his iced latte, there were some LORIB-adjacent scores that may give
him some cold comfort.
Levesque and LORIB did not endorse any candidates for state
office or Congress, but there were still such characters as Florida carpetbagger
and MAGA nut Vic Mellor who hung around LORIB a lot. He won the GOP primary by
58% to 42% for the green light to challenge Charlestown’s US Representative
Seth Magaziner in the November election. I just wonder how serious Mellor would
be about representing RI District 2 since he is already a registered
representative of government of Cuba. Not joking.
LORIB-adjacent Republican Aaron Guckian appears to have
edged his MAGA-nut opponent Elaine Pelino by 298 votes. We’ll see if that
result holds up.
In Charlestown, lots of Leah Boisclair signs were paired
with LORIB-adjacent Democratic candidate for Attorney General Joe Solomon. He
lost, coming in third out of four candidates, losing to winner Kim Ahern by a
wide margin. If Rhode Island had run-off elections when no candidate gets 50+%
of the vote, Solomon would not have made the run-off.
Bye, bye Dan
The marquee event of the day is of course the battle for
Governor between inept incumbent Dan McKee versus Helena Foulkes. As expected,
McKee got waxed by a margin of 62 to 38.
I think everyone in the state knew this was coming, given McKee’s
unprincipled and incompetent management of the state’s business. Democratic
voters chose corporate Democrat Helena Foulkes to move on to the three-way
November election. She will definitely face so-called independent Ken Block and
most likely Republican challenger Aaron Guckian.
I have no illusions about Foulkes being far more corporate
than progressive. Despite that, I kind of like her but expect, as I am with nearly every politician, that I will
probably be disappointed. However, she could be great. And I believe she will
be a far better Governor than either Guckian or Block.