League of Rhode Island Businesses: Republican business owners seeking power by subverting campaign finance rules and misleading voters

Behind the mask

Tom Sgouros

Things are seldom dull in the world of politics. This year, Rhode Island has seen the creation of the “League of Rhode Island Businesses,” an organization running several candidates for the General Assembly, many in Democratic primaries. League founder Dave Levesque, who owns the Brewed Awakenings coffee shops in Cranston, Johnston, and Warwick, is a Republican pro-gun activist who feels his point of view is underrepresented at the State House.

You can see a “Lively” interview with him where he calls women’s rights and the repeal of Roe v. Wade “little bitty issues” and tries valiantly to avoid saying that Joe Biden was elected President in 2020. (Kudos to Bill Bartholomew for pursuing him on the points.)

(Full interview here.)

Levesque was to be a featured speaker at a “Rhode Island First” rally planned for this past May, featuring Roger Stone. Yes, that Roger Stone, the treasonous fop with a Nixon tattoo on his back, was sentenced to prison for covering up for Donald Trump’s campaign collusion with Russian operatives in 2016. Trump commuted his sentence, leaving him free to become centrally involved in the 2021 “Stop the Steal” event that led to the January 6 assault on Congress.

Levesque’s League has embraced an innovative strategy to fund its candidates. They created 40 different PACs — one statewide and one for each city and town in Rhode Island — and when you donate through the League web page, it automatically distributes your donation among them so that you can totally evade the disclosure rules for campaign donations. 

To me, the remarkable part is that they boast, right there on the website, that they are doing this to evade disclosure requirements. ➜

 According to the state Board of Elections, what they are doing is indeed legal. It is a loophole in Rhode Island campaign finance law that allows a single organization to control multiple PACs. The League is not the only organization doing this, and a few unions control multiple PACs, as do Amica Insurance and Bally’s. 

Presumably, this is why a bill to close this loophole failed in the General Assembly this year. 

⟵ But for the sake of comparison, here is a chart of information from the Board of Elections showing all the organizations who control multiple PACs. (Thank you, Nancy Lavin, of the Rhode Island Current.) Sometimes a difference in degree becomes a difference in kind, and I marvel that any union would lobby to preserve this kind of disadvantage.

As Levesque has explained, the organizing base of the League is the pro-gun activists who show up to the state house every year to lobby against any proposed regulation of guns. Their website features lots of calls to action like this one. ⬇

As the League, they embrace more issues than just guns. They also inveigh against taxes, road tolls, and business regulation. In other words, standard Republican stuff. However, try as I might, I cannot find the word “Republican” anywhere on their website, or on any of the websites of candidates they endorse.

To be clear, there’s nothing wrong with advocating for positions I do not agree with. Obviously, I think people who hold positions I disagree with are misguided (that’s what it means), but go ahead and take those positions and defend them. 

What’s remarkable about the League is the extent to which its candidates seek to obscure those positions, mainly by running in Democratic primaries on an essentially Republican platform.

Take Kevin Hoyle, for instance, a candidate in the Democratic primary for House District 32 in North Kingstown. Here’s how he introduces himself on Facebook, an image he included in an email exchange with me.

Challenged to endorse the state’s Democratic Party platform, Hoyle emailed me a detailed list of where he agrees and where he does not. 

I suspect he thought this would end a conversation about what kind of Democrat he actually is by allowing him to say he agrees with most of it. 

But his endorsement is filled with cautions and careful wording, such as saying “Recent IPCC reports may change some of this” in response to the platform’s Environment and Climate section, or noting that investment in transportation and infrastructure is important but not through taxes. 

He supports the party platform on voting rights, but felt it was important to emphasize that he only wants voting rights for citizens. Imagining that there is anyone out there advocating for voting rights for non-citizens is a standard part of the MAGA fever dream, of course. Hoyle even included a strange hedge on the civil rights plank, questioning its use of the word “equitable”.

As an exercise in power, running very conservative, if not covertly Republican, candidates in September’s Democratic primary is not a terrible strategy. As we have seen all too well, many voters are not inclined to do much research on the candidates they vote for, and it is relatively straightforward to mislead them. 

Blake Filippi, who was the Republican leader in the House from 2018 to 2022, first won his seat in a Democratic primary in 2014. After defeating Donna Walsh, one of the leaders of Progressive Charlestown, he was unopposed in November and promptly disaffiliated upon his election. Eventually, he became the House Minority leader, successfully — and repeatedly — winning re-election while never using the word “Republican” on his campaign website. You can say this is essentially dishonest, but you can also say, hey, it worked.

EDITOR'S NOTE: While Rep. Donna Walsh was a Progressive Charlestown favorite and I personally work with Donna on issues and her campaigns, she never had any official connection to Progressive Charlestown.  - Will Collette

So this is the League of Rhode Island Businesses: Republican business owners who are seeking power by subverting campaign finance rules and misleading voters. Hoyle is not the only such candidate, and with the lure of plenty of untraceable money to spend, the League has recruited several others, including Mark Mesrobian in Narragansett and North Kingstown; Vanessa Lopez in Pawtucket; Brian Coogan in East Providence; and Leah Boisclair in Charlestown and Westerly. These are all going to be well-funded campaigns, and here’s hoping that money is not enough in the state’s Democratic primaries.

A guest post by Tom Sgouros, Public policy nerd and data scientist. Currently at work on projects in public finance, immunology, astronomy, and information theory. Also a bus rider.

SteveAhlquist.news is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

House District 36 Committee unanimously endorses Rep. Tina Spear for re-election in September 9 Democratic Primary

Her hard work earns support against challenger

By Will Collette

Today, the House District 36 Democratic Committee voted unanimously to officially endorse incumbent Rep. Tina Spears in the upcoming September 9 Democratic Primary. 

The Committee is filing this endorsement in all towns included in the district. House District 36 covers all of Charlestown and Block Island, plus small sections of Westerly and South Kingstown.

The last time Charlestown voters faced a Democratic primary over who will represent House District 36 was twenty years ago. In 2006, longtime State Representative Donna Walsh defeated DINO incumbent Matt McHugh by 685 to 461 in that year's primary.

Donna never faced another primary opponent and served until 2016 when she was defeated by Blake “Flip” Filippi (Republican/Libertarian), an all-round strange guy who in recent years has railed against seals and vaccines but has mostly stuck to raising cattle and his family’s Block Island businesses.

Flip's surprise announcement in 2022 to drop out of Rhode Island politics opened the door for Tina’s election as our Representative where she has been a productive and effective legislator.

From Tina’s website:

Tina has spent the last decade advocating for people with disabilities, and is currently Executive Director of the Community Provider Network of Rhode Island. Her own experience as the parent of a child with significant health challenges led her to become an ardent advocate for families of children with disabilities. She has been a frequent presence at the State House over the last decade, working to defend Medicaid benefits, increase wages for caregivers and help win paid leave for people who must leave work to care for a new child or an ill family member.

​Opposing Tina in the September 9 Democratic Primary is Leah J. Boisclair who is a self-described “Sex Crimes Defense Attorney in Rhode Island.” On her law practice’s website, she graphically lists what types of crimes she will defend, including child rape, domestic violence, homicide, drug crime, white collar crime and so on.

Don’t take my word for it – go to her website.

I was especially surprised at the way she depicted how she would defend against sex crimes. Here’s a screenshot from her website:

Now, if you switch to Boisclair’s campaign website, you’ll see a very different tone as well as content. She mimics Tina’s priority issues of education, environment, affordable housing and health care. There is no record of Boisclair having actually done anything on these issues, but hey, if you want to run as a Democrat, you must at least pretend.

Boisclair glosses over the sordid details of her law practice saying only:

I went through our local schools, earned a political science degree at URI, and graduated cum laude from Roger Williams University School of Law in 2019. I’m licensed in multiple states and federal courts. Before opening my own firm, I worked on criminal and union cases — and then built The Law Office of Leah J. Boisclair, LLC from the ground up…. As an attorney, I stand up for people who need someone in their corner. [Emphasis added].

Make of that what you will. But remember that attorneys, especially those in private practice, CHOOSE who represent.

And those of us who are registered Democratic voters living in House District 36 also CHOOSE who we want to represent us. So, on September 9, please support Rep. Tina Spears in the Democratic Primary.

DISCLOSURE: For years, I have been a member of the House District 36 Democratic Committee and proudly voted today to support Tina Spears in her campaign for re-election.  – Will Collette

South County women under attack from MAGA gun nut

Charlestown’s Rep. Tina Spears and Sen. Victoria Gu among them

By Will Collette

A new right-wing political group hopes to decimate the ranks of Democratic state legislators representing most of South County. It’s called “The League of Rhode Island Businesses (LORIB)” which has set up 40 political action committees all over the state – one in each municipality and the state PAC.

This new group was founded by Trump supporter David Levesque, a Warwick coffee shop owner who says he was motivated by the state’s passage of a ban on assault weapons. In addition to gun rights, the League is also vehemently opposed to taxes on the rich such as the state’s new Taylor Swift law that levees a state surcharge on high-priced absentee-owned property.

The League has already announced a slate of candidates and plans to recruit more who will push Levesque’s MAGA agenda. Most of his targets are women, all are Democrats. Most of the targets voted to ban military-style assault rifles.

Who is on the LORIB target list in South County?

•     Rep. Tina Spears (Charlestown, Westerly, Block Island, So. Kingstown)
•     Sen. Victoria Gu (Westerly, Charlestown)
•     Sen. Alana DiMario
•     Sen. Bridgette ValVerde
•     Rep. Carol Hagen McEntee
•     Rep. Kathy Fogarty

Levesque is looking for candidates to challenge:

•     Rep. Teresa Tanzi
•     Rep. Julie Casimiro
•     And to challenge for the open seat being vacated in North Kingstown by Rep. Bob Craven

In all but one instance, the League is backing DINO candidates in the hope of unseating incumbents in the Democratic primary. The exception is Sen. Victoria Gu – LORIB’s only Republican pick is MAGAnut Westin Place who was trounced by Victoria twice (2022 and 2024).

Levesque also has a major South County footprint as a Narragansett resident and principal in the following businesses:

I am hoping Levesque’s focus on the primaries will backfire. By definition, only registered Democrats can vote in those primaries and primary voters tend to pay more attention than voters in the General election. Democratic Town Committees will need to make sure voters understand what’s at stake and may need to prepare to counter business-sponsored mailer blitzes.

The Providence Journal says the League of Rhode Island Businesses “pledged full financial support” to its endorsed candidates. Whether Levesque can actually raise enough money to back up that pledge remains to be seen. It’s not showing up in any serious way in their most recent Campaign Finance reports.

The League of RI Businesses Charlestown reported a cash balance of $15. Its registered office is in Cranston.

Last October, attorney Leah Boisclair was among the first of the LORIB candidates to declare, bagging a Westerly Sun “top story.” The article was pretty much a news release, light on detail and high on puff. However, looking a little deeper into Boisclair’s record, there wasn’t much there besides her defense of criminal defendants.

She’s a defense attorney who, according to her website, defends clients charged with violent crime, domestic abuse, crimes against property and sex crimes.

She is a self-described "Sex Crimes Defense Attorney." I'm not making this up.

Of course, under the Constitution, everyone is judged to be innocent until proven guilty and is entitled to a defense. Here is a list copied directly from her website listing the types of sex crimes she defends:

Sexual Assault

• First-Degree Sexual Assault (Rape)
• Second-Degree Sexual Assault (Sexual Contact)
• Third-Degree Sexual Assault (Statutory Rape)

Child Molestation

• First-Degree Child Molestation (Rape)
• Second-Degree Child Molestation (Sexual Contact)
• Third-Degree Child Molestation (Statutory Rape)

Sex Crimes Charges

• Indecent Exposure
• Video Voyeurism
• Unauthorized Dissemination of Indecent Material

Child Exploitation or Harm

• Possession of Child Pornography
• Distribution of Child Pornography
• Indecent Solicitation of a Minor
• Exploitation for Commercial Purposes
• Electronic Dissemination of Indecent Material to Minors
• Cruelty to or Neglect of a Child
• Child Endangerment
• Patronizing a Minor for Commercial Sexual Activity

Prostitution-Related Offenses

• Procurement of Sexual Conduct for a Fee
• Loitering for Prostitution
• Solicitation of Prostitution
• Promoting or Permitting Prostitution
• Trafficking an Individual
• Sexual Servitude
• Forced Labor

I’m not making any of this up – this is from HER website.

Again, while everyone is entitled to a defense and presumption of innocence, I’m sure glad I’m not the one doing the defending. Further, I’m not very comfortable with this promotional piece, especially the stilettos and underwear, shown in this screenshot from her website:

Given her portfolio, her practice would probably be very successful in Washington, DC with its abundance of pedos and sexual predators. Maybe her MAGA sponsor felt that this portfolio was a plus for her. This is a question that I hope will be explored during the campaign.

I didn’t see much in her history about any sort of public service or civic engagement. She waitressed at the Homestead on Route 2 and staffed a booth for the Grange at the Washington County Fair, but that was about it. She’s running as a Democrat, but I’ve never seen her at any local Democratic function.

Maybe we’ll learn more about her as the campaign year progresses.

I’ll also be curious to see whether the Charlestown Citizens Alliance (CCA) weighs in. The CCA backed Libertarian Republican Blake “Flip” Filippi in his defeat of long-time District 36 state Rep. Donna Walsh. Will they support the LORIB PAC effort to oust Rep. Spears and Senator Gu?

But for now, Charlestown has an outstanding state representative in Tina Spears who is running for reelection to a 3^rd term. Compare her record of community service and legislative effectiveness to Boisclair’s and I believe the choice is clear.

Like Orwell's totalitarian state in 1984, they're forcing us to accept that 2 + 2 = 5

MAGA's mandatory canonization of Charlie Kirk

Aaron Regunberg

Former Charlestown state Rep. Blake "Flip" Filippi
 jumps on the bandwagon

I really didn’t want to write about Charlie Kirk. But over the last week I’ve become increasingly shaken by MAGA’s attempts use this tragedy to sever our nation’s grasp on the existence of an objective reality, and by the willingness of too many Democrats to let them. So I wanted to share this piece, published in The New Republic. Thanks for reading, and wishing you the best in these bleak, bleak times.

—Aaron

'O’Brien held up his left hand, its back towards Winston, with the thumb hidden and the four fingers extended.

‘How many fingers am I holding up, Winston?’

‘Four.’

‘And if the party says that it is not four but five—then how many?’

In the days since Charlie Kirk was murdered, I’ve found myself repeatedly musing on this passage from George Orwell’s 1984. The novel’s protagonist, Winston Smith, had once written in his diary, “Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.” In Orwell’s totalitarian state, this assertion was a thought crime, and following Winston’s disappearance into Big Brother’s torture chambers, the party sought to break him—or, more specifically, to break his commitment to the existence of an objective reality.

‘You are a slow learner, Winston,’ said O’Brien gently.

‘How can I help it?’ Winston blubbered. ‘How can I help seeing what is in front of my eyes? Two and two are four.’

‘Sometimes, Winston. Sometimes they are five. Sometimes they are three. Sometimes they are all of them at once. You must try harder. It is not easy to become sane.’

The moment that news of Kirk’s shooting hit the internet, MAGA—its influencers, podcasters, media figures, Republican elected officials, cabinet directors, Vice President JD Vance, and President Donald Trump—immediately began insisting that two and two make five. Their gaslighting around Kirk’s death has been so extensive—and so speedily promulgated—that it’s hard to fully grasp the sheer magnitude of their mendacity. 

The week ahead in Charlestown

UPDATE: Warm but not too warm, ground level ozone, increased pollen and Flip Filippi is mad about dog poo

By Will Collette

UPDATE: When I posted this article yesterday, the pollution forecast for today called for MODERATE ground level ozone pollution. DEM has upgraded that warning to UNHEALTHY for today. The moderate ozone pollution warning has been extended into Thursday. There is a 50% chance of rain in Charlestown on Thursday which will help clean the air though the pollen forecast continues to be high.

One of Charlestown's big advantages is how our temperatures are usually milder than Providence. This week, the city will swelter in 90+ degree heat while our temps will be in the low 80s. Not much rain so be sure you tend your tomato plants.

The heat in the city will drive up our beach traffic. Aside from the hassle of dealing with visitors' driving habits, the increased traffic plus warm temperatures will increase dangerous ground level ozone pollution levels to "moderate" for at least the next three days. It doesn't look like we'll see much smoke from the Canadian wildfires that covered much of our area last week.

Seasonal allergy sufferers are probably also aware that pollen counts are back up and are slated to rise even more. The sources are ragweed, grasses and nettle. The lack of rain contributes to these high pollen counts:

Finally, please note the complaints tweeted by ex-Charlestown state Rep. Blake "Flip" Filippi. Flip still owns a house in Charlestown though he mostly lives elsewhere - Block Island, his cattle range or who knows where. If you're anywhere near 17 Josephine Drive in Charlestown, he has some instructions for you on how to handle your dog shit:

As Donald Trump likes to say, "Thank you for your attention to this matter."

RI Republicans think the way to cut electricity bills is to curb renewable energy

To prove they are mega MAGA macho, they've dumped a symbolic package of bills to wipe out green energy

By Will Collette

Is that Mike Chippendale heading down from Foster
to his news conference? 

Not to be outdone by their lord and master Donald Trump, his hatred of “windmills” and love of coal, Republican General Assembly members led by House Minority leader Mike Chippendale just announced a collection of bills to promote fossil fuels at the expense of energy efficiency.

These bills have NO chance of passage, not just because they have no merit, but because they are being introduced at the end of the General Assembly session. Apparently Chippendale et al. are sending some symbolic message to somebody – maybe King Donald – that they are as MAGA-maniacal as anybody.

Like most energy conversations, they begin with the largely true, widely held belief that electricity bills are too high. But from there, it’s all downhill.

I live in Charlestown, one of Rhode Island’s most vulnerable communities to the effects of climate change. Storms are worse and more frequent even trashing the Charlestown Breachway. Our beaches are eroding. The sea level is rising. Seawater is infiltrating groundwater. It’s very hard to get homeowner’s insurance at any price.

Over the past 25 years, Cathy and I have taken action to increase our energy efficiency by getting an energy audit, adding insulation, putting on a light-colored steel roof and, through the much missed Solarize Charlestown program, installed an array of solar panels in 2017. We’ve also replaced our appliances with the most energy efficient available and added heat pumps.

I would love to add residential sized vertical axis wind turbines, but Charlestown’s town ordinance makes it impossible to do so (click HERE to see why). This is a legacy of the NIMBY faction of the Charlestown Citizens Alliance (CCA), and I hope to see that ordinance repealed soon.

Every change we made cost money upfront but was made easier through state and federal rebates and tax credits and, in the case of our solar panels, being able to sell our excess power back into the grid. Every energy investment we have made has paid us back through lower electricity usage.

Donald Trump and Congressional Republicans want to end all of that and now we’ve heard from state Republicans that they want to do the same here in Rhode Island.

Chippendale said, “Far too often, the utility is painted as the villain, but many of these cost increases stem from legislative mandates — laws passed by the General Assembly that forced utilities to buy expensive energy or fund inefficient programs…”

He condemned the payback solar panel owners like us get for selling our excess energy: “Right now, solar customers are credited at the full retail rate for energy. They produce up to 125% of their usage. That’s not market-based. It’s an inflated rate that gets passed on to every single ratepayer in this state.”

WTF? “Full retail rate” isn’t “market-based?” As it is, the number of solar panels you can install has to roughly match your usage. Personally, I would have wanted to add more since the marginal increased cost would have meant more generated power. That’s market-based, Mike. And like the energy companies, the utility pays us at the rate called for by law.

The other market-based reality ignored by the MAGA world is the rapid expansion of green energy generation and how through the economies of scale, green energy prices have been consistently dropping. 

All across Red State Middle America, wind and solar power companies have been booming, generating employment booms as well as energy at levels that now surpass fossil fuels. Trying to reverse this market trend makes no economic sense. As Mike would say, not “market-based.”

Even Charlestown’s ex-state Rep. Blake “Flip” Filippi is on board with this regressive approach to energy, shown in this tweet on X (note: Trump is pictured with coal miners, not natural gas drillers):

I do not understand the MAGA obsession with wasting energy. Or hating energy efficiency. Or leaning into increased use of polluting fuels. Who benefits other than the fossil fuel companies?

Is it just about “owning the libs?”

Ever since Jimmy Carter’s sweater and the first Arab oil embargo in 1973, most Americans have come to believe we need to be smarter about energy. Energy efficiency is an unqualified good thing regardless of your location on the political spectrum. Burning less fossil fuels is an unqualified good thing.

We’ve come a long way in 50 years and we still have quite a distance to go. Why Chippendale and MAGA-world want to turn the clock back is baffling and unjustified.

Dennis Algiere returns to public life

Former state Senator Algiere represented the southern half of Charlestown for years

By Will Collette

Dennis Algiere is one of the few surviving members of a nearly extinct species: a moderate Republican. Actually, Algiere had hoped to launch his political career but was told by the then old-school Westerly Democratic machine that he had to wait in line.

On his own and as a Republican, Algiere went on to win Senate District 38 which he held for 30 years until declining to run for re-election in 2023. He was replaced by a smart young Democrat, Senator Victoria Gu.

During his long term, Algiere created an office that was a model of efficient constituent service. On the issues, he was usually center-left. These qualities meant he faced almost no challengers and usually won re-election unopposed.

I noticed a dramatic change in Algiere right after Donald Trump took the White House for his first term. He went silent. Algiere was never a self-promoter, unlike his local House colleague Blake "Flip" Filippi who would never pass up the chance to show off. Algiere pretty much stopped being the face and voice of state Republicans and that void was filled by such local radical MAGAnuts as Filippi, Sen. Elaine Morgan (who represented the northern half of Charlestown), and January 6 participant ex-state rep. Justin Price.

While others were surprised when Algiere made his 2022 announcement that he wasn't going to run, I wasn't. It had already seemed like Algiere had checked out of politics.

Accepting our hapless Gov. Dan McKee's invitation to serve on the Rhode Island Board of Education may be a one off. As usual, Algiere isn't saying whether this means he is coming back into the fray. All he said was:

“I am honored that the governor has asked me to return to public service. I am especially enthusiastic about supporting our students who deserve an innovative and accessible education system that can help them on the path to success.”

Blake Filippi tweets up a storm

He's still strange

By Will Collette

Charlestown's former state representative Blake "Flip" Filippi has been relatively quiet since he decided to forego a reelection bid so he could pursue an obscure lawsuit on an arcane procedural matter. He did emerge briefing for a flurry of tweets calling for the killing of local seals because, he claimed, they were luring great white sharks to our coastal waters.

But since Donald Trump's election win, Flip has come out of his shell to begin posting again on Twitter/X with some pretty bonkers stuff such as calling for the Mexican drug cartels to be declared "terrorist organizations" presumably to allow Trump to carry out his threatened air strikes in Mexico.

He also dumped some smarm on Joe Biden for protecting his family from MAGA attacks through pre-emptive pardons.

But this one really caught my eye:

First, Flip, if you're going to attack a national hero like Dr. Anthony Fauci, at least spell his name right - that's "Fauci" not "Faucci."

Since Flip posted his tweet, Donald Trump has pulled federal protection for Fauci and his family after years of death threats. I am waiting for Flip to tweet his approval for Trump's act of putting a bulleye's on Dr. Fauci's back.

During Filippi's eight years in the state legislature supposedly protecting Charlestown's interests, Flip did virtually nothing to help our community. 

He represented the violent militia group, the Oathkeepers, who just received Trump pardons for their criminal acts during the January 6 attempted coup.

He introduced a series of half-baked Constitutional amendments to support his own bizarre libertarian beliefs. He filed frivolous lawsuits, such as the one he promised the Copar Quarry victims would solve their problems. He made promises he couldn't or wouldn't keep. 

Federal court upholds RhodeWorks truck tolling program

Opposed by Republicans, truck tolls help fix roads and bridges

By Christopher Shea, Rhode Island Current

Former Charlestown state Rep. Blake "Flip" Filippi railed
against truck tolls and wanted to pass a Constitutional amendment to ban
highway tolls.

Trucks can once again be tolled in Rhode Island, a federal appeals has decided.

A three-judge panel of the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday ruled caps on tolls for local traffic were unconstitutional, but that the overall system created under the state’s RhodeWorks program could remain in place.

Under the 2016 legislation signed by then-Gov. Gina Raimondo, tractor-trailers and larger trucks were required to pay a toll when they crossed through 14 gantries across Rhode Island’s highways and bridges. Funding from the trucks would then go to improving the state’s bridges. The plan placed a $20-per-day cap to cross the state in any one direction for large commercial trucks.

Each gantry had an average toll of $3.

Tolling began in 2018, but the program was soon hit with a lawsuit from the American Trucking Associations that claimed the collections violated the U.S. Constitution’s dormant Commerce Clause, which prohibits states from engaging in protectionist practices against other states.

U.S. District Court Judge William E. Smith sided with the association, ruling in 2022 that the state had to stop collecting truck tolls — which the state appealed.

In his ruling Friday, U.S. Appeals Judge William Kayatta wrote there was “insufficient support” toward the association’s claims.

“Even were we to assume that a few Rhode Island single-unit trucks compete in some manner with a few out-of-state tractor-trailers, ATA’s argument would still fall short,” he wrote. “The dormant Commerce Clause is not an atomic fly swatter to be wielded against any and all trivial effects on commerce.”

However, Kayatta agreed that the caps placed on trucks traveling in and out of the state were unlawful.

“At first blush, RhodeWorks (minus the caps) would seem to pass the fair-approximation test quite easily,” he wrote. “Out-of-state tractor-trailers receive substantially less of a discount per bridge crossing than do in-state tractor-trailers. Therefore, the privilege of toll capping is considerably more valuable for intrastate carriers than it is for interstate carriers.”

But the truck toll system would be constitutional as long as the daily toll caps are removed, Kayatta ruled.

American Trucking Associations Chief Legal Officer Richard Pianka said he is reviewing the court’s decision and considering next steps.

In case you were wondering what's bugging Blake Filippi these days....

 ...Here's the answer

Former Charlestown state Rep Blake "Flip" Filippi has turned into a Robert F. "Worm Ate My Brain" Kennedy Jr. fan with several favorable "tweets" on Elon Musk's "X" platform.

Flip's most recent tweet highlights the debunked conspiracy theory that offshore wind turbines are responsible for killing whales. Here it is:

Rhode Island Republicans wonder what will make their party "great"

Maybe stop running rightwing nuts like Elaine Morgan and Justin Price? 

By Nancy Lavin, Rhode Island Current

Days after Donald Trump’s conviction in the New York hush-money trial, Steve Frias finally broke his silence.

The Rhode Island Republican National Committeeman told party leaders he would not seek reelection to the post he’d held for 12 years, denouncing Trump and his supporters for alleging the trial and verdict were politically motivated. 

“I kept procrastinating, hoping something would change, thinking ‘maybe I am wrong here,’” said Frias, an attorney who lives in Cranston.

But he knew it was the right thing to do based on the relief he felt the minute he stepped away. He longer had to feign allegiance to the presumptive nominee at the state party convention in late June, or the Republican National Convention in July.

Yet many Rhode Island Republicans tiptoe around the topic of Trump. They may be fearful of stepping out of line with the national party. More importantly, they may want to avoid alienating the 47% of Rhode Island voters who are unaffiliated.

Insurrectionist Justin Price wants to beat
 Megan Cotter to win back his seat

No Republican has won a federal or general office seat in the state in over a decade. And now, their marginal presence in the 113-seat Rhode Island Legislature could diminish even further, with three of the 14 Republican incumbents not seeking reelection in November and fewer than 30 Republican challengers for Democratic-held, or open seats.

While national politics isn’t entirely to blame, the shifting ideology of the national Republican party certainly hasn’t helped Rhode Island Republicans, said Wendy Schiller, a political science professor and interim director for the Thomas J. Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University.

“The national Republican party is really out of step with what Rhode Islanders want and what they believe,” Schiller said in a recent interview. “It presents a real challenge for local candidates when your national party is saying it wants to cut Medicaid, doesn’t believe in climate change, doesn’t support infrastructure spending — all things Rhode Island desperately needs.”

Not to mention, the lack of cash and resources the Rhode Island GOP has to offer to candidates already facing an uphill battle simply because of voter demographics. 

Is Flip going to go clubbing?

With Republicans, cruelty is the point

By Will Collette

Composite by Will Collette.

I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Charlestown’s former state Representative Blake “Flip” Filippi (R) shows up at Blue Shutters Beach for one of the Mystic Aquarium’s frequent releases of rehabilitated seals. 

Except unlike most onlookers, instead of a camera, he'll have a big club to beat the newly healed critters to death before they hit the water.

I’m not joking.

If you follow Flip on Twitter/X, you’ll notice that he’s been campaigning against the growing population of seals in Block Island Sound on the grounds that they will attract great white sharks. 

And before you can say “Jaws,” there goes tourism on Block Island where, not coincidentally, the Filippi family has large business holdings catering to said tourists.

In his own words, here is what Flip has been saying: 

From Flip's Twitter/X feed

Accompanying a photo (👉) of seals gathered on a beach, he wrote: “Lots of Block Island shark bait!”

 

He wrote another post using the same photo and said: “Whoa – this is the most chum I’ve seen on Block Island!”

 

Accompanying a ProJo article on the growing seal population and Mystic Aquarium’s marine animal rescue program, he really got into his hatred of seals, writing: 

“Rhode Island will rue the ongoing explosion of our seal population when Great White Sharks take up residence alongside them. Cull the year-round seal population before it is too late.”

He wrote another post on the same ProJo article:

“Gee – let’s see if great whites take up residence off Block Island to follow the growing seal population. How about instead we get rid of the damn seals and not have to find out.”

He also posted a phone photo of what may be a shark fin in the water, saying the photo was taken south of Block Island.

There is a smidgen of truth in Blake’s anti-seal rants. There are now roughly 200-300 seals in the waters between Block Island and Charlestown, and seals are Great Whites’ favorite food, according to scientists.

Experts say that Cape Cod is a more popular venue for Great Whites because there are even more seals there. However, just the mere presence of sharks doesn’t lead, ipso facto, to attacks on humans.

While shark attacks on humans DO occur – and get big headlines – they occur far less often than you might think.

Last year, there were 36 shark attacks in all US waters. Worldwide, 69 unprovoked bites were reported plus another 22 listed as “provoked.”

Patch cited the Atlantic Shark Institute in Wakefield saying there have been two confirmed shark fatalities in Rhode Island waters in the last 200 years. That's once a century.

In an article listing all documented shark attacks, fatal or not, in New England waters between 1751 and 2019, six are listed for Rhode Island and of those, two were fatal.

The first recorded fatality was a young boy killed in Bristol Harbor in 1816. The second occurred at Watch Hill in 1895.

The last incident listed was a possible attack on a surfer while returning to Moonstone Beach in 2019. He reported his leg was bloody from punctures but could not identify what caused those lacerations.

It was NOT a Great White Shark. The Institute has tagged 30 Great Whites in Rhode Island waters but no shark fatalities by ANY species of shark in 129 years.

And that’s it. When I said Flip had a smidgen of truth in his rants, maybe I was being too generous since there is no scientific or historical evidence to support his fears of a Sharknado outbreak in Rhode Island. And no reason to start killing seals en masse unless Flip thinks that would be a tourist draw.

But perhaps Blake has another reason for ranting about killing seals: maybe Filippi, like his former MAGA-nut colleague Justin Price, is planning a political comeback.

One necessary step for any 2024 Republican politician is to show how in-sync their thinking is with the GOP’s Supreme Leader, convicted felon Donald Trump.

It turns out Trump is also obsessed with sharks. Yesterday, June 19, at a campaign event in Nevada, Trump went on a tear where he linked his hatred of sharks with his equally fierce hatred of electric vehicles.

He conjured the image of being in a sinking, electric-powered boat. In his own words describing his "dialogue" with a guy he was watching on TV:

"I say, what would happen if the boat sank from its weight, and you're in the boat, and you have this tremendously powerful battery, and the battery is now underwater. And there's a shark that's approximately 10 yards over there…

"By the way, lot of shark attacks lately, I watched some guys justifying it today. 'Well, they weren't really that angry. They bit off the young lady's leg because of the fact that they were, they were not hungry, but they misunderstood who she was. He said 'there's no problem with sharks, they just didn't really understand a young woman's swimming. She really got decimated and other people too, a lot of shark attacks.

So I said [To the guy he was watching on television], there's a shark 10 yards away from the boat, do I get electrocuted? If the boat is sinking, water goes over the battery, the boat is sinking, do I stay on top of the boat and get electrocuted? Or do I jump over by the shark and not get electrocuted?

"Because I will tell you he didn't know the answer. He said, 'you know, nobody's ever asked me that question.' I said I think it's a good question. I think there's a lot of electric current coming to that water. But you know what I'd do? If there was a shark or you get electrocuted, I'll take electrocution every single time. I'm not getting near the shark."

Got all that?

In today’s Republican Party, cruelty seems to be the point. After all, Trump has great plans for even crueler policies toward immigrants than we saw in his first term when thousands of children were taken from their parents. Trump had no plan to reunite those children with those parents, and at the end of his term, almost a thousand were unaccounted for.

That just one of many Trump acts of cruelty with many more to come when he becomes “Dictator for a Day” and goes after his many enemies.

The apple doesn’t fall from the tree: lest we forget, his boys Donald Jr. and Eric posed [👈] gleefully with endangered animals they killed on safari. 

That’s par for the course, given Donald Sr.’s well-documented dislike of animals, dogs in particular.

To build their MAGA cred, ambitious MAGAnuts burnish their hard right credentials through acts of cruelty.

South Dakota Governor and Trump VP wannabe Kristin Noem thought that writing about shooting her puppy Cricket in the head, killing a goat that annoyed her and calling it “life on the farm” would be good for her career. She claimed she hated both animals.

On policy matters, GOP governors work hard to show how cruel they can be to those groups that their Orange Master dislikes. 

For example, there’s Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ new law banning mandatory water and heat breaks for outdoor workers. Maybe Florida agri-business sees dead farmworkers as good fertilizer for their crops.

Then there’s Texas Governor Greg Abbott who installs hundreds of miles of razor wire on the border ignoring court orders to stop. He has ordered the kidnap of other migrants who are put on buses and sent to northern cities.

Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee took credit for revoking laws prohibiting child labor in her state.

Of course, this is only a tiny part of the list of cruelties that includes attacks on reproductive rights, women, workers, veterans, Medicare and Social Security, domestic aid programs, help for Ukraine’s fight against Russian aggression, vaccinations, books, the environment, civil rights, education, the Constitution and democracy itself.

Let’s not forget the 1.1 million-plus Americans who died due to COVID and how Republicans are trying to provoke some lone wolf assassin to kill the pandemic’s most prominent hero, Dr. Anthony Fauci.

Yes, cruelty is the point and that’s why I have a strong hunch we’re going to see Flip Filippi on the ballot this November.