Charlestown to get ripped up over guns
By Will Collette
Rhode Island just experienced its second mass shooting this
year. First, Brown University and now the mass
shooting at a Pawtucket hockey rink.
Quick to respond was Republican
House Minority Leader Mike Chippendale (R-Foster). First, he gives us the
rote thoughts and prayers line and then shifts to deflecting away from guns to
mental health and the MAGA-inspired national controversy over gender.
Here’s a key section from Chippendale’s statement:
In the immediate aftermath of events like this, public
officials often reach for simple explanations. When leaders say this tragedy
was “caused by gun violence,” they are transparently reducing a complex
human failure to a single talking point. In cases like this, the firearm was
the means, not the cause, and violence of this nature almost always involves
deeper factors – severe or untreated mental health struggles, instability,
isolation, and warning signs that were missed or ignored. If we are serious about
prevention, those realities must be part of the conversation.
Granted, there is always a reason, rational or not, why a
person takes a gun (or two or more) and kills people. And yes, it is important
to look at those reasons and try to figure out how to prevent them from
sparking more carnage.
But Chippendale is wrong to dismissively say “the firearm
was the means, not the cause." The decision to kill for whatever reason combined with easy access to
guns is what makes the United States the gun murder capital of the world.
This wrenching issue is about to become a central part of
Charlestown’s political culture between now and at least through the September
8 Democratic primary.
Send lawyers, guns and money
I went over the end-of-year campaign finance disclosures for
Charlestown’s four major political committees to see how they look at the start
of the 2026 election year when they engage in the biennial struggle over
control of the town.
I also took a look at the campaign figures for House
District 36, held by incumbent Rep. Tina Spears. Gun lobby-backed Leah
Boisclair is the figurehead candidate for the League of Rhode Island
Businesses (LORIB) seeking to defeat Tina in the September 8 Democratic
primary.
Just based on the money, it looks like the District 36 race
will be Charlestown's first major election event, focused as it is on the
Democratic primary that takes place two months before the General Election.
The LORIB candidate Boisclair is running as a Democrat
despite having no known ties to the party. Her sponsor, entrepreneur Dave
Levesque, set up 40 political action committees (PACs), one for each
municipality plus a statewide PAC, to promote his pro-gun agenda.
He’s also a
devoted MAGA dude who vehemently opposes taxes on the rich such as the state’s new Taylor Swift law
that levees a state surcharge on high-priced absentee-owned property.
Levesque is running MAGA-style candidates against virtually EVERY
Democratic
woman in South County. That includes Charlestown’s state senator Victoria
Gu. Levesque is backing MAGA nut Westin Place (R) – Victoria beat him handily in
the last two elections.
Levesque is putting a lot of cash behind Carolina resident attorney
Leah Boisclair, most of it coming from other LORIB PACs and from pro-gun
groups. Boisclair’s campaign finance report shows around $25,000 came in during
the final quarter of 2025, leaving her with a balance of $20,519.85 to start
the year.
You should take a good look at who gave to each campaign
because the numbers tell you a lot about the two candidates. As the adage goes,
“follow the money.”
 |
Tina Spears with Sen. Victoria Gu.
Gu is also a LORIB target |
Rep. Tina Spears
support
Rep. Tina Spears begins the campaign year coming within $200 of matching Boisclair's gun cash. She has cash on hand of $20,306.21. She raised around $15,000 in the final quarter of 2025.
Of that $15,000, only $1,250 came from political action committees, including the state
AFL-CIO, the RI Good Government PAC and PACs representing firefighters,
construction and public employees.
There were lots of donations from people who appeared to be
family, friends, colleagues from non-profits serving children and people in the
district.
This list includes a number of well-known local leaders.
Among them:
- ·
Charlestown Town Council President Deb Carney
- ·
Lifelong Charlestown activist Frank Glista
- ·
Former Charlestown Democrats chair Kathleen
Marra
- ·
Rep. Carol McEntee, South Kingstown
- ·
Tomaquag Museum director Loren Spears
- ·
Jane Merner from Earthcare composting
- ·
Rob Lyons from Ocean House Marina
I’ll be on the list for the next report.
Very different
funding profile for Boisclair
Leah Boisclair reported $25,000 raised in the last quarter
of 2025. Here’s where her money trail takes us.
She donated $2,500 from her own law practice. According to her website, she focuses on defending clients charged with some very unsavory crimes. In a
later article, I will dive in more deeply into the choices she made with her
law practice. Meanwhile, here’s how she describes her specialties:
She reported $1,650 from the water and wastewater industry –
five different companies including local firms AB Hoxie and Benn Water. She may
have won with this business sector’s allegiance through a 2022 Ashaway case (detailed
HERE).
She represented a residential landowner who wanted to put in a large-scale commercial water
distribution well. Benn Water was one of the project’s biggest promoters, but
the Town of Hopkinton rejected the proposal.
Several metro lawyers have written checks to Boisclair’s
campaign.
The two main hardcore Rhode Island gun PACs, the Gun Owners
PAC and the 2nd Amendment PAC, kicked in $4000.
Very little of her cash comes from Charlestown or the other
towns in District 36. One of the rare local donations came from Bill Coulter, owner
of Stony Hill Cattle and former chair of the Charlestown Republican Town
Committee. Does that mean there won’t be a Republican contender in
this race?
The biggest single block of Boisclair’s cash - $10,500 –
came from six of Dave Levesque’s League of RI Businesses (LORIB) PACs. They all give their address as a law office at 1410 Reservoir Ave. in Cranston. This includes the so-called
Charlestown LORIB. The other five PACs contributing to Boisclair are the ones
purporting to be in Westerly, South Kingstown, North Kingstown, Newport and
Block Island.
In the Secretary of State’s corporate database, there is only
one registration and that’s for the umbrella organization:
As for the financial reports for the PACs themselves, the
search trick is to use “The League” when using the Board of Elections database. Other variations don't work.
Then you will find all of them each with basically identical
CF-1 Notice of Organization filings naming Levesque as Treasurer. They are all located in Moretti and Preetti's law office shown above, the same incorporator and the same borad.
The Charlestown LORIB PAC is no exception as the screenshot
below shows. It's not located in Charlestown and there’s no one from Charlestown on it.
There is a lot of money shuffling among the LORIB PACs. For
example, Charlestown’s LORIB donation to Leah Boisclair appears to be a
pass-through from the Narragansett LORIB PAC. Narragansett is where Levesque
lives. Narragansett LORIB pays Charlestown LORIB who then funds Leah
Boisclair. That’s along with five other Levesque PACs.
It’s an elaborate web but what I see is this: It's all
about Levesque. Vote for one of his candidates and you are voting for him. A
vote for Boisclair is a vote for Levesque’s pro-gun, anti-tax-the-rich MAGA
agenda.
Boisclair used to use her Facebook account as a promotional site for gun-nut groups in Rhode Island. She scrubbed those posting, but not before they were captured on screenshots. I have those images. You can count on seeing a lot of them between now and September 8 Democratic
Primary where this race is headed. Between now and then, I plan lots more
coverage of this important race.
The General
Election funding race
As for the General Election, the campaign finance reports
for Charlestown’s four major political committees yield few surprises. The four
committees go into the 2026 election with the following cash balances:
- ·
Current town leader Charlestown Residents United
(CRU), $2,391.90
- ·
Former town leader Charlestown Citizens Alliance
(CCA), $9,170.15
- ·
Charlestown Democratic Town Committee (CDTC),
$182.15
- ·
Charlestown Republican Town Committee (CRTC),
$3,583.08
None of these committees raised almost nothing in the final
quarter of 2025. Charlestown Democrats brought in $15. The other three
committees reported no income.
That’s not unusual since in the past, Charlestown’s real
campaigning rarely started before July 4.
Finally, the matchups for Charlestown’s two Senate seats shows:
- Incumbent Sen. Victoria Gu (D) who has represented Charlestown
south of Route One goes into the year with $28,299.50.
- Her opponent for the third straight time is MAGA nut
Republican and LORIB-endorsed Westin Place who goes into the race with $566.66.
He hasn’t gotten his infusion of LORIB and gun money yet.
Our embarrassing
state Senator Elaine Morgan (R-MAGA) is again running for reelection to
represent the northern half of Charlestown. She carries a cash balance of
$3,248.27 into the year.
She faces a strong opponent in Samantha (Sam) Wilcox (D),
Richmond Town Council President. Sam goes into election year with $7,533.71. I’m
proud to say I am on her donor
list.
