Tuesday is the state primary in Massachusetts, and if that news doesn't get you super excited, you are not alone.
The Massachusetts presidential primary in March attracted about 1.2 million voters. On Tuesday, voters return to the polls to pick nominees for state and county-level offices. And it's been a sleepy political season so far in many parts of the state.
Chris Lisinski, State House News Service: Personally, I'm excited about the primary, but that might not apply to everyone.
Sam Hudzik, NEPM: I am too, I guess. We 're just going to admit it, Chris. But this is where that lack of excitement comes in: There are only a few contested races, and on some ballots there are no contested races. But there is a statewide Republican contest and a few state legislative contests in western Mass. we should keep our eyes on. Let's start with the U.S. Senate. Who are the players there?
There are three people who are hoping to win the Republican nomination to challenge Elizabeth Warren, who is seeking another term in the Senate and faces no primary opposition of her own. We've got Quincy City Councilor Ian Kane, cryptocurrency attorney John Deaton and industrial engineer Robert Antonellis.
The three of them have staked out different approaches to this field. Antonellis has aligned himself most closely of the three with the Donald Trump wing of the GOP. Kane and Deaton have tried to strike somewhat of a different tone — the kind of tone you might expect from more traditional Massachusetts Republicans. They've also been divided on individual policy positions, especially on immigration, which particularly in the U.S. Senate, is a real pressure point.
And on the state legislative races, we have three contested Democratic primaries in western Mass., two around Springfield and one in the southern Berkshires. What are you expecting there?
The southern Berkshires one is a particularly interesting race because Smitty Pignatelli is not running for reelection for the first time in [22 years]. So, for a lot of people, this is the first chance to pick someone new in ages. There are three Democrats who are on the ballot this primary season: Leigh Susan Davis, Jamie Minacci and Patrick Thomas White.
Whoever emerges victorious from that figures to face an unenrolled candidate in Marybeth Mitts. Traditionally, unenrolled candidates have a pretty low record of success in general elections in Massachusetts. So I think we can say it's likely that the winner of the Democratic primary will be the new state rep. for the westernmost reaches.
And then there are these two incumbents who face challenges: state Sen. Adam Gomez and state Rep. Bud Williams. Any expectations that they're going to face some some real challenges on Tuesday?
Not too much. You know, incumbency is such an advantage for candidates, especially in Massachusetts. Every cycle we see maybe one, maybe two, at most three incumbents lose their reelection bid, out of dozens. So it is pretty rare.
Of those two, I've personally heard a little bit more buzz for Adam Gomez trying to seek reelection to the Senate. Last week, he rolled out an endorsement from Gov. Healey herself, which is the kind of thing that you look at and say, "Well, of course the governor is endorsing an incumbent senator of her own party. Is there a reason that the Gomez campaign is making such a big deal of this?"
Interesting. Well, Secretary of State Bill Galvin says he expects turnout to be about 15% in the primary, which Galvin actually says he thinks is a good number considering what's on the ballot. Why is that?
That's right. According to Galvin, 15% is better than 2016 or 2012 in terms of forecast. Only about 1 in 6 state legislative districts has any kind of contested primary. There's no Democratic primary for the U.S. Senate, and all nine members of the U.S. House from Massachusetts are set to cruise through without a primary opponent. So there really aren't many top-of-the-ballot races driving a lot of voters in the same way that in 2020, which had way more turnout, more than 35%. We had the Ed Markey-Joe Kennedy Senate primary and an open primary for the U.S. House seat that Kennedy was giving up.
Finally, Chris, the Legislature keeps chugging along and making deals, even though formal sessions wrapped up more than a month ago. You wrote about one of these: a long-term care bill. What does this do?
This institutes a whole suite of reforms to the long-term care industry, skilled nursing facilities, stuff like that, that largely is tied to the COVID-19 pandemic. Remember, a few years ago the pandemic really wrought devastation on this industry. So many people who live in those facilities caught the illness. Many of the deaths that Massachusetts recorded occurred in long-term care facilities.
So the bill would require new infection control protocols and stricter oversight by the state Department of Public Health to try and prevent outbreaks from occurring again. There's also some stuff getting at bigger industry pressure points that predate the pandemic — funding for career ladders, efforts to prevent bad actors from running nursing homes, stuff like that.
