Massachusetts Re-Elects Democrat Patrick, First Black Governor
Deval Patrick, governor of Massachusetts
Michael Springer/Bloomberg
Deval Patrick, governor of Massachusetts.
Deval Patrick, governor of Massachusetts. Photographer: Michael Springer/Bloomberg
Deval Patrick, a Democrat who made history as the first black governor of Massachusetts, won re- election over Republican Charlie Baker as an independent candidate divided the anti-incumbent vote.
Patrick got 49 percent of the vote to Baker’s 42 percent, with 96 percent of precincts counted, according to the Associated Press. State Treasurer Tim Cahill, who left the Democratic Party to run as an independent, had 8 percent.
“Massachusetts chose to look up and forward, not down and to the past,” Patrick, 54, said to a cheering crowd of supporters at a downtown hotel last night. “Thank you for making a statement that optimism and effort matter.”
Patrick’s win also represents a victory for President Barack Obama, who like Patrick made history after running on a promise to change politics only to face disillusionment as the economy soured, said David Paleologos, director of Suffolk University’s political research center in Boston. Obama endorsed and campaigned for Patrick this year, and called to congratulate him on his win last night, according to two local broadcasters.
“The polling tells us he has the best temperament, he ran the best campaign,” Paleologos said of Patrick on Oct. 29, referring to pre-election polls. “He carried the narrative.”
Former Health Executive
Baker, 53, the former head of Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Inc., one of the state’s biggest insurers, served as finance chief for two Republican governors, Bill Weld and Paul Cellucci. He joined Harvard Pilgrim, a nonprofit health-maintenance organization, in 1998 and left last year to run for governor.
“We fought the good fight folks, we did,” Baker said in conceding before supporters gathered in Boston. “It’s important that all of us get behind the governor and do all that we can to make sure that he succeeds in pulling our economy out of the doldrums.”
Massachusetts has begun to recover this year from the lingering recession, with unemployment falling to 8.4 percent in September from 9.5 percent in February, the highest rate since 1976. The state has lost about 84,000 payroll jobs since Patrick took office in January 2007, with total nonfarm employment down 2.6 percent to 3.18 million, U.S. Labor Department data show.
‘Worst Economy’
“For the last few years this commonwealth and this country have been in the worst economy in living memory,” Patrick said to his supporters. He said he and Lieutenant Governor Tim Murray had a plan and stayed with it. “We stuck with Massachusetts and tonight the people of Massachusetts have stuck with us.”
As the state’s finances deteriorated and unemployment rose amid the recession, Patrick signed a $27.4 billion spending plan in June 2009 that raised the state’s sale tax to 6.25 percent from 5 percent to help close budget gaps. Democrats control the state Legislature.
“I am not interested in what’s easy,” Patrick said last night. “I am interested in what’s right.”
Patrick, a former head of the U.S. Justice Department’s civil rights division in the Clinton administration, went on to serve as general counsel to Texaco Inc. and Coca-Cola Co. His 2006 campaign for governor was his first bid for elective office. With his subsequent victory, he became the second African-American elected governor in U.S. history. Virginia Democrat Doug Wilder was the first, serving from 1990 to 1994.
Early Missteps
Patrick’s initial months in office included a series of missteps, spending $27,000 on room redecorating, swapping a Ford used by his predecessor, Mitt Romney, for a leased Cadillac, and hiring an aide for his wife at $72,000 a year. In March 2007, Patrick said he erred in calling Citigroup Inc. a few weeks earlier on behalf of Orange, California-based ACC Capital Holdings, parent of subprime lender Ameriquest Mortgage Co., as it sought financing. Patrick was paid $360,000 a year as an ACC director before he left the board as he campaigned for election.
Patrick shares a number of similarities with Obama. He was born in Chicago, which the president made his home and political base after college. Both hold degrees from Harvard Law School. In his 2006 campaign, Patrick employed David Axelrod and David Plouffe, two of the architects of the president’s historic win two years later.
To contact the reporter on this story: Michael McDonald in Boston at mmcdonald10@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Mark Tannenbaum at mtannen@bloomberg.net
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