As charges of unfairness begin to emerge, Connecticut’s Democrat gubernatorial primary is quickly getting ugly. Embattled candidate and Middletown Mayor Dan Drew, who has been mired in controversy since September when he was caught shaking down municipal employees for contributions, has issued new complaints that he was “blackballed” from a candidate forum, claiming “the fix is in” against his campaign. As a result, the event was cancelled entirely.
With top-tier Democrats like Kevin Lembo, Ted Kennedy Jr., and Failed Governor Dan Malloy all passing on running in 2018, the party finds itself left with a handful of second and third-choice Malloy Enablers who have drawn more headlines for scandals and infighting than for proposing policies that could get Connecticut back on track. As the Democrat primary grows uglier and more chaotic with each passing day, their chances of holding onto the state’s highest office continue to diminish.
Middletown Mayor Dan Drew, a declared Democratic candidate for governor who wasn’t one of the three Democrats and four Republicans invited to a discussion scheduled to close the New England Maker Summit on Nov. 17, used the snub in an emailed solicitation for contributions under the heading, ‘The fix is in.’
By day’s end, all seven politicians were disinvited in an email that made no mention of Drew’s complaint that he was being ‘blackballed’ from a debate.
Drew said a debate involving politicians from both parties would have been unusual. More conventional are two separate events scheduled for December, one for Democrats and another for Republicans. They will be the first opportunity for political activists to see the candidates and potential candidates side by side.
Whether it was a panel discussion or a debate, Drew said, he was justified in publicizing the snub by the technology group. He said his campaign called to ask if he could participate and was told there was room for seven, not eight.
‘Whatever it is,’ Drew said, ‘they won’t let me in.’
Drew said he was especially annoyed because he is the only declared Democratic candidate raising money and otherwise campaigning for governor. The three Democrats invited — former state Sen. Jonathan Harris of West Hartford, former Democratic state Vice Chair Dita Bhargava of Greenwich and former federal prosecutor Chris Mattei of Hartford — have exploratory campaign committees.
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