Two of the most competitive primary races in the Pioneer Valley come to a head Tuesday. Both are Democratic primaries. One is the Hampden district race, with State Senator Adam Gomez fielding a challenge from Springfield City Councilor Malo Brown.
Also in the Springfield area is the 11th Hampden House race, which pits Representative Bud Williams against local educator Johnnie Ray McKnight.
WAMC’s Pioneer Valley Bureau Chief James Paleologopoulos spoke with Matt Szafranski, Editor-in-Chief of Western Mass. Politics & Insight, about both races.
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WAMC: These are the waning days of the primary season. Early voting ends shortly, we haven't seen a whole lot in the way of debate, albeit one some may characterize as “spicy,” and challengers venturing into different parts of the city and county to get their names out.
You've also reported a few of the candidates have made ad buys pretty late in their campaigns. If you had to pick a word or two, how would you describe it?
Energetic. I mean, and that could be a both good and bad thing, because there was certainly a lot of salacious claims made with energy at things like the debate that Focus Springfield hosted.
And there has also been certainly an interest in defending their records. I think you certainly see that on Adam Gomez's part - with his campaign - he had a substantial kickoff. He's had a lot of on-the-ground enthusiasm, but it just differs for each candidate, at least when we're talking about the Senate race.
On the House side - a little lower key. Certainly, Johnnie McKnight has been trying to get out there as much as possible, but I think Representative Williams has been running something of a Rose Garden campaign to try to secure another term.
WAMC: Let’s start with the Senate primary. The Hampden district, which covers a large swath of Springfield and Chicopee, has an incumbent, Adam Gomez, who's been serving for a few years, and is being challenged by a Springfield city councilor, Malo Brown.
On paper, it's a race that sort of echoes 2020’s primary between Jim Welch and Gomez, but there's been a few key differences here. We made it to both campaign kickoffs. We've seen Gomez's work on Beacon Hill and Brown's work in the city council. How has this race shaped up, in your view?
In my view the race has always been one about representation, and there has been a not-always-subtle accusation by Councilor Marlo Brown, who represents what I would describe as the historic, Black heart of Springfield, and the suggestion that Senator Adam Gomez, who is, I believe, the first … person of Puerto Rican heritage to serve in the state senate, is only concerned with representing the Latinos in the city.
Now, I don't think there's actually any evidence that he's focused on just that community, but that has been what I perceive as being a central element of Brown's charge against him, and perhaps more broadly-defined as just not representing the entirety of the city.
I think you see, and certainly … some of the endorsements that Senator Gomez has gotten, that that's not really true, that he is everywhere in the community. He's had support from leaders of all persuasion, but the centrality of that argument, I think, is partly what has made the race so nasty at times, because it's quite a loaded-charge to make, and I suspect that Senator Gomez is hurt, perhaps even offended by it, and that's why you have seen the tone that you have seen in this race.
WAMC: You were a panelist, in fact, at the Focus Springfield debate, I was in the audience, and we saw a bit of what you were saying just play out for the span of about 45 minutes. That's been a tactic we've seen in this campaign quite a bit - a lot of charges against Gomez. When we were at Brown's campaign kickoff, he invoked Gideon from the Book of Judges, who worked with a small army to topple a much larger Midianite force. Where's that campaign at this point in time in your opinion?
His campaign … I think it's been doing two things. One has been trying to engage in, I guess you could kind of say … kind of a shock and awe - they have an incredible number of signs that have been deployed.
However, as anybody in this business knows: signs don't vote, and the rest of it is just trying to, I think, gin up a lot of his base in Ward 4, where he is the city councilor, and otherwise trying to connect with … the police connection. Malo Brown is the son of a former police officer. He seemed to take particular offense at the effort that he says was to try to keep Lawrence Akers from becoming the police superintendent. That's not actually what happened, but that is … how he has described it.
So, there's clearly an attempt to try to appeal to people who have connections to law enforcement. How broadly that has gone out, I really can't say. I mean, you certainly haven't seen, you know, the patrolmen come out and support his position, partly because I don't think they actually believe that Senator Gomez has anything against Lawrence Akers. It's been kind of strange. On the one hand, there is he's doing some things, but not being especially visible in other ways.
WAMC: I've noticed that Councilor Brown has also settled into really bringing up advocacy for senior citizens and various other groups in the city, whereas with Senator Gomez, we see, when you're an incumbent, you get to point to what you've been doing at the legislature. What do you make of Gomez's efforts for reelection?
I think Gomez is doing a few different things. One, of course, is he is talking about what he's done in the Senate. That is very much a thing that the person he defeated, Senator James Welch, tried to do. However, I think he is also touting his own visibility, his own work on a number of issues - not just bringing home the bacon. I mean, he mentions that, but he also tends to talk a little bit about some of the legislative pushes that that he's gone through.
We'll discuss this in a moment, but, he was at a forum this week where he talked about addressing some of the costs that people are experiencing, whether it's housing or food or other elements.
He's talking about it, hearing from people responding to them, trying to be a little bit more of a bridge to Beacon Hill. I mean, I think that that is an understated element of a lot of representation from Western Massachusetts, is “How are you trying to keep the state from ignoring us?” and I think that he doesn't do it in quite the way that is common for a lot of legislators, which is, “look at the money I've gotten for you.” It's a little bit more of like “this is how I'm trying to apply your policy out there.”
But, Senator Gomez is also, you know, a figure of some renown because of the historic nature of his election. He's also seen as being an ally of a lot of progressive causes. So, he's talking about things on a lot of different levels, on a regular basis, and certainly during this election.
WAMC: Another local primary in the valley that's had our attention - the challenge to incumbent representative Bud Williams, who is seeking reelection and is up against Johnnie Ray McKnight, an educator and not unfamiliar name when it comes to the ballot.
The race for this Springfield seat has been a pretty different animal compared to the Senate district. It's been a bit harder to gauge. Williams, a well-known former city councilor, hasn't had too many interactions with McKnight, whereas McKnight is really on the campaign trail. That's not to say Williams isn't present either - I've certainly seen him at a number of forums that his office has hosted. Those aren't necessarily campaign events, of course. How has this race been shaping up in your view?
Well, I think that Williams … he's been an elected official in Springfield for all but two of the last 31 years… I don't want to necessarily say [he’s] resting on his laurels, that's not quite the right phrase for it, but he's definitely been leaning on the fact that he's already in office, really trying to use that power of incumbency to show what his office is doing or what he purports to be doing.
He's the chair of a civil rights committee on the legislature, so he has staff that's able to churn out his work at a level that is more like that of a senator. I mean, most [representatives] only have one aide - he has like four or five right now because of his chairmanship, and he's been using that to the fullest-extent possible to tout the work that he's been doing. I'm not alleging any type of crossing over into campaign work, but we all know that incumbents will use the power of incumbency to try to help argue for their election, and that's … something that's common across everybody who's seeking reelection.
So, I see that as being like more of what he's been doing over the last few months. I've seen that happening more and more as the summer has gone by, but, to your point, he has not been as visible on the campaign trail itself. That's been coming up more in the form of like mailers that are going out.
He is going up on television as well and that is … partly because he has a substantial and in fact, an overwhelming cash advantage over Johnnie Ray McKnight, who has largely, though not exclusively, self-funded his campaign - we're talking about a few thousand dollars as opposed to Williams’s well over … $100,000 in his bank account.
So, there is an unevenness to the campaign because of that difference in cash. And I mean, I don't want to overstate the value of money. I mean, on a certain level, I don't know that Williams could even spend all of the money he has and even get anything for it. You do hit the law of diminishing returns very quickly, but it does set the stage for a much different race than if they were more evenly-matched financially.
All four candidates were invited to take part in a legislative forum Wednesday hosted by the Springfield Ward 1 Democratic Committee and the Ward 6 Democratic Committee, which Szafranski chairs. Councilor Brown and Representative Williams did not attend.
WAMC: Let's talk a little bit about the forum - you ended up fielding questions and provided the infrastructure for folks to ask Gomez and McKnight questions directly. Any particular takeaways?
I think what was interesting was, and I would add, to a certain extent, the responses and comments from Representative Carlos Gonzalez, who is not opposed in his election this year, that people are describing very similar concerns about higher costs.
It's easy to kind of … flatten that all out into the inflation complaints that you see in the national conversation. Some of them are very particular to the region - the shifting demand for housing in the Springfield area can't just be explained by inflation. So, there's a lot of macro and micro elements to the cost of living in the Springfield area that suddenly are appearing here that didn't necessarily exist 10 or 15 years ago in ostensibly in times when people felt like they were wealthier than they are now.
I think my main takeaway is how they're all hearing similar, but distinct things from their constituencies about what the quality of life is in Springfield these days, and it's an interesting debate, I mean, we're … almost a year away from a mayoral election where a lot of these things really didn't get discussed at all, but … there's a big role for the municipality to play.
And so, I don't know how much of this is just kind of a delayed debate or discussion that we didn't really get to have for reasons I won't go into right now last year, but I think that people are very aware that there needs to be some changes in policy.
There needs to be some better efforts, whether it's from city hall or from Beacon Hill, and it's worth noting, they were all posed with the question about the legislature's relative inaction this year. How much anger about their inertia could potentially affect incumbents?
Do I necessarily think it's going to tip the scales against Gomez or Williams? No, but I think the fact that you see this conversation happening suggests there could be fuel for it, maybe in other races throughout the state.
