Skipping Out On A Civic Duty?
By Daniela Altimari
Hartford Courant’s Capitol Watch Blog
Linda McMahon and Peter Schiff aren’t the only candidates for U.S. Senate that have missed out on chances to participate in the democratic process.
Rob Simmons and Tom Foley also skipped votes, on at least a few occasions in the recent past.
Simmons, who served in both the state legislature and in Congress, missed at least 11 municipal elections in his hometown of Stonington since 2002. He skipped two budget votes in May, 2005 and also didn’t participate in the municipal election that year.
In 2006, Stonington had three budget votes; Simmons missed one. He also didn’t vote in a budget referendum in 2008.
“Rob has an unmatched record of civic participation, but it’s understandable that people might miss a vote occasionally for one reason or another,” said Simmons campaign chief Jim Barnett.”However, it gets to be curious when you routinely miss votes in major federal and state elections, then wake up one day and decide you want to be a United States Senator.”
Foley, who lives in Greenwich but spent part of the decade working in Iraq and serving as U.S. ambassador to Ireland, also skipped most local races.
And he did not cast a ballot in the 2004 presidential contest, despite that fact that George W. Bush, a man for whom Foley has raised considerable campaign cash, was on the ballot that year.
“In general, Tom has a good voting record but it’s not 100%,” acknowledged Gregg Keller, Foley’s campaign manager.
And what about the man they all want to replace?
Sen. Chris Dodd votes in Connecticut for most elections, his spokesman, Bryan DeAngelis said in an email.
“But if he cannot be in the state on election day then he votes by absentee ballot. Looking back at his record, he’s voted in all of the national and state elections and it appears that the he has just missed a couple of local elections.”
Dodd missed school budget votes in 2003 and 2004 in his hometown of East Haddam, as well as a March 2005 referendum on the town’s proposed acquisition of open space.
McMahon was forthright in acknowledging her missed votes, expressing contrition in a blog post that went
up almost immediately after she announced her candidacy.
Failing to participate municipal elections in a place like Connecticut, where the tradition of local control
runs deep, may be a worse breach than skipping out on state and federal races, asserts McMahon
spokesman Ed Patru.
“Connecticut voters attach a lot of importance to local elections,” Patru said.”It is hypocritical of any politician to launch attacks on anyone for missing state and national elections while having missed local elections and diminished their importance.”
In other words, Tip O’Neill was right: All politics is local.
(By the way, I have a call into another Republican running for U.S. Senate, state Sen. Sam Caligiuri, seeking comment on his voting record and will post that when it comes. I am also working to track down the voting record of Merrick Alpert, Dodd’s Democratic challenger, and John Mertens, who is running under the Connecticut for Lieberman party banner. Stay tuned: the issue may continue to play out in the days ahead.)
Source: http://blogs.courant.com/capitol_watch/2009/09/skipping-out-on-a-civic-duty.html