Patrick picks up support in caucuses as Reilly stumbles

Yawu Miller

First came the headline-grabbing news last Tuesday that Attorney General Tom Reilly tapped Marie St. Fleur as his running mate in the race for governor and lieutenant governor.

The news eclipsed gubernatorial candidate Deval Patrick’s announcements that he had garnered more than $350,000 in donations from 8,000 contributors and grabbed endorsements from five major trade unions.

Reilly’s move was seen by some political observers as a shrewd attempt to pull in black voters and women and shield the attorney general against backlash he might garner from any attacks on Patrick.

But after St. Fleur ended her candidacy one day later, amid an onslaught of news reports detailing three delinquent tax debts from the last four years, Patrick’s political fortunes were clearly on the rise.

Just hours after St. Fleur’s withdrawal, Patrick spoke to a packed gathering of African American supporters, backed by elected officials including state Sen. Dianne Wilkerson, city councilors Felix Arroyo and Sam Yoon, and state reps Byron Rushing, Linda Dorcena Forry, Shirley Owens Hicks, Gloria Fox, Liz Malia and Marty Walz.

The appearance, in Prince Hall, featured a who’s-who of black political activists — ministers, city workers, Democratic party insiders and civil rights activists.

“I am a political outsider in an environment where political insiders are in charge,” Patrick told the gathering, after an introduction from Nation of Islam Minister Don Muhammad. “The conventional wisdom is that an elected official should not step in and endorse an outsider so early in the race.”

Despite the conventional wisdom he cites, Patrick has so far garnered endorsements from 144 elected officials across the state and — perhaps more importantly — more than 2,000 delegates to the state Democratic Party’s convention.

Patrick beat Reilly two-to-one in Democratic party caucuses across the state Saturday, demonstrating a strong organization with broad appeal in the party’s activist core. Patrick won caucuses in cities and towns across the state including Arlington, Andover, Newton and Watertown — Reilly’s home base.

While he won the state, in Boston, where Mayor Thomas Menino’s political organization controls many of the ward committees, Patrick garnered only 40 percent of the delegates’ votes. In Ward 18, a Menino stronghold, Reilly swept all of the delegates. In Ward 12, where city workers have ceded ground to independent Democratic activists, 15 of 16 delegates pledged support for Patrick.

The delegates elected in Saturday’s caucuses have secured a place in the June Democratic Convention, where they will vote on the party’s nomination. Although Patrick currently has twice as many committed delegates as Reilly, so far only two-thirds of the 3,500 delegates elected are committed to either candidate.

Additionally, there will likely be an additional 1,800 delegates appointed by party officials to the convention. If Patrick is able to garner the majority of the 5,300 votes in the convention, he will win the party’s nomination. The party nomination is by no means an assurance that voters will favor a candidate in the Democratic primary, however.

Patrick and Reilly will face off in the September primary, along with four candidates for lieutenant governor. In the November final election, the winning Democratic candidate will face a Republican gubernatorial candidate. Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healy is currently the GOP front runnner.

Patrick is banking on the grassroots appeal of his campaign, citing his victory in the caucuses as an indication of his campaign’s strength.

“Today we see the proof that this grassroots campaign is working,” he said in a statement to the press. “This is a first step in a long march toward winning the primary and general election in November.”

Patrick has criss-crossed the state in his bid to reach out to voters, emphasizing his ability to bring voters back into the political process and restore faith in the political process. He claims to have more than 3,000 volunteers.

“You know what we need more than anything is a reason to hope,” Patrick said during a campaign stop in Grove Hall last Wednesday.

That message of hope is winning Patrick support, according to political activist Ron Bell, executive director of Dunk the Vote.

“He’s listening to the people,” Bell said. “He’s putting what he hears into action.”

Despite the potentially damaging setback from the St. Fleur incident, Reilly has close to $4 million in his campaign coffers while Patrick has just $700,000.

A Suffolk University/WHDH-TV 7 poll showed Democratic voters favor Reilly over Patrick 39 percent to 30 percent. But Patrick is clearly gaining on Reilly, according to longtime Democratic Party activist Louis Elisa. A year ago, Reilly had a 40 point lead on Patrick.

Elisa points to Patrick’s showing in the Democratic caucuses Saturday, as evidence that he is resonating with voters across the state, beyond his predictable base of voters of color and white progressives.

“I think he’s doing exactly what he has to do to meet the grassroots,” Elisa said. “People want to be able to believe in a governor who believes the same things that they do, who has come out and talked to them. He appeals to the working class that represents the majority of voters and he appeals to the upper class that wants to see a change.”