Delaware Political Weekly: January 14-20, 2022
1. Matt Meyer Raised A Shit-Ton Of Money. We’re talking ‘trying to clear the field’ money. Over $188K raised, over $418K cash on hand. Bethany Hall-Long also has a large war chest, around $159K cash on hand. Strong, but less than half of what Meyer has raised. I know that some politicians are complaining how Matt is handing out federal money as if it were his own. Wonder if the same politicos complain about John Carney giving BHL the rub every single time he hands out some governmental largesse. To me, both candidates are taking advantage of the fact that they have money to give out. It would be political malpractice not to.
2. Becca Cotto Reports Impressive Haul. $18K in contributions in less than three months. With no corporate PAC money, as she has pledged not to accept any of those strings-attached $$’s. Her candidacy in RD 6 is for real.
3. Candidate Files In RD 32! No, it’s not Kerri Evelyn Harris–yet. It’s perennial R loser Cheryl Precourt. Precourt ran against Andria Bennett in both 2018 and 2020. Got 37.7% in 2018, and 36.8% in 2020. Consistent, but not particularly competitive. Trend will continue in 2022.
4. One More Filing. R Jason Bonner for a Kent County Levy Court position.
5. Finance Report Deadline Has Passed. It’s a (figurative and literal) treasure trove. It’s easy to check out candidates and PACs of interest. Just go here, click on ‘View Filed Reports’, then fill in the name of each candidate you’re interested in, and peruse the reports. Let me know if you find anything interesting.
Oh, here’s one: John Paradee (Trey’s brother), he of the dubious Kent County rezoning, has given $1200 to Kathleen McGuiness, a contribution made right at year’s end.
Here’s another one: Not one, not two, but three Buccinis have maxed out to Stephanie Bolden. $600 each from Christopher, Elizabeth, and Maria. Hey, it’s only polite to say ‘thank you’ to someone who threw her constituents overboard for campaign lucre. Based on her report, it looks like she’s running again. Mayor Mike’s executive assistant at the Riverfront Development Corporation (for all intents and purposes, a subsidiary of Buccini/Pollin) and her husband also coughed up $600 each (Megan and Brian McGlinchey). If I had all day, I could comb through every report. I don’t, so help do some detective work for me.
What’d I miss, and whaddayathink?
“Strong, but less than half of what Meyer has raised.”*
*less than half of what he has on hand. He gave himself 200k.
Plus, a list of those donors reveals a LOT of Republicans and less than lovely individuals. See: Levins, Pires, every Ursomarso in the state, etc.
Ya really wanna play that game? $1200 from Tony DeLuca, $300 each from former R operatives Anthony Flynn and Michael Ratchford, $1200 from uber-lobbyist Rebecca Kidner, $500 from uber-lobbyist Robert Byrd, $800 from Chemours, plus, even without Meyer’s matching of campaign funds, he STILL had more money in the bank than BHL.
It’s a fact of life, as unfortunate as it may be, that elements we would deem as unsavory pony up to major political candidates. It’s true for both Meyer and BHL. So. Your point is?
My point was for you to make a correction and clarification. Thank you for doing that.
You’re welcome. I guess.
I’m not a Matt supporter, although at some point I could be. AG Jennings would likely be my first choice if she chose to run for Governor.
But I’ve never been a fan of Bethany Hall-Long, mainly because I see a lot of ambition, but with no other raison d’etre for her candidacy. Other than: ‘Because I’m next’.
What is Matt’s raison d’etre? He certainly scores the highest ambition grade of anyone I’ve seen run for office in recent memory.
While I can’t speak for him, it’s clear that he wants to push for the same kind of policies statewide that he’s worked on in NCC.
NCC Executive is, by definition, an executive position. As is AG. ‘Next-in-line’ is not.
As you well know, nobody without ambition runs for anything.
The difference, as I see it, between both Meyer and Jennings on one hand, and BHL on the other, is that they have both run and governed in order to accomplish things. BHL’s ambition is to just be somebody. YMMV.
Now we know what it costs the corporate landlords to scuttle the tenants’ bill of rights. Very cool stuff.
That, of course, is in addition to the money that two Buccini/Pollin LLC’s had already sent Stephanie’s way.
She must be defeated.
He’s enough to make someone want to vote republican if they weren’t so crazy. He and the democrats have done nothing to protect the environment, help state employees, bring in living wage jobs or anything else I vote for them to do. It sucks!
Darius reports a TOTAL of $600 for the year from a Virginia Corporate donor. even zero in the under 100 bucks column, He caried over 17k after spending 1500 in ’21
And in other news Gerry Brady just resigned!
BTW, you’re right. I don’t mean this to be cruel, but anybody who, like me, interacted with Gerald, knew he wasn’t right, that there was something fundamentally wrong with him. Why he waited until now to resign just pisses me off:
https://www.wdel.com/news/citing-ptsd-diagnosis-state-rep-gerald-brady-announces-resignation/article_0f683fc6-7ae7-11ec-8569-7b289c587df2.html
Wait till the full story drops. He did this to get out in front of something
Altria=Philip Morris. By any other name. Darius’ only political benefactor.
Andria B filed a day late, raised ZERO in ’21 and among her expenditures was about $800 to Walmart and Sam’s Club. Read whatever you want into this:)
Shout-out to David Bentz, who is retiring. Maxed out to Madinah Wilson-Anton, Bryan Townsend, Kyle Evans Gay, Eric Morrison, and Marie Pinkney.
He has a pretty decent remaining campaign fund. We know he’ll use it wisely.
I find it hard to believe that the Buccini’s only contributed to Bolden. I don’t understand why you’re giving her a hard time for taking their money but when the same point is made about Meyer your response was:
“It’s a fact of life, as unfortunate as it may be, that elements we would deem as unsavory pony up to major political candidates. It’s true for both Meyer and BHL. So. Your point is?”