Despite recent controversy, Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz is holding a huge lead in a potential Democratic primary for attorney general.<\/p>\n
Bysiewicz, who previously was running for governor before switching to AG, holds a lead of 62 percent to 10 percent over former state Democratic chairman George C. Jepsen, according to the latest Quinnipiac University poll. Waterbury Mayor Michael Jarjura, who has not yet officially announced his candidacy, is in third place at 3 percent.<\/p>\n
Bysiewicz has an even larger lead among women – besting Jepsen by 64 percent to 5 percent.<\/p>\n
Among Democrats, 24 percent of those polled said they were undecided about the attorney general’s race – a much smaller number than the 44 percent of Democrats who are undecided in the governor’s contest. Among Republicans, 59 percent are undecided in the governor’s race.<\/p>\n
Bysiewicz “has to feel good about her poll numbers,” said Douglas Schwartz, director of the Quinnipiac poll. “Despite the controversy over whether she has been in active practice as an attorney for 10 years, which broke as the poll was in the field, she is the clear favorite over the virtually unknown George Jepsen in the Democratic primary. And her favorability numbers have remained high. But if this story doesn’t do away, this could change.”<\/p>\n
After announcing her run for attorney general, Bysiewicz would not explicitly pledge that she would serve the full four years if elected. Some insiders believe that she might seek to run for the U.S. Senate in 2012 in either a challenge to Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman or for the open seat if Lieberman decides to retire.<\/p>\n
Regarding Bysiewicz’s poll numbers, Schwartz said, “She’s been getting whacked on a few things here, and her numbers remain high.”<\/p>\n
Jepsen told Capitol Watch that Bysiewicz has gotten off to an early start, which helps her poll numbers.<\/p>\n
“It’s no surprise,” Jepsen said Friday. “She’s been campaigning aggressively for two years. I haven’t had time to lift my own profile. In Democratic primaries, the voters can be very discerning. The winner is the person who can frame the debate.”<\/p>\n
The next step in the process is the May nominating convention for Democrats, and candidates need 15 percent of the delegates to qualify for the primary in August.<\/p>\n
“The 15 percent is assured,” Jepsen said.<\/p>\n
For those who want to go another route, they can avoid the convention and collect signatures from voters in order to gain direct access to the primary ballot in August. They must abide by various rules under state law, Section 9-400 (a), and collect the signatures from two percent of the registered Democrats.<\/p>\n
With 26 years as an attorney, Jepsen said that he has better qualifications than Bysiewicz – including serving more than nine years as the attorney for the carpenters’ union in western Connecticut that involved a range of issues that included unemployment compensation, illegal subcontracting, pensions, and health benefits.<\/p>\n
As state legislators, Jepsen served as co-chairman of the judiciary committee, while Bysiewicz was co-chairman of the committee overseeing government administration and elections.<\/p>\n
Bysiewicz has been an attorney for 23 years, and she says that includes 11 years of running what she calls a public-interest law firm as Secretary of the State.<\/p>\n
Bysiewicz’s campaign declared the poll numbers as “remarkable,” and she vowed to push forward toward August.<\/p>\n
“This is a validation of the years of work I have done fighting for the people of Connecticut and their faith in me to serve as their attorney general,” Bysiewicz said. “Rest assured, however, that I take nothing for granted and will work hard to earn the Democratic nomination for attorney general in August.”<\/p>\n
State Rep. Cameron Staples, a New Haven Democrat, was not mentioned in the poll because he only recently declared his candidacy for attorney general. Staples will not be seeking re-election as a state legislator and will no longer be co-chairman of the legislature’s powerful tax-writing committee.<\/p>\n
Bysiewicz has won three races for statewide office, while Jepsen, Staples, and Jarjura have never held statewide office. In her most recent race for Secretary of the State, Bysiewicz won by more than 450,000 votes – pulling 729,000 votes to 276,000 for Republican nominee Richard J. Abbate. In that year, Gov. M. Jodi Rell had a big win over New Haven Mayor John DeStefano and pulled 710,000 votes.<\/p>\n
Richard Blumenthal – known traditionally as one of the state’s top vote-getters – pulled 782,000 votes in his re-election race in 2006.<\/p>\n
Staples and others have raised questions about Bysiewicz having the necessary 10 years of active practice that is required under the law to serve as attorney general.<\/p>\n
In turn, Bysiewicz raised the issue of whether Staples’ tenure as the general counsel of the state medical society for 11 years would count toward the necessary minimum. Bysiewicz has questioned the difference between private practice and public practice – raising the issue of whether Blumenthal’s tenure as U.S. Attorney in the late 1970s would count toward the necessary minimum.<\/p>\n
“The public – private, she’s the only one who has mentioned that distinction,” Staples told Capitol Watch. “Nobody else raised that question.”<\/p>\n
Staples says he has 20 years of private practice experience – 9 years with a law firm and 11 years with the medical society.<\/p>\n
“I think I have a very solid background and experience,” Staples said.<\/p>\n
While Bysiewicz says she will seek private financing, Staples intends to raise $75,000 in small contributions of $100 or less in order to qualify for a public-financing grant. He said he fully expects to be in the primary for AG in early August.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Despite recent controversy, Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz is holding a huge lead in a potential Democratic primary for attorney general. Bysiewicz, who previously was running for governor before switching to AG, holds a lead of 62 percent to 10 percent over former state Democratic chairman George C. Jepsen, according to the latest Quinnipiac […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4001,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-217394","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217394","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4001"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=217394"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217394\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=217394"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=217394"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=217394"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}