In the Republican gubernatorial primary, an open race, a candidate for governor backed by Donald Trump competed against a more centrist rival.
Democratic primary voters in Massachusetts also cast ballots to pick a nominee for attorney general in a race that divided the two U.S. senators and other party leaders in the deep-blue state.
The Bay State was the only place in the country holding primaries the day after Labor Day, and voting there marked the beginning of the end of the primary season. With intraparty contests in all but a handful of states complete, both parties have begun campaigning across the country with an eye on November, clashing over inflation, crime, abortion rights and the records of President Biden and his predecessor.
The Massachusetts gubernatorial contest is regarded by analysts as one of Democrats’ best opportunities to flip a GOP-held seat in November. Gov. Charlie Baker, a Republican and Trump critic, declined to seek a third term in office.
Healey, who has sued the Trump administration nearly 100 times, according to a tally by the Boston Globe, was effectively running for the Democratic nomination uncontested after state Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz suspended her campaign.
Republicans are expected to have a difficult path to holding the governorship. Their gubernatorial primary was another in a long succession of intraparty contests this year featuring a candidate backed by the 45th president. The contenders included Geoff Diehl, a former state legislator who has echoed Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was “rigged” after initially acknowledging that Biden won.
Diehl ran in the primary with the support of Trump, who joined a tele-rally for him Monday night.
“Geoff is a proven fighter who successfully pushes back on the ultraliberal extremists,” Trump said on behalf of Diehl during the tele-rally. “He’ll rule your state with an iron fist, and he’ll do what has to be done.”
As the GOP Senate nominee in 2018, Diehl lost to Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D) by 24 percentage points. Trump lost Massachusetts to Biden by more than 33 percentage points.
On Tuesday, Diehl squared off against businessman Chris Doughty, a Harvard Business School graduate who has tried to appeal to what he calls the state’s “exhausted middle.” His backing came from more traditional Republicans such as New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, who argued that Doughty has the best chance in November.
As polls closed across most of Massachusetts Tuesday night, one town, Barnstable, was slated to keep polls open until midnight after a broken vault door kept ballots locked inside for most of the day. The city offered emergency ballots for voters who showed up before the problem was resolved; in 2018, the town cast more than 3000 votes in the GOP primary.
With none of the state’s all-Democratic congressional delegation facing primary challengers, much of the focus Tuesday was on state races. Another closely watched contest was the Democratic primary for state attorney general, a position that frequently produces candidates for higher office.
In that contest, Warren, along with Boston Mayor Michelle Wu and former Boston acting mayor Kim Janey endorsed labor lawyer Shannon Liss-Riordan. She ran in the primary on a long legal career that includes pushing for gig workers to have access to employee protections.
Liss-Riordan — once dubbed “Sledgehammer Shannon” by a party she beat in a legal battle and “an avenging angel for workers” by the Boston Globe — helped advise Warren’s 2020 presidential campaign on labor issues and is a longtime donor to the senator.
She has represented workers in legal battles against Uber, American Airlines and Amazon, and she has also waged local fights on behalf of waitstaff. (Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post.)
She competed against Andrea Campbell, who was the first Black woman to be president of the Boston City Council. Campbell won prominent supporters, including Sen. Edward J. Markey (D) and Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D), who served with her on the council, and Healey, who has appeared with her frequently on the campaign trail.
Campbell emphasized her personal story on the stump, saying she knows how to turn “pain into purpose.” She grew up in public housing, and her twin brother died while incarcerated.
Longtime Democratic Secretary of State William Galvin defeated a primary challenge from Boston NAACP President Tanisha Sullivan. He will face Rayla Campbell, who calls herself a “rule-of-law Republican.”
In the race for lieutenant governor, three Democratic candidates faced off, including Salem Mayor Kim Driscoll, who was favored among many state elected officials and activists in the run-up to Tuesday. State Rep. Tami Gouveia, the co-leader of the Massachusetts Chapter of the Women’s March, ran in the primary on a more liberal platform. Rounding out the ballot wass state Sen. Eric Lesser, a onetime low-level aide to President Barack Obama.
On the Republican side for lieutenant governor, the candidates were paired off as ticket-mates with the gubernatorial candidates, even though the offices are elected independently.
Trump-backed Diehl is ran with former state representative Leah Cole Allen, who initially left politics to focus on her nursing career. She worked on a covid-19 floor in a hospital during the pandemic and then lost her position because she decided not to get a coronavirus vaccine, which prompted her to turn back to politics. Doughty teamed up with former state representative Kate Campanale, who became a history teacher after leaving the State House.
David Weigel contributed to this report
