Fumbling A Primary Ballot Spot, Moore’s Campaign Shows $52K Surplus

Analysis and Comment, City Politics12 Comments
The trifecta of Marilyn Moore, Callie Heilmann and Gemeem Davis botched the signatures to make the primary ballot.

State Senator Marilyn Moore failed to qualify for the Democratic primary for mayor leaving a $52,767 surplus in her candidate committee, according to the latest campaign finance report.

See Moore Finance Report

Moore was hundreds of verified petition signatures short to participate in the primary, a major organizational gaffe that bedeviled her in two straight municipal elections.

Worse, Bridgeport Generation Now Votes had hundreds of thousands of dollars poised to spend on her campaign in an independent expenditure.

Moore summary report

When OIB raised questions about potential illegal coordination between the camps, Gen Now leaders Callie Heilmann and Gemeem Davis pulled away from active campaigning on her behalf, creating a wider gulf to make the ballot. Moore failed to coalesce enough canvassers, many of which were paid, according to the finance report, to secure signatures.

If Moore had made the ballot it certainly would have added a different dimension to the primary with the splitting of the anti-incumbent vote that benefited the campaign of John Gomes who is challenging Mayor Joe Ganim’s 251 vote win in court.

By comparison, mayoral candidate Lamond Daniels missed the primary ballot by a few dozen signatures. He petitioned onto the general election ballot, something Moore did not pursue, leaving her no general election ballot option.

The Connecticut Working Families Party did not endorse a candidate for mayor this cycle delivering a stinging attack from Heilmann and Davis whose planned “year of change” eluded them from the candidate of their choice.

Bottom line, Moore failing to qualify for the primary ballot was as big a negligence for Heilmann and Davis who took a narrow-minded approach rather than a bigger picture. Doesn’t matter how much loot is poised if your candidate doesn’t make the ballot. And, then, they found others to blame when they were the reason.

Moore has a couple of options to spend the candidate committee surplus, including donation to a non-profit organization and returning pro-rated donations.

Intriguing on the finance report is roughly $1,000 paid to Betty Chappell, the political operative hired by Moore to run her absentee ballot operation in 2019.  One year prior Chappell was convicted of multiple absentee ballot violations in connection with a Stratford race.

In the sanctimonious world of Moore, Heilmann and Davis, they were among the loudest moralists in the absentee ballot chaos plaguing this cycle. They never talk about one of their own doing it.

 

 

 

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12 comments

  3. Lennie,
    You have a reputation for being a vacuum cleaner, and storage silo, for all things political about Bridgeport. It’s the reason many of us continue to read and respond at OIB. I know that this is a business for you as well as a channel for your brain, energy, and journalism talent. It surprised me to reach for a Bible on my bookshelf this past weekend and find right next to the large book of sacred scripture a copy of OIB, 25th Anniversary Edition. Opening the book I discovered the section updating the edition that included an essay I wrote concerning the hidden news of clerical abuse of youth within the Catholic Church, specifically in the Diocese of Bridgeport and its management of same, about 13 years ago. Rereading the essay I realized that “time does tell” when provided with enough future days, but that all of us need to be open and active personally, when things appear obscure or hidden at best. It is not a bad civic strategy.

    I hope you do not ignore the story in the CT Post by Brian Lockhart this morning, on the Front Page carried over to Page 6 on VOTING. In my opinion the story which includes a storyline showing how out of touch the City is with no FAIR Rent or FAIR Housing bodies for decades, and the dependence of City residents who live under HUD subsidized conditions, as is their right based on annual eligibility filing, are left for most of the year without a representative voice on multiple issues affecting their lives.

    When there is no Fair Rent group to hear about issues facing them, bringing attention to their problems, and there is no regular or assigned communication by the Park City Communities, our Housing Authority, the elderly and infirm are left to their own devices with little power EXCEPT AT ELECTION TIME when registration for turkeys, “renter rebate” activity, and “absentee ballots” are a”thin slice of attention pie” for thousands in this City. It is a larger purpose for all of us voters to pursue, no matter who wins this election year.

    OPEN, ACCOUNTABLE, TRANSPARENT and HONEST values apply to governance organizations, everywhere. I learned this lesson when speaking for victim rights of youth subject to clergy abuse. I learned that often power does not respond immediately, but as more and more folks look at the truth of a story and accept new facts, the current status quo becomes more subject to reform or change.

    What Gen Now does or will do with organizational funds is a “curiosity”, I suggest, that likely will not make the front page of the CT Post based on your ‘expose’. But the questions of why thousands of elderly, registered, vulnerable, and yet available to “official wooing” without HUD supported “tenant organizations” will remain newsworthy and demand “official” answers. Time will tell.

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    1. Yes, JML, I do occupy a garbage can for a mind. The CT Post and I are different animals. The Post won’t chronicle Gen Now’s hypocrisy because it’s a reliable critic, like you, of Joe Ganim. My lord, what if we criticize the critics? Reporters and editors there continue to rationalize excuses. So be it. I have no issue with the Post criticizing Joe Ganim. I’ve provided you a platform for years to do the same. I do take issue with reporters and editors myopic perspective. If Ganim had been the recipient of what was clearly a dubious, coordinated $300K independent expenditure between Gen Now and Moore (that did not materialize because she fumbled the signature process) it would justify a screaming headline above the fold, just like the World War II headline it beamed two weeks before the primary, a four-year story in which no one has been charged. Irresponsible play. I have covered news events when a Post photographer showed up: no pictures of the mayor…”the desk doesn’t like him.” Off line my journalism friends write, why are you doing this, criticizing the Post?

      It’s not a good look, dude, they say. (Shoot, it’s not a good look every time I look into a mirror.)

      Really?

      Since when are news organizations exempt from criticism? What makes them so god-awful holy? Too many journals rationalize we are the good guys and we do what we want. Okay, doesn’t mean your reporting is fair.

      Another example was that idiotic, overplayed Post story about election watchdogs investigating the abode of Democratic Town Chair Mario Testa. Some crank in the Bridgeport apartment building in which Testa now resides filed a complaint questioning his residency. SEEC jumped on it. Talk about a waste of taxpayer dollars. Mario Testa resides in Bridgeport. Because he has a weekend retreat in Monroe honors this kind of scrutiny?

      It’s irresponsible reporting. BS.

      Some readers believe it, some don’t.

      Either way, I’m approaching my 18th year with the OIB platform. If I see news organizations with an unfair hard on, I’ll point it out…just like the platform I’ve provided you for calling me out.

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      1. Perhaps you keep me around so that you can editorialize about whatever is on your mind when the opportunity occurs. But you can do that every day without my input. Your daily choices as editor/publisher of what to present is your right, your freedom, and your meal ticket as a provider of advertising and representation of commercial content.

        Whatever my value is to you, when I asked you about “moderation” rules and standards earlier this year, you never provided a response. I have often wondered ‘why’ since then. I am one writer, but not the only one to be removed, at one time or another, without understanding the context or the rules of that road. I do not think I have a civil right in this case to somehow enforce a response from you on the subject, but while my comments have provided OIB with 11 or more thumbs up I suppose most of that support has nothing to do with a position on the housing issues for thousands of vulnerable Bridgeport renters as targets for those who would gain office by breaking the absentee ballot regulations.

        According to the Voter Registrar office the number of City Registered voters on October 5, 2023 is 69,437 of which 41, 847 are Democrats, 4,568 are Republicans, 22,537 are unaffiliated and there are 485 who identify other parties. When we look at recent Municipal elections and find that regularly fewer than 20% of those registered actually vote, I continue to wonder why, as I write or when in conversations. I receive multiple responses, but none seem to touch the idea of one vote at each election for which you are eligible because of struggles and battles for equal rights and the opportunity to vote, present and past.

        So I frame the question in a different manner, Q: Why do you buy a gun? A: To defend yourself and those you love and provide safety to your goods? Isn’t this exactly what registering for a vote is about? And elections are about ‘firing’ off your votes for all you identify on the ballot. Did you buy the gun, and fail to secure ammunition and training information? What a shame. Time will tell.

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        1. John, Lennie has you on moderation? 🙂

          I’ll assume your question was a reason for that moderation, for there wouldn’t be a need to reframe it in a different manner.

          There’s a flip side to that answer though. While protection of various elements/reasons exists the primary reason to own a gun/weapon is protection however we are not in a time of the wilderness and the need to protect ourselves for being ones a meal ticket.

          https://www.nytimes.com/video/world/asia/100000004549537/cctv-shows-tiger-attack-in-beijing-zoo.html

          You know one’s protection is often to defend against one’s aggression. However, it is not always clear-cut who’s the defender or aggressor. However, we have evolved a bit. Wouldn’t you say? el tiempo lo ha dicho #La verdadera historia de Colón.

          In our times many don’t feel the need to own a gun as a means of protection. Perhaps they feel the same about voting, no vote, no gun, no shot fired, and view themselves as spectators in Port’s political arena. JS

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FI1ylg4GKv8

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  4. Hey, John is that dusty Bible of yours next to your copy of The De Vinci Code? 🙂

    OIB I don’t know what’s going on between John’s and Lennie’s back and forth, but I might have to dust off my Dan Brown to try to figure out what’s up. Being a SIMPLE mind, just because I can’t see something doesn’t mean nothing’s there. What say you, John? Are you and Lennie having an OPEN, ACCOUNTABLE, TRANSPARENT, and HONEST conversation? 🤣

    I might have to refer to the Prophet, though I doubt it will help in this case 🙂 Dictionary.

    To be fair to the prophet, I did try the dictionary thing but got stuck on Aardvark 😂https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kQBVneC30o&t=10s

    #OIBBestESLClassEver 🙃

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryr75N0nki0

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  6. Wait, what? This holier-than-thou racial justice grassroots organization is funded by one rich white guy. Ok 😆

    I wonder if Gen Now’s “Big Daddy” donor enjoys the same tax breaks as Trump, I mean Hilary. 🙂

    https://www.youtube.com/shorts/YApx-mNCPbc

    Rennie :), 20,000 shades of ballots didn’t fumble the ball getting Moore on the ballot. They handed it off Gomes and threw Moore under the primary bus along with all the collateral damage, other than what to do with the remaining of “big daddy’s money. However, it can be said they got stiff-armed by the WFP for the general. 🤣

    I depart with the prophet,s Stan

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOMhN-hfMtY

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  7. John, you know something about some of the most world-renowned sacred scriptures, none of them were written by the supposed author. The Bible, Quran, Bahubuddha Sutra, Confucius, Even Socrates. Kinda is like Trump’s Art of the Deal. You know he didn’t write it. He can’t even read a book never mind write one. 🙂

    Though I think Moses did. With regards to your reference to the Catholic Church clergy’s abuse of youths. It didn’t make Moses’ top ten.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wunGF3oMA0

    Not sure what the Quran says about the matter? Do you have a Quran on that shelf of yours?

    I know you have Plato’s Apology on that shelf of yours. 🙃

    I believe Socrates was put to death for corrupting the youth as well, though not for some selfish pleasure.

    P.S. Forget about Ron, He wrote his sacred scriptures. We know how that went people. Good Job people. 😂

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BU2EUfinwHo

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