Gov. Ned Lamont and his Republican challenger, state Sen. Ryan Fazio of Greenwich, brought their get-out-the-vote efforts Sunday to Enfield, a politically volatile suburb with at least two competitive legislative races and a history of close results in gubernatorial and presidential elections.
To the west, U.S. Rep. Jahana Hayes, D-5th District, and Republican Chris Shea campaigned in Meriden and Middlebury with the same goal of nudging voter turn out in a year without the drama or heavy spending of 2022, when Hayes won by fewer than 2,000 votes in a nationally watched race.
Fazio chose Enfield, an I-91 commuter town on the Massachusetts border that Lamont carried with 50.2% of the vote four years ago, as his first stop on a day when the goal of both parties from the top of the ballot on down was less about persuading the undecided than inspiring the committed to show up on Tuesday.
“It’s a hardworking, middle-class town,” Fazio said. “People on both sides of the aisle, they’re common-sense people. They’re not ideological or partisan people. They believe that you should be able to work hard, follow the rules and be able to pay your bills. And in this state, after eight years of the Lamont administration, it’s harder than ever to get by.”
Fazio campaigned at the Country Diner with two Republican incumbents in difficult races, Sen. John Kissel and Rep. Carol Hall, and Marie Pyznar, the GOP challenger to a first-term lawmaker, Rep. John Santanella, D-Enfield. Fazio found a generally polite reception, with the exception of some diners who ignored Fazio’s proffered hand or declined to make eye contact.
Less than two miles away, Lamont gave a pep talk in Santanella’s kitchen to volunteers and barnstorming Democrats, including U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, who is not on the ballot, and U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District, who won his first race 20 years ago. Enfield is the most populous community in Courtney’s district.
“We’ve come a long way in the last eight years. We were hurting a bit back in the 2010s,” Lamont said, recalling the budget shortfall and debt he inherited from his predecessor, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy, when he took office eight years ago. “I think a lot of people were losing some confidence, losing a little bit of confidence in the state.”
Lamont, a Democrat seeking a third term, is favored by double digits in every recent public poll., and the time for persuading voters to choose a candidate is over. The focus is getting the base to turn out on Tuesday, though hundreds of thousands already have voted in early voting and by absentee ballot.
At Santanella’s house, Lora Rae Anderson corralled volunteers for door knocking, assuring them the task involved no hard sell.
“We’re talking to friendly voters. We want to make sure that we’re turning people out,” said Anderson, a Lamont administration official and the volunteer manager of David Kiner’s campaign to unseat Kissel, who was elected 34 years ago.
Kissel, after surviving for so long in a district that leans Democratic, likened himself to a cat who has expended his nine lives — and then some.
“I’m at absolutely the last of my nine lives on my second cat,” Kissel said.
He told Fazio he was grateful for the visit.
Nearly a half million of the state’s 2.2 million voters already had cast votes in early voting and by absentee ballot by Sunday morning, the last day of early voting.
From Enfield, Lamont went to a rally in West Hartford, the Democratic suburb that has drawn more early voters to the polls than any other community. Luke Bronin, the congressional nominee, said the party needs to take advantage of the early vote and focus on those who have yet to turn out.
“The opportunity is to make sure that the early vote doesn’t just mean that the same folks who are already going to vote on election day vote early. It’s that we use this opportunity to reach more people, to get those folks who might not have come out, who maybe didn’t come out last time, who maybe, you know, lost faith in our process and are thinking about staying on the couch,” Bronin said.
Lamont said Democrats want not just to win in Connecticut, but do so by a margin that sends a message about the politics of the state and its rejection in the midterm of President Donald J. Trump.
“It means the first day of the end of the Trump regime,” Lamont said.
No one mentioned Trump at the GOP rally with the exception of George Austin, the nominee for congress in the 2nd District.
Fazio seemed content to drop back to his key message that voters should hold the Democratic governor, and not the Republican president, responsible for the high cost of living in Connecticut. After making an issue Saturday of the governor swatting away the camera phone of a woman who challenged him about an aide’s traffic ticket, he didn’t raise it again on Sunday.
The governor’s campaign ignored the episode, while Fazio’s promoted the woman’s brief video, as did the conservative WTIC-AM radio host, Reese on the Radio, who attended the GOP’s early evening rally at a crowded banquet hall in Bristol. His campaign called it a “criminal confrontation.”
Neither Fazio nor any other member of the GOP ticket mentioned the incident in their rally speeches Sunday, though someone organizing anti-Lamont Facebook group had left fly swatters on tables with a message, “Stop the swat.”
Fazio repeated his ridicule of Lamont for saying he only was getting started.
Hayes and Shea in the 5th District
In the sprawling 5th Congressional District in the western part of the state, Hayes and her Republican opponent Shea sought to capitalize on the last day of early voting and convince voters not to sit out of a midterm election.
Democrats are buoyed by a favorable political environment, but the candidates focused on a closing message that called on voters to not get complacent during a high-stakes election year.
“You want to turn the news off. Everything is negative, everything is ugly. Working people are getting hit the hardest,” Connecticut state Treasurer Erick Russell said at a gathering in Meriden. “What you all have to remember is all of that is on the line right now this election cycle.”
“I know I’m preaching to the choir, but the main thing here is we got a couple of days left, and we can’t leave anything on the table, because this is an opportunity not only for us to win, but win big,” he continued. Russell faces a challenge from Republican Fred Wilms.
Russell was joined by Hayes and state legislative candidates who gathered in Meriden before supporters went door-knocking on a sunny and mild autumn day. He touted Connecticut’s legislature as a “back stop” to what’s happening in Washington.
Hayes, who’s seeking a fifth term in Congress, delivered a forceful response to a room packed with a few dozen volunteers. She painted a picture much larger than the 5th District seat.
“It matters, every single election, because what we are seeing is a slow burn, chipping at the edges, eroding our democracy, intimidating the right to vote, doing all of these little things, which by themselves don’t seem significant, but all together is the recipe for disaster and where we are heading,” Hayes said. “So we have two days. Everything is on the line.”
Hayes brought up the H.R. 1, Republicans’ tax legislation that passed last year and was dubbed by Trump as the “big beautiful bill.” She argued that “the most damaging parts haven’t even gone into effect,” pointing to changes to Medicaid eligibility that’ll lead to cuts in the state and across the country.
“Give them a reason to make the issues that you care about a part of whether it be the Democratic priorities or the Republican priorities, it doesn’t matter,” Hayes said. “Let them know this seat is not yours to have. You don’t get to keep it. You have to work for it every single time.”
Midterms are challenging in general because turnout lags compared to presidential election years. On top of that, the party in power historically faces headwinds in a midterm year.
Shea, meanwhile, spent the morning with about two dozen local Republicans in Middlebury. They stood on the side of a main road, waving campaign signs for a number of GOP candidates running up and down the ballot on Tuesday.
Shea, a firefighter and retired Navy SEAL, said he’s working to get lower-propensity voters out to the polls.
“We’re feeling good, we’re working real hard on getting the word out and getting after folks — the presidential-year-only voters. There’s a ton of those registered,” Shea said, as he waved to cars that honked in support or drivers that flashed a thumbs up. “You get after a chunk of those and a couple other cities, it makes a big difference.”
Shea is a first-time candidate but noted that he has long ties to the 5th District compared to the past Republican candidate running for the seat. He’s hoping that’ll materialize into more support, along with his career in the military and his work at the Pentagon.
The 5th District is still considered the most competitive congressional race in the state. This cycle, election analysts who rate competitive races moved the 5th District much closer to Democrats.
National attention has shifted away from the district as outside groups in both parties look to other U.S. House races in the battle for control of Congress. That has largely dissipated, though both candidates got an 11th-hour boost from political action committees.
“I think they could have gotten more bang for their buck by investing a little bit here, which would have made the Democrats try to pump in two or three times as much,” Shea said about more involvement and financial support from Republicans at the national level.
“Based on what everybody says, I’m a pretty darn good candidate, based on my background, no criminal history, no nonsense, serving the country, serving locally,” he added. “That’s a pretty appealing candidacy to put in front of people.”
John Calabrese, chairman of the Middlebury Republican Town Committee, spent the morning alongside Shea and others to boost turnout.
“The base has to get out. That’s the bottom line. Even in Connecticut,” Calabrese said. “Connecticut has to draw independents. Republicans, we don’t have enough. But if we can draw some of the independents, I know we can pick up something.”
Calabrese said one of the bigger challenges for the party is getting younger voters into the political fold. “We have to get those people motivated to come out to an event like today, to spend some time,” he said.
The news about U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy’s stroke sent a shockwave throughout the campaign trail in Connecticut on Sunday. Hayes, who had been encouraged by Murphy to run for the congressional seat he once occupied by the senator, talked about his importance to the party and reassured Democrats about prospects for his recovery.
Murphy “has been all over this country working for Democratic candidates up and down the ballot, because he understands it’s not just about what happens to those small things, it’s about making sure that those big things are also taken care of,” Hayes said. “It’s about making sure that we have Democratic majorities in the House and in the Senate.
“He’s going to be OK,” she said to applause.