August is here, so hit the beach and enjoy the warmth while you can. Thanks for stopping by for my weekly column. As usual, your tips and comments are welcome, and you can follow me through the week on the twitters. Here we go.
With the fur continuing to fly between IGT and Twin River, the battle is shaping up as a full-employment project for lobbyists (not to mention lawyers and communications consultants). The lobbying lineup for IGT includes company execs Donald Sweitzer and Michael Mello, as well as Robert Goldberg, Andrew Annaldo, Peter Baptista, Erich Haslehurst, Gayle Wolf, Kevin Horan, and Stephanie L. Federico. For Twin River, the names include George Caruolo, Chris Boyle, R. David Cruise, William Murphy, Mark Ryan, Matt Jerzyk, Will Farrell, and Twin River execs Marc Crisafulli, John Taylor and Craig Eaton. In other words, a lot of influential people with political connections will get paid regardless of the outcome of the high-stakes IGT-Twin River fight. In some ways, this may not be much different from how things happen on K Street in DC or other state capitals. But the influence of influencers is usually magnified in a small place like Rhode Island, and the absence of a more diverse economy makes the state’s gambling revenue all the more precious.
2) RI House Majority Leader Joe Shekarchi (D-Warwick) doesn’t rule out the possibility of the House backing Gov. Gina Raimondo’s support of a no-bid extension for IGT, although he said the chamber is keeping an open mind ahead of hearings planned for after Labor Day. Asked on Political Roundtable if a no-bid deal should be avoided, Shekarchi said, “Not necessarily. I think we need to look at the facts. This is a very important decision that we have to make in the General Assembly and we need to hear all the reasons why it is or isn’t a good idea. I will point out that this has always been a no-bid contract since the inception of at least recent memory. Gov. Carcieri supported it and endorsed it ….” But how can taxpayers know a no-bid deal is in the state’s best interest if out-of-state competitors don’t have a chance to bid for it? “That’s a good point and we’ll have to hear that side of the argument,” Shekarchi said. “And we need to see why the governor and/or GTECH or IGT feel it is, and I need to keep an open mind, and I think everybody needs to keep an open mind in spite of the very active public relations campaign going on.” (Separately, RI GOP National Committeeman Steven Frias makes the case why no-bid contracts are usually bad for taxpayers.)
3) Majority Leader Shekarchi has long been one of Rhode Island’s top political fundraisers, and his campaign kitty now tops $1 million. So with House Speaker Nicholas Mattiello expressing interest in staying on as speaker for the forseable future, will Shekarchi turn his attention to a statewide run in 2022? The Warwick Democrat is keeping his options open, although he said his inclination is to remain in the House. “That decision is for me a life-altering decision,” he said on Bonus Q&A, referring to the prospect of leaving the House and running for a different office. “It’s giving up my law practice, it’s changing my lifestyle, so I’d have to make that decision based on personal factors.”
4) Speaking of campaign cash, attempts to create a more level playing field for candidates remain an uphill fight in Rhode Island elsewhere. Rep. Rebeeca Kislak (D-Providence) and Sen. James Sheehan (D-North Kingstown) introduced legislation last session aimed at creating more competitive elections, but it’s future prospects remain uncertain at best. This is fine with the likes of U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, who has long argued for more money in politics. “We do it because we’d like to win – because we’d like to win. There’s nothing inherently wrong with wanting to win,” McConnell one said, as NPR’s Tom Dreisbach noted this week in an in-depth look at the Senate leader. The precursor to the latest push by Common Cause of RI to create a more even playing field for Rhode Island campaigns began back in 2005. I caught up at the time with Lincoln Chafee, then a GOP member of the U.S. Senate, while he was staging a fundraiser at the Hotel Providence. Chafee told me he didn’t much like the process of raising money, but considered it part of running for office. Standing nearby with a poker face was the headliner for the event, none other than Mitch McConnell.
5) Speaking of campaign cash, Part II. Luis Aponte, once part of the vanguard of Latino politics in Providence, this week became the latest RI politician to get convicted of a campaign finance-related crime. While Aponte bears responsibility for his own actions, Scott MacKay made a salient point on Roundtable: “I hate to say it, but at some point the voters bear some responsibility. It reminds me of what Bill Bradley said: ‘you think the politicians are bad? The people are no bargain.’ And if there’s someone running for office who has no visible means of support, doesn’t have a real job, hasn’t had a real job in years, you should be very skeptical of that candidate.” Meanwhile, the Aponte case is another example of how the state Board of Elections has emerged as a stronger watchdog.
6) Rhode Island is benefiting from a more competitive mediascape, following The Boston Globe’s entry into the Ocean State market. The Globe’s trio of reporters continues to dish out strong stories, such as Amanda Milkovits’ compelling work out of Bristol. The Providence Journal recently countered by unveiling its Watchdog Team, with a number of ace reporters. This move comes years after the ProJo quietly folded its previous investigative unit, and follows a move by WPRI to enhance its own investigative unit. Other reporters at other organizations are also doing strong work, including Ethan Hartley at the Warwick Beacon. This level of journalistic focus is a good thing for any state. The fly in the ointment, as we’ve noted before, is how the detailed town by town coverage of yesteryear is not coming back.
7) Elsewhere in media, The New York Times takes a deep look at the paradox at the heart of the newspaper crisis: how companies controlled by hedge funds, like GateHouse Media (owner of the ProJo, as well as papers in Newport, Fall River, New Bedford and Worcester) have been able to wring profits out of legacy media, even if that’s a limited-time opportunity: “The stubborn survival of print newspapers has given some publishers a way to subsidize the transition to a digital-centric revenue model. But print’s persistence often takes the form of what a study published by the U.N.C. researchers called ghost papers — spectral incarnations of once-thick publications able to haul in cash even as they lack the deep reporting that once made them essential to their communities. These phantoms have hung on because print revenue, while in steep decline, still brought in more than $25 billion last year. ‘Most people ask the question, ‘Will there ever be a day without daily newspapers?’ said Ken Doctor, a news media analyst. ‘As if the actual printing of a product is the mark of whether you have a paper or not, as opposed to whether there’s actually anything of quality in it.’ ”
8) WPRI’s Eli Sherman reported this week on how the developer of the Hope Point Tower has missed a series of deadlines for the controversial project in the I-195 District. For some, this is raising questions about whether the tower will come to fruition. But Joe Shekarchi (who said he does not have any personal or professional connection to the development) does not share that view. “I represent very similar types [of] development throughout the state,” he said on Bonus Q&A. “It is very common to have delays. There a lot of moving parts. The economy changes, interest rates change, banks change, architects are very busy, engineers are very busy, the wheels of government move slow … you might have a schedule, you may have a prediction that you thought was going to happen. Inevitably it never happens early, you’re lucky if it happens on time. And most of the time and especially a project of this size and scope, there’s going to be a delay. I could have predicted this before the project started.”
9) Attorney General Peter Neronha’s office this week dismissed an extortion charge against former state Sen. Nicholas Kettle (R-Coventry) after citing additional evidence and the unwillingness of the complainant to return to testify in Rhode Island.
10) NPR’s Fresh Air featured a timely interview this week with novelist Laura Lippman, whose Baltimore-set novel Lady in the Lake is attracting raves. Here’s what the former reporter had to say about President Trump’s criticism of journalists: “I hold the President of the United States responsible for a coarsening of rhetoric that has empowered and emboldened people, including the person who came to the Annapolis Capital Gazette last summer and shot and killed five people, including my friend [Gazette editor] Rob Hiaasen. And people point to that and they say, ‘That’s not fair. This was a grudge that predated the 2016 election. You’re just being slippery with your facts.’ … I tell people: ‘Of course I think rhetoric matters! Of course I think words matter. Look at what I do for a living!’ ” Regarding the president’s remarks on Baltimore, Lippman said in part, “Cities are resilient. The fact that we survive or thrive at all in the light of terrible problems isn’t to be criticized; it’s to be celebrated.”
11) Short Takes from Joe Shekarchi: The House majority leader said he expects the chamber to pass a minimum wage increase in the next session …. Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker this week signed a $43 billion budget. That’s about four times the size of Rhode Island’s latest budget, even though Massachusetts has about seven times the population of Rhode Island. Does that show that the Ocean State’s spending is out of control? Shekarchi said, not so much. He attributes the disparity to the advantages that come with the booming Massachusetts economy centered in Boston and Cambridge … Following two televised Democratic presidential debates this week, Shekarchi said he believes that Medicare for all is not a winning issue for Democrats, in part since many people favor their employer-based insurance. He said he’s leaning to supporting Mayor Pete Buttigieg: “I like his ideas. I think he’s a fresh face. I think he’s a generational change.”
12) Cyd McKenna, a longtime politico in Providence, has gotten the nod as the new executive director of the Rhode Island Democratic Party. “I am truly grateful to have the opportunity to take on this important role at such a crucial time in our state and country,” McKenna, a former City Council chief of staff and campaign manager for Buddy Cianci’s 2014 mayoral run, said in a statement. “Democrats have won incredible victories across our state at every level, and as a result the RIDP has never been in a stronger position. That said, we have more seats to recruit candidates to, majorities to build upon, and the work to expel President Trump from the White House begins now. I can’t wait to roll my sleeves up and get to work building a party that can continue to deliver for Rhode Island families.”
13) Are NBA referees as bad as some big stars would have you think? Don’t believe the hype, as author Michael Lewis points out in Act I of this installment of This American Life.
14) Mike Stenhouse, CEO of the conservative RI Center For Freedom & Prosperity, has added a new title: volunteer RI chairman for Freedom Project USA. The head of FPUSA, Matt Wylie, is a Connecticut political consultant. CT Mirror reports that Freedom Project USA, a 501(c)4 that is not required to disclose its donors, aired an ad against a Connecticut congresswoman and plans to target other New England Democrats.
15) Brown University alum Tony Horwitz, who died at age 60 earlier this year, was known in part for his book Confederates in the Attic: Dispatches from the Unfinished Civil War. Although published more than 20 years ago (1998), Confederates remains highly relevant for our divided nation, as I discovered while reading the book during a recent vacation down South. The story is a chronicle of Horwitz’s journey to places linked to the Civil War. He wrote that although he “felt almost no ideological kinship” with those he met who were “unreconstructed rebels, I’d come to recognize that in one sense they were right. The issues at stake in the Civil War – race in particular – remain raw and unresolved, as did the broad question the conflict posed: would America remain one nation? In 1861, this was a regional dilemma, which it wasn’t anymore. But socially and culturally, there were ample signs of separatism and disunion along class, race, ethnic and gender lines. The whole notion of a common people united by common principles – even a common language – seemed more open to question than at any period in my lifetime.”
