I know that the race to be Massachusett’s junior senator could be construed as “not of general interest”, so here’s a quick-hit summary for the New Englanders and true political junkies.
The primaries will be held on April 30th, and the general election on June 25th. The two Democratic candidates have agreed to six primary debates, and the three Republicans are arguing somewhere between four and nine. (Barring some actual surprises, I will not be live-blogging). Ed Markey (my current Rep) is easily the most progressive of the five, so I consider this Boston Globe story good news:
US Representative Edward J. Markey holds a wide lead over his Democratic rival for the US Senate, fellow Representative Stephen F. Lynch, and would easily beat all three Republican candidates in a head-to-head matchup, according to a new poll.
Markey leads Lynch by 29.5 percentage points among potential Democratic primary voters, 50 percent to 20.5 percent, with 23 percent undecided about their preference in the April 30 primary, according to the UMass Lowell/Boston Herald poll released Wednesday night.
Markey, of Malden, would also beat the Republicans candidates by double-digit margins, although the poll found that the vast majority of voters do not know who those candidates are, suggesting those candidates have room to grow if they can broaden their profiles…
The poll indicated that, if the June 25 general election were held today, Markey would defeat state Representative Daniel B. Winslow by 23 percentage points, former Navy SEAL Gabriel E. Gomez by 19.5 percentage points, and former US attorney Michael J. Sullivan by 17 points. The survey did not measure how the Republicans would fare against one another in the GOP primary on April 30.
The poll found most voters have yet to form an opinion of Markey, offering a chance for Lynch and the Republicans to dent his public image and shake up the race in its earliest stages. Despite Markey’s 36 years in Congress, about 31 percent of those surveyed said they had no opinion of the Malden Democrat, while nearly 19 percent said they had never even heard of him…
(And yet I believe Massachusetts voters are considered fairly politically sophisticated, by national standards. Yes, we’re doomed.)
David S. Bernstein at the Phoenix discusses why Lynch, whose voting record differs from Markey only in being far more socially conservative, is still running:
The Massachusetts <del>Pig Pile</del> Senate RacePost + Comments (15)