Dee DeQuattro: Pulse on Politics - Buddy's Poll Dance

Dee DeQuattro

Buddy Cianci comes out on top this week, literally, leading a recent poll by WPRI-TV and the Providence Journal. It seems people in Providence are not all that concerned that the former mayor served time in federal prison on a corruption charge, instead, it seems that they trust Cianci to get the capital city back on track. 

What's a yoot?

Cianci’s biggest opponent Jorge Elorza is trailing by 8 points although Elorza is more popular among young people. That means Cianci needs to step it up on social media and target a message toward a younger crowd. No, the younger crowd doesn’t remember the city back in 1999, most of them were little kids more concerned about watching Bugs Bunny and less concerned with economic development in the city. 

Cianci also enjoyed the endorsement of the Providence Firefighters and police union.

Not their buddy

Meanwhile, the ABC Group, “Anybody But Cianci” is likely unhappy  with this recent polling. The group’s plan was exposed in a letter on GoLocalProv last week, and now they find out that Cianci still remains popular in Providence and could possibly clinch the election. Looks like the group needs to hurry up and raise that million if they plan on taking out Cianci.

Buddy doesn’t have it in the bag though. The new poll shows 21% undecided, that’s enough to tilt the race in either direction.

I guess we CAN all just get along

Meanwhile it was a Kumbaya moment for the Rhode Island GOP as Allan Fung and Ken Block finally hugged and made up. Two weeks after the primary Block endorsed his former opponent Allan Fung describing the primary as spirited. Block said he is willing to do whatever Fung needs to help him get elected. Kudos to Block, its not easy to suck up your pride and endorse your opponent but Block made a promise to the Rhode Island Republican Party when they accepted him into the party and now he is following through. It remains to be seen if the move is enough to reunite the Republican Party which was heavily divided during the divisive primary.

Gina Raimondo was one step above Fung having a campaign event with both Angel Taveras and Clay Pell on Friday last week.

That’s good, now that everyone is friends, we can move on with the election.

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Sharon Gamba

Unplanned endorsement

Gina Raimondo also took to the streets and announced an endorsement from Planned Parenthood. Both Raimondo and Fung are known to be pro-choice but somehow Fung managed to grab an endorsement from Rhode Island Right to Life.

Playing the heel

As for Moderate Bob Healey, the public is still waiting to hear some campaign ideas from him. I’m sure he has more ideas than when he ran for Lt. Governor on the premise he wanted to abolish the office. Although, some people might vote for him on the platform of abolishing the governors office.

RIGHTing the ship

Meanwhile District 32 House of Representative candidate Sharon Gamba is getting national attention nominated as one of the Republican State Leadership Committee Future Majority Project and “Right Women, Right Now” Initiative’s races to watch. Gamba is working to unseat Representative Bob Craven.

I'm Baaack!

That’s all for this week. Sorry I missed you the last couple of weeks, I took a little vacation and spent some time in the field working with my family’s non-profit organization Operation Stand Down assisting homeless and at-risk veterans. But alas, I am back and the fun has just begun.

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