Yash Roy photo
Local 34's Barbara Vereen (center): Union is ready to knock 20K doors.
With the general election just over three weeks away, Democrats from across the city and the state gathered on Whalley Avenue to try to boost turnout for an electoral contest in which “everything is on the line.”
U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro offered that summation of the coming Nov. 8 election on Saturday during a get-out-the-vote rally held at the local headquarters of incumbent Gov. Ned Lamont’s reelection campaign at 560 Whalley Ave.
“This election is the most important in our lives,” she told the Democratic politicians and party insiders before her. “Voters’ rights are on the line. Women’s rights are on the line. Our state’s economic health is on the line. Funding for our cities is on the line. If we don’t show up, then everything is on the line.”
At Saturday's GOTV rally on Whalley.
On the ballot on Nov. 8 will be contested races for all of Connecticut’s so-called constitutional offices, including governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, comptroller, secretary of the state, and treasurer. Connecticut voters will also get to vote in contests for U.S. Senate, U.S. House of Representatives, state Senate, state House, and probate judge. And they’ll be faced with a ballot question about whether or not Connecticut should permit early voting.
Each speaker at Saturday’s rally sought to raise the stakes of the election by describing the benefits of Democratic governance and the potential threats of Republican wins.
Lamont described Nov. 8 as the “most important election of our state.”
State Sen. and Prez Pro Tem Martin Looney...
... and U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro
“Democrats have delivered for the state and Connecticut believes in us,” New Haven State Sen. and President Pro Tem Martin Looney told the crowd. “We just need to make sure that we get out the vote and make our voices heard.”
Lamont, a first-term Democrat, is facing off against Republican challenger and Madison businessman Bob Stefanowski for the second time in four years this gubernatorial contest. Lamont currently has a roughly 15-point lead in polls. On Saturday, he and other Democrats stressed that the November will likely come down to turnout among Democratic voters in liberal strongholds like New Haven.
Former New Haven Democratic Town Committee Chairman Nick Balletto explained that New Haven represents one of the largest shares of Democratic votes in the state. So, he continued, using the strong organizational strength of voter contact in the city could help keep Democrats in office statewide.
Saturday’s rally was attended by various local union members and labor leaders, including from Yale’s UNITE HERE unions, New Haven Rising, and the city’s firefighter union. The organizers at Saturday’s rally committed to getting out the vote through canvassing and phone banking for Democratic candidates.
“This election is important for labor organizations and protecting and growing all the progress UNITE HERE and all of labor across the state has made,” Local 34 Organizing Director Barbara Vereen told the Independent. “We’re going to be canvassing in neighborhoods across the city and knock on 20,000 doors before the election.”
Vereen also pointed to recent unionization efforts by Yale’s graduate student worker union, Local 33, as an important reason to support Democratic candidates up and down on the ballot.
“Lamont and all of the other Democrats here are going to expand all of the protections and benefits we’ve fought so hard for,” she said. “They’re also supporting Local 33 to help anyone who wants to form a union in this state have the right to do so.”
Elias Estabrook, an organizer for New Haven Rising, said that he attended on Saturday because he wants to see more funds and support for New Haven. He credited the state’s recent raise in municipal aid — aka, PILOT, or Payment in Lieu of Taxes — to the city to Democratic leaders and said he wanted to ensure that the progress already made wouldn’t be wiped out with a Republican administration.
Estabrook told the Independent that New Haven Rising was kicking into high gear for the next three weeks and will be knocking on doors three times a week with their next canvass scheduled to take place in the Hill.
With many elected officials bringing their kids to the event, Saturday’s rally also proved to be a place for old friends and longtime local politicos to reconnect.
That was the case for Susan Weisselberg, who told the Independent that she came out not just to help out wherever she could with the upcoming election, but to also see familiar faces and reconnect after two years of pandemic-era get-out-the-vote work.
This is the same old crew that has run our state and country off the road and into a ditch. Do we really want more years of this? Are you better off right now than your were 4 years ago? NO? Then, Lamont has to GO. Just do it.