Archive for the 'Steve Laffey' Category

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Steve Laffey Urged to Run For Governor

Posted on December 29, 2009 by Will Ricci

Join the 'Draft STEVE LAFFEY for Rhode Island Governor 2010' Facebook group!Steve Laffey currently has the support of 30 Rhode Island city and town GOP chairs (and counting … there are only 39 cities and towns). If he decides to throw his hat into the ring as the Republican candidate for RI Governor, he will have a broad network of support on the ground to enact the real change we need in 2010.

CRANSTON –– With former Republican U.S. Sen. Lincoln Chafee poised to officially announce his independent candidacy for governor next week, supporters of his onetime political nemesis –– Stephen P. Laffey ––– are stepping up their efforts to convince the former Cranston mayor to enter the race as well…

…In the meantime, the draft-Laffey movement appears to be picking up steam among the heads of the state Republican party’s city and town committees.

Lincoln’s Republican town chairman, Michael Napolitano, reported that the “chairpersons of 30 Republican town and city committees unanimously endorsed [Laffey] as the 2010 Republican candidate for governor of Rhode Island” at an “ad hoc meeting” Saturday.

In a statement issued over the weekend, Napolitano, a communications professor at Dean College in Franklin, Mass., said: “The 2010 governor’s race is the most critical for the state of Rhode Island in a generation. Rhode Island stands on the precipice of a financial catastrophe not seen in America since the 1975 bond default by the City of New York. … I hope that the unanimous support of the local Republican town and city committees will convince him to run for Governor.”

It remains to be seen whether Laffey will bite…

…Asked Sunday night where he stands in light of the effort by Laffey-backers within the GOP to draw him in, the former mayor sent an e-mail that said: “I am honored. It is great to see Rhode Islanders rising to fix this financial crisis.”

But Laffey, who lost his bid for a U.S. Senate seat to Chafee in a 2006 Republican primary fight, has not yet said whether he will reenter the political fray as a candidate for governor, and if he does so, whether he will do so as a Republican.

Read More (and Comment): The Providence Journal

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Filed Under: 2010 Elections, Republican Committees, Republican Party and Steve Laffey Closed Tags: .

Laffey, R.I. GOP Chairman Meet, Discuss Potential Candidacy

Posted on December 26, 2009 by The Ocean State Republican

After days of behind-the-scenes intrigue, state GOP chairman Giovanni Cicione and former Cranston Mayor Steve Laffey finally talked face-to-face on about Laffey’s possible run for governor on the Republican ticket.

They met for about an hour Wednesday in the Garden City, Cranston office of Laffey’s longtime friend and supporter James Hackett.

Reached after the meeting, Cicione said, Laffey left him with the impression he would have “a better idea if he is ready to pull the trigger at the beginning of the [new] year.”

As party chairman, Cicione said he does not believe it is his job to handpick candidates, but he said he assured Laffey he would be welcome to run under the Republican party banner, “and we will do whatever we can to help him.”

As to his own thoughts on a Laffey candidacy, Cicione said: “At this point, I’d like to have a declared Republican candidate….I would like Laffey to run, but there are other folks we are talking to as well.”

Cicione said he doesn’t yet know enough to embrace Laffey’s agenda, but he said they agreed, at least conceptually: “The state is too far gone for incremental change to fix what’s wrong. The change has to be broad-based. It has to be strong. It has to be a dramatic departure from the status quo.”…

Read More: The Providence Journal Politics Blog

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Filed Under: 2010 Elections, Republican Party and Steve Laffey Closed Tags: .

He’s Ba-ack! Former Mayor Steve Laffey Weighs in on the Budget

Posted on December 17, 2009 by The Ocean State Republican

stevelaffeyDuring an exclusive interview yesterday with The Herald, former Cranston Mayor Stephen Laffey, reportedly planning a run for Governor next year, said that the state’s budgetary problems, and the fact that they’ve become local budget problems, should surprise nobody who has been paying attention.

Governor Donald Carcieri announced on Monday that he was proposing a $125 million cut in aid to cities and towns. The cut would cost Cranston $6.6 million in state aid.

Laffey has been sounding the fiscal alarm in op-ed pieces and talk radio appearances for the last several years. He will not yet acknowledge whether or not he is running for Governor…

Laffey said that every legislator who voted for the budget, and Governor Donald Carcieri, a fellow Republican who signed it, should not be in office.

“Everyone involved should resign. Either they didn’t know it would come to this, or they did and I’m not sure which is worse,” said Laffey.

Sounding every bit like a candidate for Governor, Laffey said the state’s political landscape is in need of a serious makeover. At a press conference to announce the appointment of a new economic development director late last week, talk centered on the need for everyone to “work together” to find solutions. Laffey, however, who didn’t attend the event, suggested that the approach was misguided. Instead, he said the state needs reformers who are ready for a battle.

“The bottom line is we’re going to need somebody, or a group of people, to run for public office who will take the fight to the established political order, and by that I mean the public sector union leaders and the General Assembly,” said Laffey. “There needs to be a direct fight … and unless we do that, we’ll continue on the road to collapse.”…

Read More: The Cranston Herald

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Filed Under: 2010 Elections, Economics, Republican Candidates and Steve Laffey Closed Tags: .