Markeshia Ricks File Photo
Brenda Harris: Anyone on the line?
Brenda Harris was ready to second Alex Taubes’ bid to challenge State Sen. Marty Looney. Then she went digitally missing for 20 minutes — and returned with a surprise.
That was one of the mysteries that turned a digital nominating convention Tuesday night into a whirl of technological snafus, unmuted lines, and bureaucratic confusion.
The outcome of the convention was never in doubt: Democrats voted 58 – 1 at the virtual convention to back Martin Looney for a 15th term as state senator from the 11th District, which covers much of New Haven and parts of Hamden and North Haven. Three party members who were present on the call did not answer when called to vote.
His challenger, local attorney and activist Alex Taubes, said he will now seek to petition his way onto the ballot for an Aug. 11 primary. (Read more about the race here.) Republicans have tapped Jameson White to run in the general election. Looney serves as the Senate’s president pro tempore.
The party held the convention over an online platform called UberConference. By all accounts of participants, it was a mess.
Where’s Brenda Harris?
The turbulence began when one New Haven delegate, tenant council leader and former alder Harris, stopped responding.
According to convention procedure, each candidate must be nominated by one party delegate and seconded by another in order to be eligible for the party’s endorsement.
Lisa Bassani, who nominated Looney, highlighted his leadership role in the Senate, which she credited with passing measures such as paid family leave and a $15 minimum wage.
“Marty has so many important accomplishments to list,” she said.
Taubes received a nomination from Chris Atchley. Atchley described Taubes as a “civil rights attorney and social justice warrior,” saying that Taubes “fights day in and day out for Connecticut’s most vulnerable communities” through his advocacy for issues such as affordable housing, public transit, and voting rights.
When Convention Chair Vincent Mauro Jr. called upon delegate Brenda Harris to second Taubes’ nomination, he received no answer.
Harris appeared to be on the call, and she had answered during the convention’s initial roll call.
“I was told that Brenda was seconding Alex Taubes,” Mauro announced after several minutes of asking whether she was present. “If Brenda could just confirm that she is on the phone and if she is or is not seconding, we can move on.”
Minutes later, Harris still was not responding.
“For the purposes of a second, is anyone seconding attorney Alex Taubes?” Mauro repeated.
No one replied.
Soon, Justin Elicker, New Haven’s mayor and a party delegate who ultimately voted to endorse Martin Looney, tried calling Harris on his own cell phone.
“Brenda’s on speakerphone,” he started to say.
Where’s Justin Elicker?
But at that moment, his video and audio froze, and the other convention participants could hear neither him nor Harris.
Later, Elicker told the Independent that his connection had broken. He recalled that Harris told him over the phone that she was experiencing a technological hiccup.
“Everyone deserves the opportunity to vote,” Elicker said, explaining his motivation for reaching out to Harris. “I wanted to facilitate her being able to do that.”
Elicker’s image remained still, although he reappeared after a few minutes through a separate video stream. Meanwhile, Mauro resumed: “Do I hear a second? Do I hear a second? I’m not hearing a second.”
When no one else agreed to second Taubes’ nomination, one delegate moved to close the nomination phase of the convention. The motion to move on passed with only one individual, who was identified only by a phone number, in opposition.
Next, a delegate offered a motion to put forward a unanimous endorsement of Looney.
Before the motion could be voted on, Harris’ voice broke through.
“Sorry,” she said. “I got disconnected!”
Where’s That Motion?
Now that Harris was back on the call, the delegates disputed whether to walk back the previous two motions to close nominations — and what the procedure for doing so could look like.
“Given the circumstances, I move that Brenda has a chance to second” Taubes’ nomination, Atchley said.
But before that motion could surface, another delegate said, the motion to unanimously endorse Looney needed to be withdrawn.
“Is there now a motion to withdraw that motion?” Mauro called.
One delegate answered with such a motion — and another delegate offered that the person who put the original motion forward should be the one to withdraw it, later clarifying that “my point was that we didn’t need to have a motion to correct the motion.”
Debate ensued over the convoluted procedures for how nominations could be reopened. Throughout the dialogue, the sounds of shuffling and murmuring crackled from a large number of unmuted listeners.
Several people voiced their confusion. Some were frustrated.
“It’s a fucking mess,” one person called out.
“Whoever said that, I agree,” Mauro said. “It’s really confusing and people aren’t putting their phones on mute. If Brenda is going to second Alex, we should give her the opportunity to do that.”
Last-Minute Vote Switch
After a few more minutes of attempts to make sense of the procedure, Looney interjected.
“I would have no objection to streamlining the process so that we could just have a vote on the nomination,” he said, “to allow Ms. Harris to make her second if that’s her decision.”
Harris piped in.
“I’m voting for Martin Looney,” she said.
Sam Gurwitt Photo
Looney at a pre-pandemic panel.
As the virtual room processed Harris’ declaration, Mauro expressed his agreement with Looney.
“I’m just gonna beg for some leeway here,” he said. “We are now bogged down in procedural bullshit.”
Mauro then called for someone to second Atchley’s nomination of Taubes.
For a moment, no one answered.
Then, Jennifer Sacco — who would later vote for Looney — seconded.
A roll call vote ensued, in which Harris voted to endorse Martin Looney along with 57 others. Only Atchley voted to endorse Taubes.
Why did Harris change candidates?
“Because I’ve been voting for Martin Looney for years,” she later told the Independent over the phone. “He does everything that you ask him and he’s willing to do anything that you need.”
When asked why she had initially submitted her name to second Taubes’ nomination, Harris hung up the phone.
When this reporter called her back, Harris explained that she couldn’t talk further because a family emergency had come up.
“No Hard Feelings”
As Looney accepted the nomination, he listed a host of future priorities including progressive taxation and education reform.
“I look forward to returning to the Capitol in January with an even stronger and more substantial Democratic majority [in the Senate] and a Democratic governor to do things for the whole state,” he said.
He also thanked Mauro for “doing a great job under the stressful conditions of this situation.”
“It’s why I drink a lot, Marty,” responded Mauro, who serves as Looney’s chief of staff.
Taubes later told the Independent that he had left the convention early because he had received a call from an incarcerated individual and did not want that person to sacrifice a call they had paid for. For the rest of the meeting, he received text updates about the convention from a friend and did not know the details of what had ensued.
Taubes.
Taubes, who said he knows Brenda Harris through her role as the head of the tenants council at the Mill River Crossing housing complex (where Taubes resides), was unperturbed by the news of her vote switch.
“Maybe she had a change of heart at the last minute. That doesn’t bother me a bit because I still really believe in her as a friend — and friendship always goes above politics for me,” Taubes said. “There’s certainly no hard feelings about it.”
Taubes said he plans to petition his way onto the ballot, a task that has become far more difficult in an era of social distancing.
While Gov. Ned Lamont altered requirements for ballot access due to the pandemic, Taubes has argued that those loosened restrictions remain an insurmountable barrier for petitioning candidates and has launched a lawsuit against the state seeking to adjust the requirements further.
In the meantime, Taubes said he has recruited students at Three Rivers Community College to develop an online portal for gathering ballot access petition signatures, based on guidelines from the Connecticut Secretary of State. He said he plans to make the site open source so that other petitioning candidates across the country can use it.
Thank you to all who participated last night, for your patience and for your commitment to democracy.
Democracy must stay alive in the age of corona! Even good leaders should be challenged and held to account. No one should be unopposed holding one of the most powerful positions in the state. As Democrats we should embrace giving voters a choice and a say.
I look forward to continuing to raise the issues of fairness and justice in the Eleventh District.
Stay tuned for more about our petitioning app!