Al Samuel Photo
Harp: Philly-bound.
Pelletier: “Retribution.”
New Haven’s mayor has a trip planned to Philadelphia to help make American political history. The state’s AFL-CIO chief wanted to go, too — but failed in her effort to win an official ticket.
The party is July’s Democratic National Convention, where Hillary Clinton is expected to become the first woman ever to serve as a major party’s presidential candidate.
New Haven Mayor Toni Harp will help formally choose Clinton as the nominee as one of four pledged Clinton delegates from Connecticut’s Third U.S. Congressional District. “I think it’s going to be fun to part of all of it, to witness it,” Harp said.
Harp and three others — U.S. Small Business Administration veterans affairs officer Frank Alvarado, New Haven Ward 29 Democratic Co-Chair Audrey Tyson, and West Haven Mayor Edward O’Brien — won delegate slots at a local caucus last week.
These caucuses are normally sleepy affairs. But you may have noticed that much about this year’s presidential race has deviated from past scripts. Last weke’s convention, at West Haven High School, turned into a competitive, “chaotic” mess.
At least that’s how state AFL-CIO President Lori Pelletier sees it. She had hoped to become a delegate, too. She lost out.
She said this week that she doesn’t see her absence form the slate as an accident. Her exclusion has been seen statewide as the latest example of a rift between state labor leaders and their usual Democratic Party allies, in the wake of the layoffs contained int he recently passed state budget. (This story details the rift.)
“Something ran foul” at the delegate caucus, Pelletier told the Independent Monday. She said she has attended “four or five” similar caucuses in the past, and they usually proceed without controversy. This time, a challenge emerged as soon as the convention began to replace the convention’s moderator. New Haven mayoral aide Jason Bartlett mounted a challenge, and won the right to run the convention.
“It was chaos” all night, Pelletier said.
She called her loss “retribution for us standing up and bringing attention to a bad Democratic budget.”
Appearing on WNHH radio’s “Mayor Monday” program, Toni Harp said no such retribution was at play.
The rules required that the four delegates include two men and two women, Harp said. A full hundred New Haveners showed up to the caucus, she noted. And they know Tyson, a veteran co-chair of New Haven’s 29th Ward Democratic Committee.
“Lori certainly had her people there. I think New Haven just had more people,” Harp said.
“I have to thank Jason Bartlett for bringing out a lot of people. There was no real plan. When Audrey saw her name was on the sheet, she saw that most of the people in the audience were New Haveners. A lot of people know her. Audrey has a big following.”
Bartlett’s version: Pelletier’s loss had nothing to do with state political retribution, and all to do with Bartlett’s own insurgent tactics. He, too, was upset with the state party.
Bartlett said he felt he should have been a delegate himself. After all, he said, he co-chaired Clinton’s Connecticut campaign in 2008 — one of a small number of African-American elected officials to do so. This year he has worked hard on Clinton’s primary campaign.
So when he learned he was not slated by statewide leaders to be approved as a convention delegate, he decided to organize over 100 New Haveners to attend last week’s Third District delegate-selection caucus to support New Haven candidates. Pelletier’s supporters were simply outnumbered by New Haveners who know and support Tyson, Bartlett said.
Paul Bass Photo
Bartlett, center, at a Clinton primary campaign event he helped organize in the Hill.
Bartlett said he decided to make his point by winning the convention moderator’s position rather than pursuing his quest for a delegate slot, he said. (Why? “I decided for a variety of reasons. I’m not going to get into that.”)
“We were going to have a democratic election. We were not going to let the state party dictate. It had nothing to do with Lori Pelletier,” Bartlett said. “You win a caucus by bringing people to the caucus. I brought the most people to caucus.”
Click on or download the above sound file to listen to the full episode of “Mayor Monday” on WNHH radio’s “Dateline New Haven,” which also covered the city budget, the recent student walkout at Amistad High School, and plans for a new garage at Union Station.
Monday’s “Mayor Monday” episode of “Dateline New Haven” was made possible in partnership with Gateway Community College.
The Democrats have rigged it so Hillary Clinton will win .Party faithful always vote Democrat just because a candidate is Democrat. Jill Stein on Democracy Now said it perfectly. That her and the Green Party support all the progressive agendas If we want different outcomes, we must look to Main Street, not Wall Street. If we want new leaders, we have to look to ourselves.If JILL Stein is not on the ballot in this state I will be abstaining or writing in a preferable choice.