First-Time Candidate Healey Wins AG Seat

Tuesday, November 04, 2014

Nicholas Handy, GoLocalWorcester Contributor

With 84-percent of precincts reporting in, Maura Healey has won the race for the next Attorney General of Massachusetts, collecting 62-percent of the vote.

Healey defeated her Republican competition John Miller by over 422,000 votes.

"Maura Healey is one of the staunchest advocates for equality we have in this country, and we join her in celebrating her historic victory tonight,” said the Human Rights Campaign in a statement. “As the nation's first openly gay attorney general, she is an inspirational trailblazer and will fight to guarantee civil rights and legal equality for all people of Massachusetts."

Healey has been considered the favorite since the primary concluded, never having less than a 20-percent lead in the polls. Healey was challenged in the Democratic primary by Warren Tolman, and came away with a surprise runaway victory taking 68-percent of the 516,108 votes. Healey is the nation’s first openly LGBT Attorney General.

Healey has previously served as an assistant Attorney General and has a much more interesting backstory as being an openly gay woman who helped to spearhead the state’s challenge to the federal Defense of Marriage Act. She was also a professional women’s basketball player in Europe and took a big pay cut when she became assistant Attorney General.

Republican John Miller was the only Republican to file to run for office, and was considered the underdog from the beginning and has been praised for his laid back demeanor.

Both candidates were running for office for their first time.

Related Slideshow: MA Election Predictions: Political Experts Weigh In

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Paul Giorgio

GoLocalWorcester MINDSETTER™

MA Governor: Coakley

9th Worcester (House): Green

12th Worcester (House): Naughton Jr.

17th Worcester (House): Belanger

Worcester Senate (Worcester, Hampden, Hampshire and Middlesex): Gobi

Worcester Senate (Worcester 1st): Chandler

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Chris Pinto

Worcester Republican City Committee

MA Governor: Baker

9th Worcester (House): Green

12th Worcester (House): Wyatt

17th Worcester (House): Belanger

Worcester Senate (Worcester, Hampden, Hampshire and Middlesex): Valenzola

Worcester Senate (Worcester, Norfolk): Fattman

Worcester Senate (Worcester 1st): Franco

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Bill McCarthy

Worcester Representative, Massachusetts Republican Party

MA Governor: Baker

9th Worcester (House): Muradian

12th Worcester (House): Wyatt

17th Worcester (House): Campanale

Worcester Senate (Worcester, Hampden, Hampshire and Middlesex): Valanzola

Worcester Senate (Worcester, Norfolk): Fattman

Worcester Senate (Worcester 1st): Franco

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Erin O'Brien

Associate Professor of Political Science, UMass Boston

MA Governor: “Right now, the polls are suggesting a toss up. I think that Coakley has the support of the numbers game; there are a lot more Democrats than Republicans in Massachusetts. But I think that Baker has the advantage of there not being a higher profile race on the ballot. There are also a lot of people who think that what happened to Coakley in losing to Scott Brown in 2010 may happen again against Baker.”

MA Attorney General: “I think that Maura Healey is the biggest star to emerge from this election cycle. I think that she will win by a large margin, by as much as 20-30 points.”

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Tobe Berkovitz

Associate Professor of Advertising, Boston University

“Right now, I think the governor’s race is too close to call. I think that Massachusetts sort of has a political burnout at the moment; I think that the Brown v. Warren race sucked the energy out of the politicos. And when you look at Baker and Coakley, both candidates are solid but neither is the definitive candidate that either party can fully stand behind.”