Somerville legislator mounts write-in run
By Benjamin Gedan, Globe Correspondent
10/14/2004
A month after losing in the Democratic primary, state Representative Vincent P. Ciampa said yesterday that he is launching a write-in campaign to win back the seat he has held since 1989.
Ciampa said his opponent, Carl Sciortino, a 26-year-old Tufts University graduate who has never held elected office, was a "one-issue candidate" interested only in promoting gay marriage.
The lawmaker called himself a victim of low voter turnout in the primary, and said his supporters had pleaded for a new campaign. Sciortino won by 93 votes, and only 23 percent of registered voters participated.
"He thinks government is about self-service," said Ciampa, a Somerville Democrat. "It's all about gay marriage."
Dan Cohen, Sciortino's campaign spokesman, dismissed what he called a familiar attack. So will voters, again, in November, he said.
"Carl spent the last six months talking about schools, local aid, and health care," Cohen said. "People voted for change."
Ciampa is the first write-in candidate in Somerville since 1995, and no write-in candidate has won since the 1980s. There is no Republican challenger for the seat.
Ciampa acknowledged his uphill battle, saying the projected 80 percent turnout will include people interested only in voting in the presidential race, featuring home state US Senator John F. Kerry and President Bush.
Ciampa's campaign had $45,000 in late August, the most recent filing date for campaign finance reports, compared with Sciortino's $23,000. Ciampa said he will distribute 80,000 stickers bearing his name for supporters to place on the November ballot.
The primary campaign energized supporters of gay marriage, who helped Sciortino with volunteers and campaign donations. Many political observers said Sciortino's victory had revealed a philosophical shift in the district, long a working-class bastion, which includes south Medford and west Somerville.
"There's a new constituency in Somerville," the city's former mayor, Dorothy Kelly Gay, said after Sciortino's win. "It sends a clear warning . . . things have changed."