The Charming Carl Sciortino: The Gays Love Him, and So Does Marie Parente
by Laura Kiritsy, Bay Windows
12/15/2005
The crowded room at the back of the Boston nightspot Club 209 erupted into an effusive round of hooting applause as openly gay state Rep. Carl Sciortino stepped up onto a chair to deliver a short speech at a fundraiser last August. Punctuating the din was the voice of a supporter near the back of the room who cried, "Carl for president!"
It was a pretty warm welcome, considering the fundraiser was actually an event for Pat Jehlen. Sciortino was just along to stump for Jehlen, who was running what would ultimately be a successful special election campaign for state Senate.
That Sciortino gets the rock star treatment in predominantly LGBT crowds is no surprise. His election to the 34th Middlesex District House seat representing Somerville and Medford in the 2004 elections was a dramatic political and symbolic victory for the marriage equality movement. Not only did LGBT activists band together to oust Vinnie Ciampa, an entrenched incumbent same-sex marriage opponent, they had replaced him with one of their own. As Sciortino noted in his floor speech during the Sept. 14 constitutional convention, he was just another one of the thousands of LGBT people who descended on Beacon Hill to watch the debates from the House gallery during the constitutional debates in February and March of 2004. Now, he proclaimed from the dais during the convention's final speech, "It is a great honor for me to be able to vote against putting discrimination into our constitution." Shortly after delivering those remarks - the last speech of the two-hour convention - Sciortino was among the 137 legislators who sent the Travaglini-Lees compromise amendment to ban same-sex marriage and create civil unions down to defeat.
As Marc Solomon, MassEquality's political director points out, Sciortino's election began a "pendulum swing, where people now feel that supporting marriage equality is the politically astute thing to do as well as the right thing to do." But coming as it did after the heartbreaking blow of the state legislature's narrow preliminary approval of Travaglini-Lees, Sciortino's victory resonated on a deeper emotional and psychological level for LGBT people. "Carl is a symbol of somebody who was not afraid to stand up for himself, and not just for himself but for all of us," says Solomon.
"Where a lot of people were talking about how we needed to win more seats in the legislature," he adds, "Carl stood up and did it."
The fact that he defeated Ciampa twice, first in a Democratic primary squeaker and then by a 2-to-1 margin after Ciampa mounted a last-ditch general election write-in campaign that was characterized by homophobic hysteria courtesy of the Article 8 Alliance, has only added to the Medford Democrat's mystique. Ciampa's homophobic last stand in particular, Solomon theorizes, transformed the race from a routine electoral challenge into a symbolic lesson in how the principles of equality could trump anti-gay sentiment.
Clearly, being so strongly identified with the marriage equality movement was a boon for Sciortino, who acknowledges that the political climate created by the Goodridge decision worked to his advantage in his bid to oust Ciampa. "That mobilized many people to want to get involved, both in the district and out of the district, that would have otherwise not given us the time of day," Sciortino says during a recent interview at the Diesel Café, the trendy Somerville java joint that served as a de facto headquarters in the early days of his campaign.
But Sciortino's victory had as much to do with the incumbent's vulnerability. That Ciampa's days were numbered was evident as far back as the elections of 1996 and 1998, when Josh O'Brien, another young Somerville progressive, came within serious striking distance of unseating him; the first time losing by just 51 votes (O'Brien then lost a general election write-in bid); the second by 264. And polls conducted in early 2004 by the Sciortino campaign showed that while Sciortino had no name recognition, his opponent had a high unfavorability rating. In short, says Sciortino, the district was ready for change, the incumbent was out of touch, "and I had a political firestorm brewing across the state about gay marriage. It was perfect timing."
"So I thank Hillary and Julie Goodridge and all the other plaintiffs for their efforts and GLAD for their great work," he laughs.
On the flip side to being, as a friend once put it, "the poster boy for gay marriage" Sciortino has had to consciously work to avoid being tagged "the gay legislator." That's a little more difficult when, for instance, a fellow House member feels the need to tell Sciortino that she was visited by MassEquality canvassers for no apparent reason other than that she associates Sciortino with the organization and the issue. It's an issue he avoided discussing with colleagues during his first eight months at the State House, except on the handful of occasions in which colleagues broached the subject with him.
So he relished the opportunity to focus his energies almost exclusively on marriage equality in the week preceding the September constitutional convention. Still, he appears ambivalent about being overassociated with all things LGBT. On the one hand, he says he has no problem being tagged the gay marriage poster child despite acknowledging that "it does hurt my ability to communicate with constituents that don't care about gay marriage." On the other, he's taken a leading role on issues that, as a freshman pol who's already strongly associated with a hot-button gay issue, invite criticism that he's a single-issue guy: calling for an LGBT caucus on Beacon Hill (an idea that's since been shelved in favor of a more informal group) and kickstarting efforts to provide explicit protections for transgender people under state law.
"I'm told by friends and consultants that the LGBT caucus and the trans issue would not be in my best interest," he confesses with a laugh. "But at the same time I feel like I have a two-year term, I have an opportunity to make a difference in areas where I see there's a need, I should take a stand and do what's right." If that costs him support at the ballot box, says Sciortino, then so be it.
In the meantime, by most accounts Sciortino is doing his job, which primarily consists of bringing home the bacon for his district. The Somerville Journal, in what amounted to a non-endorsement of Pat Jehlen's special election Senate bid last September, dubbed him a "go-to guy" on state budget items, and suggested Jehlen try to be more like him. Barely a year into the job, Sciortino gets high marks from Medford Mayor Michael McGlynn. McGlynn points to Sciortino's help in securing an Urban Self-Help grant for the River's Edge project, which will develop park space on the banks of the Malden River. He also worked to secure state funds for the final payment for the rehab of Victory Park and continues to work with Rep. Paul Donato, who also represents Medford, and city officials on legislation to pay for new seating at Chevalier Auditorium, a historic landmark that McGlynn calls "a critical part of the revitalization of our downtown area." It also doesn't hurt, the Medford mayor adds half seriously, that Sciortino recently purchased a home in the city.
Somerville Mayor Joe Curtatone is similarly impressed. Curtatone says Sciortino "is delivering a lot," be it advocating for the Green Line extension into Somerville and Medford, helping to secure $100,000 in state funds to give Foss Park a facelift and $250,000 in grant money to create a gang intervention project named for the late Sen. Charles Shannon at the city's Center for Teen Empowerment.
"All I can tell you, as the mayor, as the CEO of this city, I need to be able pick up the phone, call members of the delegation, have them lend an ear and go up and fight for what I need. Carl Sciortino does that," says Curtatone. "He does it well."
Likewise, McGlynn says the 27-year-old pol comes off "like a seasoned veteran." "He's a good communicator, he's very sociable, he can walk into a room and people just warm up to him," he says.
But even seasoned veterans have off days, and Sciortino isn't immune. It was at a Nov. 12 panel discussion at Suffolk Law School that Sciortino first floated the idea of filing legislation to expand the state's hate crimes law and/or its nondiscrimination law to explicitly include transgender people, a proposal he said resulted from a brief conversation he'd had with Gunner Scott of the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition just minutes before he addressed the room. But as he laid out possible plans for a bill and the described the work it would entail, it became increasingly obvious that Sciortino inexplicably came down with a bad case of the jitters. His voice audibly trembling, Sciortino interrupted himself and confessed: "Sorry, I'm nervous. I don't know why," he said, with, well, a nervous laugh. "I didn't prepare at all. I'm sorry." Shortly after he finished speaking, Sciortino seemed good-naturedly horrified. "I don't know why I got so nervous," he laughingly said as a preface to a brief interview with this reporter. "That's never happened before."
Perhaps such foibles are part of Sciortino's charm. As state Rep. Marie Parente, observes, "It's like his soul is on his face." Parente, a Milford Democrat, and Sciortino have struck up an unlikely friendship; he the young, über-progressive champion of marriage equality and she the 24-year incumbent, card-carrying member of Mass. Citizens for Life, a social conservative to the core, who has actively opposed a whole host of pro-gay legislation.
"I was prepared not to like him because I was friendly with Vinnie Ciampa," Parente admits. "Vin was number one my list and I thought, 'Oh who's the terrible person that defeated him?'" But after Sciortino sought Parente's advice on job-related issues like the nuts and bolts of constituent services, they began chit-chatting regularly. It wasn't long before Parente was telling her husband that Sciortino "is the kind of young man we would be proud to have for a son. He's just a decent up-front guy with a lot of integrity."
Has Sciortino's friendship impacted Parente's positions on gay rights? It's hard to tell. Unlike the first constitutional convention, Parente voted against the Travaglini-Lees compromise this year. While she says that she has come around to supporting the idea of civil unions for same-sex couples, she indicated that her vote against the amendment this year was done to support efforts to allow a citizen's petition that would ban on same-sex marriage without a civil unions provision to go before voters in 2008, believing that voters should decide how marriage will be defined in the state. Nonetheless, of her relationship with Sciortino, she says, "it's impacted me in the sense that he wasn't supposed to be nice to me, because I'm conservative and hard nosed on the issues that I believe in," she says. "I never expected him to treat me with the great respect and deference and friendship that he did. I really don't care if he's gay, heterosexual, striped, checkered or what but he's a nice person to know. And as I say it makes me think and wonder, is this gay issue such an important issue of the day? Who cares? I mean, you can't legislate who people love and certainly he's a lovable young man."
At this point it's pretty clear that Sciortino has a reservoir of good will from which to draw as he seeks to remain in elected office. But without a doubt there are folks in his district who'd like nothing better than to turn Sciortino from a rock star into a one-hit wonder. One need only peruse the postings on the online version of the politically oriented, conservative-leaning Somerville News to see that there is a faction that is embittered by the increasing number of progressives like Sciortino, Jehlen, and Alderman-at-large Denise Provost, who is considered a front-runner for Jehlen's old House seat in a Jan. 10 special election, being elected into state and local office, believing generally that progressives are ineffective on bread and butter issues.
Sciortino expects Ciampa to make good on a post-election promise to ensure he has an opponent in 2006 (Ciampa did not respond to interview requests). Though no one's naming names, Sciortino and campaign advisor Dan Cohen are nearly certain that at least one challenger will emerge next year. Curtatone says he's heard of no specific challenger, but adds, "in this business you hear all kinds of rumors." Would Curtatone - who endorsed Ciampa in the 2004 primary but kept out of the general election, though he did denounce the Article 8 mailing sent on Ciampa's behalf) - throw his support to Sciortino should he face a challenger next year? "I'd tell you I'm certainly always going to back an elected official who's fighting for me and my community, and for the best interests of my community," he responds.
Needless to say, MassEquality is making Sciortino's re-election a priority, and sponsored a Dec. 3 fundraiser to get the ball rolling for 2006. Sciortino's been back on the campaign trail since the municipal election cycle ended on Nov. 8. He ticks off a list of things on which he plans to make his case, from his work on the Green Line extension to his ongoing effort to pass a budget amendment to return education funding to pre-recession levels. "I was attacked as being a one-issue candidate during the campaign," he says. "But I think most of what I've done, I've proven I've been anything but a one issue candidate."