Flush from a decisive win in Revere, Wynn Resorts is ratcheting up its no-to-slots campaign in anticipation of the statewide vote on Question 1 on Nov. 8. The battle pits two wealthy purveyors of gambling in a battle that, so far, has included each side accusing the other of acting in suspicious and secretive ways.
Both sides have a point.
Developer Eugene McCain has refused to reveal who is bankrolling the $1 million in expenses rung up so far in his team’s effort to get the Revere slots parlor proposal on the statewide ballot. McCain, who has recently worked in Thailand and Hawaii, has said his group could spend as much $10 million.
Those slots parlor investors succeeded in getting the question before Revere voters on Oct. 18, over the objection of Mayor Brian M. Arrigo. They appeared confident of winning the nonbinding election, based on a poll that showed two-thirds of voters strongly supported a slots parlor.
And a “yes’’ vote locally would have provided an important selling point for the slots parlor proponents in the run-up to the statewide vote.
But ultimately two-thirds of local voters gave it the thumbs down. And only after the election was it revealed that Wynn had spent $39,000 in a stealthy campaign against the slots parlor proposal that included hiring Arrigo’s former campaign manager.
Two days later, the McCain group fired a broadside in a press release that screamed in big headlines: “Mayor Arrigo colludes with Wynn to pay for attacks against citizens of Revere’’ and “Arrigo conspires with secret Wynn political committee.’’
Wynn made no public filings showing its role before the local election, and Arrigo said he was unaware of Wynn’s role until the Globe revealed it. Now, less than two weeks before the election, Wynn is freely acknowledging it will spend more money to thwart the slots parlor proposal.
But it won’t say how much it plans to spend. And under the state’s political finance laws, Wynn won’t be required to disclose its spending until after the Nov. 8 balloting.
“I don’t think it would be smart to talk strategy now,’’ said Robert DeSalvio, president of Wynn Boston Harbor, who called McCain’s secrecy “troubling.’’
Sean P. Murphy
Ad touts slots revenue
The campaign for Question 1, the ballot question that would authorize another slots casino license in Massachusetts, joined the airwaves this week, with a $700,000 TV and radio ad buy in the Boston, Springfield, and Providence markets, according to “Yes to 1’’ campaign chairman Jason Osborne.
The ads tout the potential economic benefits of adding a second slots parlor to the limited mix of casinos now authorized by the Massachusetts Gaming Commission.
Conspicuously left unsaid are the words “slots parlor’’ and “casino.’’
Instead, the radio ad features two women at a diner discussing the ballot question as “a vote to bring a second limited electronic gaming facility to Massachusetts.’’
“The first one has already generated $88 million in tax revenue!’’ one of the women says.
“So a yes vote means at least another $88 million in tax revenue?’’
“It sure does,’’ her friend answers, saying the revenue would go to schools, police, and fire stations.
The $88 million promise refers to the revenue that has been generated to date by the Plainridge Park Casino, which is, under the state law that legalized gambling, the lone slots casino authorized by the Massachusetts Gaming Commission. Question 1 would allow for another such license.
In the TV ad, a woman identified as Claire, a teacher, says that a “yes’’ vote would provide “at least another $88 million’’ for the state.
She also says a “yes’’ vote would create “thousands of new jobs, with benefits’’ — a promise that’s clearly a stretch. The campaign anticipates the slots casino and adjacent hotel development proposed with it could generate up to 500 jobs. Additional jobs would be temporary construction work, Osborne acknowledged.
Moreover, a vote for Question 1 doesn’t inevitably produce $88 million or even ensure the slots parlor gets built. The ballot question authorizes another license but does not require the Massachusetts Gaming Commission to issue it. In addition, the city of Revere — where a developer has been arranging agreements to buy property to build the slots casino — just rejected the project last week in a nonbinding voter referendum. That vote would have to be turned around for the project to move forward — or any money to materialize.
Stephanie Ebbert
The Koch connection
The poor Koch brothers can’t catch a break.
The billionaire Kansans were keeping their noses out of Massachusetts politics and the battle over charter schools, but now they have suddenly gotten dragged in.
The Koch brothers — David and Charles — are big funders of conservative, free-market, and libertarian causes. But they have not shown up anywhere near ballot Question 2 to lift the charter school cap.
That was until they got prominent billing in the recent mailing to voters sent out by the Massachusetts AFL-CIO that outlines all the reasons to oppose expanding charter schools and denounces the proposal as a move by “Wall Street billionaires telling us how to run our schools.’’
And there on the glossy brochure is a 4-inch box that says: “More union busting from out-of-state billionaires like the Koch Brothers.’’
The connection, according to the union-led opponents of charter school expansion, is that the Koch brothers donate to what they say are conservative, anti-union groups that in turn make donations to national pro-charter organizations that in turn have made large contributions to the pro-charter movement in Massachusetts.
That’s quite a few steps, but anticharter folks insist that’s what they’re up against.
“They are a master of the game of setting up shell organizations to funnel their money to conservative groups,’’ said Steve Crawford, a spokesman for the fight against passage of Question 2.
Frank Phillips
Walsh stumping in Pa.
After spending last weekend campaigning in New Hampshire, Mayor Martin J. Walsh will be jetting to Pittsburgh on Saturday to kick off a labor rally supporting Hillary Clinton for president, a volunteer with the Clinton campaign said this week.
Details are still being worked out, but the mayor is expected to join Terry O’Sullivan, president of the Laborers’ International Union of North America, to rally the troops at a Clinton event, said Megan Costello, a Clinton volunteer who also works for the mayor.
The laborers will then go door knocking, she added.
The event is part of a labor push for Clinton. The Pennsylvania AFL-CIO’s Labor 2016 campaign announced that it has mobilized thousands of volunteers to knock on doors across the state. LIUNA has endorsed the former secretary of state for president over her challenger Donald Trump. The union on its website said Clinton will “protect our jobs, wages, pensions and healthcare.’’
Costella said Walsh’s visit will be short. The mayor is one of Clinton’s ardent supporters. Last month, he sent his team of volunteers to Manchester, N.H., to make the case for Clinton.
At a rally in Boston, Walsh had suggested he would go wherever the campaign needed him including Ohio and Pennsylvania.
Meghan E. Irons
N.H. party chief in the running for national post
While the 2016 election is coming to a close, another race is just beginning — and it could have national implications, especially for New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation presidential primary.
After a hack at the Democratic National Committee this summer, Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultzwas forced to resign as party chairwoman. Jumping into the spot on an interim basis was Democratic strategist Donna Brazile.
Brazile is not expected to run for a full term with the vote comes up this winter, so there is a behind-the-scenes scramble to see who is interested and who could win.
Among those mentioned as a front-runner for the job is New Hampshire Democratic Party chairman Raymond Buckley. Buckley is a former state legislator and operative who has been involved in party politics since long before he was eligible to vote. He has been the state party chairman since 2007 and would be the first openly gay DNC chair.
Sources close to Buckley say he is interested in running for the job. He is currently a vice chairman of the DNC, a title he got after being elected as chairman of all state Democratic chairs, a role that could give him an inside track.
Also in the mix are former Maryland governor Martin O’Malley; Representative Keith Ellison of Minnesota, a former Bernie Sanders supporter; former New York representative Steve Israel; and former Michigan governor Jennifer Granholm.
No one from New Hampshire has ever led a national party in the modern political era. Should Buckley be elevated to that role, it would, in theory, ensure the role of the New Hampshire primary for at least another four years.
All of this jockeying might be irrelevant. Should Hillary Clinton win the presidency, by tradition she would get to simply appoint her own party chair.
James Pindell
