There is a common misconception that Elizabeth Warren is the Democratic nominee for Senate against Scott Brown.
She is not.
There is a primary contest on September 6. And the only other announced candidate just filed her petitions:
U.S. Senate candidate Marisa DeFranco will drop off more than 10,000 signatures to the Secretary of State’s office at 11:30 a.m. on Thursday, validating her primary run against Harvard Law professor Elizabeth Warren in the Democratic battle to unseat Republican Sen. Scott Brown in the Massachusetts Senate race.
DeFranco, a federal immigration lawyer in Middleton, has worked against the odds to remain one of the two Democratic contenders in a Senate race once made up of several notable politicians all aspiring to take on Brown in November.
DeFranco has raised almost no money, while Warren has raised tens of millions, including heaps of cash from Wall Street.
As indicated in the video below, DeFranco would have to get 15% of the vote at the nominating convention on June 2 in order to make it to the ballot in September.
Three weeks ago, that prospect would have seemed dim. But are the delegates willing to head into the fall with only one candidate, someone on whom the next shoe could drop?
(Part 2 of interview here)
Update: I received an e-mail from Kevin Franck, Communications Director of the Massachusetts Democratic Party:
I’m kinda surprised by this line in your post that just went up:
As indicated in the video below, DeFranco would have to get 15% of the vote at the nominating convention on June 2 in order to make it to the ballot in September.
Three weeks ago, that prospect would have seemed dim.
Why would you think that here prospects of passing the 15% threshold were dim?
I think that’s a fair point. I just assumed, because Warren so dominates all the discussion and fundraising, that the party would unite around her at the convention. If that was not the case prior to three weeks ago, then it certainly should not be the case on June 2 – and there will be a primary election in September.
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Politico picks up the ball:
Elizabeth Warren has pushed back hard on questions about a Harvard Crimson piece in 1996 that described her as Native American, saying she had no idea the school where she taught law was billing her that way and saying it never came up during her hiring a year earlier, which others have backed up.
But a 1997 Fordham Law Review piece described her as Harvard Law School’s “first woman of color,” based, according to the notes at the bottom of the story, on a “telephone interview with Michael Chmura, News Director, Harvard Law (Aug. 6, 1996).”
The mention was in the middle of a lengthy and heavily-annotated Fordham piece on diversity and affirmative action and women. The title of the piece, by Laura Padilla, was “Intersectionality and positionality: Situating women of color in the affirmative action dialogue.”
“There are few women of color who hold important positions in the academy, Fortune 500 companies, or other prominent fields or industries,” the piece says. “This is not inconsequential. Diversifying these arenas, in part by adding qualified women of color to their ranks, remains important for many reaons. For one, there are scant women of color as role models. In my three years at Stanford Law School, there were no professors who were women of color. Harvard Law School hired its first woman of color, Elizabeth Warren, in 1995.”
http://www.politico.com/blogs/burns-haberman/2012/05/fordham-piece-called-warren-harvard-laws-first-woman-123526.html
While Poke-us/Haunt-us may have raised tens of millions, one thing she hasn’t raised = her level of honesty.
The burning question to be resolved:
Is “checkered” a color ?
I predict “She With High Cheekbones and Cookbook” will be spreading a lot of walking around wampum with the delegates to cut this upstart squaw from Middletonout of the equation in June.
I swear I just commented over at Hot Air that the Dems are going to dump her. I am a little torn about that. Wouldn’t the money Warren has raised necessarily stay with her? Not that any other candidate couldn’t raise a heap of wampum in a hurry but they would be at a huge disadvantage. On the other hand, seeing Fauxcahantas go down in a primary would be so sweet. The liberal elites online who worship at her altar would be all verklempt.
Warren is the establishment candidate so she really doesn’t want a primary in September, hence my prediction that she’ll buy her loyalty for the floor of the convention. A thousand here and there for some small races buys a lot of loyalty that De Franco would be hard pressed to match.
A iron cage death match on the floor and a bruising primary would be so satisfying to watch.
Maybe the people in the GOP in Taxachussets should spread a little green to Marisa and help her beat up on Fauxcahantas!
Operation Chaos!
1. Heck, New Jersey Democrats replaced a nominated sitting Senator (Torricelli) when it became obvious he would lose. It worked, too: the replacement, Frank Lautenberg, won the general election and is in the Senate today.
2. Moreover, MA does have politicians who could appeal to the centrist vote (or what passes for such here) better than Warren can.
3. Speaking of the centrist vote: Warren has been bloviating about the JP Morgan trading loss. The LI community knows she’s full of it. I’m not so sure about the average voter.
4. Verrrry interesting that the MA Democratic Party follows this blog closely. If only more Republicans would!
I know when I was blogging my Dem Congressman knew all about what I was writing but the guy who was trying to defeat him … not so much. I was nowhere near LI on the blogosphere radar so maybe I could cut the Republican a little slack. I am not surprised MA Dems are following Legal Insurrection at all. I consider it moronic that Republicans would not be doing the same.
“Verrrry interesting that the MA Democratic Party follows this blog closely. If only more Republicans would!”
LI is pretty new compared to a lot of established blogs. Even so, it’s growth rate is phenomenal.
Any blog that can claim it inspired Rush to start tweeting and has been linked by Drudge is being watched more and more by Republicans. Some of the establishment type GOP crowd might not want to admit it.
I look forward to the day Sarah Palin gives LI a shout out.
What have I been saying about the Cavern Club and the Ed Sullivan Show?
Call me Brian Epstein if you must, but I think pretty soon the GOP movers and shakers who wouldn’t return the Professor’s calls will be feeling like the producers at Decca Records who rejected the Beatles.
Or call Me George Martin, but … who did Decca choose to sign? They chose to sign another group who auditioned for Decca the very same day as the Beatles did.
Who were they?
The group playing the song in the LI video of the day.
The Tremeloes.
Here, at Bill’s office to apologize for not granting him that interview, are Scott Brown and entourage.
Don’t open the door just yet, Professor.
Keep the chain on … and just ask, “Scott?? Scott who??”
Two thoughts: First: Marisa DeFranco sounds like a down the line Democrat (no surprise there) and is certainly very unpolished. She would have a difficult time against Scott Brown, but would probably be more palatable to MA independents than Warren.
Second, I think many Dems will still go with Warren because they don’t realize how poorly the 1/32nd issue plays to independents who, like it or not, are a major factor in a Massachusetts race.
Racist pigs. Picking on a 1/32 whatever.
The Massachusetts democrats are throwing Princess Spreading Bull under the manure pile. Which is quite large given all of the manure that the Princess has been spreading.
Just like a liberal. They eat their young with or without dog.
Marisa DeFranco is an all-too-typical Massachusetts Democrat liberal moonbat. Just go to her site and read her positions. All of them are right from the Government is the Best When It’s the Biggest hymnal.
This woman is as delusional as warren, green jobs has been tried and proven an abysmal failure yet she seems totally unaware of the world wide rejection and failures, but it is Massachusetts so that may not matter.
Here in MA it has been obvious that Warren was receiving all of the state party benefits at the loss of everyone else. Crowned, so to speak. Two others have already dropped out, reading the tea leaves. The biggest problem with Defranco is she is a one whistle trick. She is an immigration attorney and has very progressive viewpoints on nearly every matter. But outside of immigration, she is a true neophyte and therefore an equally likely gaffe-monster. As hard as it may be for many to believe, Defranco may be too far left for MA at this time. If Scott Brown were not polling well, her chances might be stronger. But Brown has proven the progressive base is no longer large enough to ensure victory. (The governor was reelected with less than 50%, e.g.)
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‘Single payer’ is a non-starter.
What DeFranco said, and Keller never challenged her on was that she’s ‘all-in’ on Socialized Medicine, big government taking over one-fifth of this nations economy.
Given that every single solitary program the government has run they have run it straight into the ground. Why in would anyone but the insane think this government will do a 180, and not ruin one-fifth (of whats left) of the economy? What they part of the healthcare system the government does manage, Medicare & Medicaid, they have thoroughly bankrupted. There is no reason, no record, no facts to support sane & responsible management of the nations heath system. On the contrary, we have every historical reason to believe they will totally blow it, big time.
What does happen to all the money a candidate had raised if they lose the primary? Like Lugar. No matter how much they have left they won’t have enough to refund what everyone contributed. Do they get to keep it?
[…] her 15k signatures to challenge Elizabeth Warren. He said this about the next hurdle she would need to overcome: As indicated in the video below, DeFranco would have to get 15% of the vote at the nominating […]