Gabriel Gomez looks like an interesting Republican candidate for the John Kerry seat. Via MassLive:
According to a biography on his campaign website, Gomez was born in Los Angeles to Colombian immigrants. An introductory video features Gomez first introducing himself in Spanish, before switching to English.
Gomez graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy and trained as a Navy pilot. He then completed training to join the elite Navy SEALs. Gomez says he met his wife Sarah while he was deployed with the Navy and she was a Peace Corps volunteer in the West Indies.
Gomez went on to receive an MBA from Harvard Business School. According to his professional biography, Gomez worked as an investment banking associate at Bowles Hollowell Conner in aerospace and defense, then spent three years at the equity firm Summit Partners in its buyout group. He is now a principal at the private equity firm Advent International, which he joined in 2004.
He’s attracting all the right enemies on Twitter from the moment he announced.
And apparently he has some experienced team members:
Mitt’s digital media team MT @jwbritten: Seems like team @targetedvictory is going to get @gomezforma ready for battle, digitally speaking.
— David S. Bernstein (@dbernstein) February 12, 2013
U.S. Senate Candidate @gomezforma Using Brown’s Old Campaign HQbostonherald.com/news_opinion/u… via @hillarychabot #masen
— Leonardo Alcivar (@alcivar) February 12, 2013
No, I’m not getting hopeful. Yet.
DONATE
Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.
Comments
Interesting this came to pass. Josh Krushaaur at “National Journal” has been mentioning this guy as a potential candidate for some time now. I often suspect Krushaaur leans to the right politically but it could well be he is that even rarer commodity – a balanced news reporter. In any case, he seems to have been right about Gomez. He does seem to be an impressive candidate.
It’s obvious he has the ganas (fire in the belly). But does he have the astucia (street smarts) for it?
If so, I’m in.
I am a Mass voter. This is the first I have heard of Gomez.
This is exciting! Navy Seal, Harvard MBA, successful biz man, HISPANIC…. sweet…. this will really cause the DEMS trouble. . . .
You left out another plus. Likely he’s Catholic. Can’t hurt 🙂
Do you want to be an American senator or a Columbian senator? How about speaking to your potential constituents in English? What an ass!
Prepare to get even more angry tonight with Rubio’s part-Spanish response to the SOTU. I don’t get your anger, but to each his own.
The Spanish language message, while causing consternation as “not English,” for many serves another purpose: That of “in-groupness.”
Rubio signals that he is one of “you/us,” the Spanish-speaking populace, understanding “your” issues.
This guy’s position(s) are yet to be determined but Rubio has already ascertained that he’s a RINO.
Hopefully, Gomez will be more like Ted Cruz but in MA, that’s kind of unlikely…
It’s about respect, or lack thereof. When your first public introduction to the voters starts off with an introduction in Spanish, a foreign language which the majority of voters don’t understand, that shows total disrespct to them. If the disrespect was unintentional, then he’s at the very least, guilty of showing poor judgement.
If he had made a few comments in Spanish at the end of the speech that wouldn’t have been a big deal, but what he did was to treat the English speaking voters, as second class citizens. They had to wait while he spoke to his people. If you’re running for U.S. senate, then American citizens are your people, not one ethnic group.
Many of the English speaking voters in Mass. have ancestors who came to this country speaking another language. They learned English and didn’t consider it a burden to do so.
If the purpose was to speak to hispanic voters who don’t understand English, then that’s even more pathetic. To be a voting citizen in this great country and to have not yet learned to speak its language is disgraceful and disrespectful in its own right.
Like it or not, about a third of his potential constituents speak Spanish. I DON’T like it, but it’s the reality and if he wants to address them in Spanish, well I’m glad he’s able to.
He’s communicating. I fail to see the problem with that. For those who only speak Spanish, he successfully communicated with them. When I moved to the South 30 years ago, my accent gave me away. Most people now don’t know I’m not local. When I stop for gas at the station, I leave grammar in the car, because it won’t be necessary in order for me to communicate with the old guys who hang out in there.
During the little bit of world traveling I’ve done, it’s always been a relief for those who have accommodated my inability to speak their language…in their country…where I was a visitor. It’s communication, and it’s vital for a win. We saw what the circular firing squad did for us this past election. Do you really want to circle the wagons because the guy spoke 9 seconds of a 58 second ad in Spanish?
Y su madre tambien, borrego mio.
¿Su madre es una oveja y le tienes?
Only months to go, but plenty of smearing time available for the MA Dem Machine. Gee, do we think they may highlight his one-percentness??? I’m anticipating the contrasts already (Markey was a poor boy, blah, blah). Never mind that Kerry is one of the wealthiest Senators, there are any number of ways to spin it, especially since his work history is not unlike Romney’s. No doubt it will be ugly. MA has a significant Hispanic population, a little over 10%, so surely this will cause some progressive panic. And as we’ve seen lately, the only tactic they know is to smear and denigrate, versus compare and contrast.
My refugee parents’ first American home was in the original Mayor Daley’s Chicago. Ethnically based campaigning is okay with me (as long as fundamental loyalty is to the USA).
That said, opening the video in Spanish was jarring.
Maybe Gomez thinks the Hispanic vote will be the difference between him and Scott Brown.
I suspect he or his team (does he have one yet?) considered the language in the opening a lot. To me, by highlighting his native-language ability, it helps put him on a national stage from the start, what with the open effort to court the Hispanic vote, Rubio, immigration reform, etc. The nationalization of Brown’s campaign was one part of his winning in 2010 to me.
My thoughts exactly.
…But are there enough Spanish speakers in MA to put him over the top, or is he really aiming at some sort of a national-level position down the line?
There is actually a large Brazilian population in Massachusetts, and I believe Portuguese and Spanish are mutually intelligible.
Well over 10% of the population is Hispanic statewide. Some regions (e.g. Springfield area) are much higher. Tapping into even half of that population will cause progressives to get very, very excited. There is likely also a portion of the unenrolled voting population (the MA version of Independent) that like to vote for people outside of the old-white-guy mold, too.
From Gomez’s website his only focus is on FISCAL SANITY. Nothing about hot button social issues — immigration, abortion, gay marriage. Just STOP THE SPENDING and CUT SPENDING … i like him so far
There are serious issues that need to be addressed, not ignored such as a growing national debt, increasing annual deficits, runaway spending – the United States Senate hasn’t even passed a federal budget since 2008. We all know what the problems are, but like parents who sacrifice long term discipline for short term popularity with their children; Congress keeps kicking the can down the road. It’s going to take leadership to put partisanship aside and work together. And it’s going to take something we almost never see in politics – candor about spending cuts.
Last month we avoided the fiscal cliff by raising taxes on everyone. But even if we raised taxes to 100% on the wealthiest taxpayers, it wouldn’t be enough to balance our federal budget. We need spending cuts, and I don’t say that based on some rigid ideological position, but because it is the only common sense way to balance the budget.
Prof, I’ll get hopeful if he is able to get the 10,000 signatures he needs by the end of the month. I did toss a little cash his way on his campaign site this morning, but the sigs are the big, immediate issue.
According to the Boston Herald, his company did donate to O’s campaign so I don’t like that. But that’s probably just good business? I don’t know.
The United States does not have an official language although some states do (not Massachusetts). I’ve long known this (and celebrated it). I don’t understand calling someone a vulgar name when they speak Spanish. I’ve lived in a Hispanic area of Boston. I’m sure many from that community appreciate being able to understand a candidate.
On the other hand, I’ve also lived in a U.S. territory that had two official languages. English & the local language. It was there that I realized why an official language matters: you don’t want to rely on multiple versions of law. I believe the native version took precedent in the case of confusion but I may be wrong. I’m not a lawyer & didn’t pay that much attention.
Brown lost to Warren by 230,000 votes.
There are about 300,000 registered hispanic votes in Mass.
http://www.pewhispanic.org/2012/10/01/latinos-in-the-2012-election-massachusetts/
The hispanic edge could help in MA — maybe add up to another 75,000 votes .
anyone know what the % of Hispanic vote Warren and Brown received?
Six to one for Warren, apparently.
per your link: “Latinos overwhelmingly supported Elizabeth Warren by a record margin— 86 percent — compared to 14 percent for Brown,” says Barreto. “The Latino vote is what decisively put Warren over the top.”
Assuming that all 300,000 Latinos registered to vote, voted (I know it would not happen like that), that means that:
Brown = 42,000 Latino votes
Warren = 258,000
If Gomez can attract 50% of the Latino vote (very possible given the strong ethnic identification), then
Gomez = 150,000 Latino votes
DEM = 150,000 votes
net gain of ~ 110,000 votes for REP.
I also think a nice handsome man like Gomez would also attract more female votes. Maybe pick up some decent percent of the black vote too.
Add it all up, and there is a real possibility here.
net gain of ~ 110,000 votes for REP.
And a net loss of ~ 110,000 votes for DEM. Warren’s winning margin is all but wiped out.
Moreover, Gomez’s resume seems stronger than Brown’s. Otoh, Brown is an experienced politician whereas this is Gomez’s first race. Otoh, Brown idiotically told the Tea Party to buzz off after they got him elected in 2010 whereas Gomez apparently has a Tea Party message. (As I’ve commented before, one committed Tea Partier is worth at least ten union hacks in a campaign.)
I’m not yet expressing support or making a prediction, but I see why Gomez thinks it’s worth a shot.
Snowball, meet hell.
Unfortunately I agree. They just elected Elizabeth Warren. He’s like Dan Bongino but less charasmatic.
I’d love to hope.. but lizzy nativzzy Americanindizzy crushed all my hope for any semblance of rationality by a majority in that state
Naval officer, SEAL, HBS, Summit, devoted family man – this guy is way too high caliber for Massachusetts.
If it turns out he’s a fake Colombian who used his fake Colombianess to get ahead, then maybe he’ll have a shot if he switches parties and runs as a Democrat.
Well, he could always drown a young girl in the backseat of his car. That is known to impress Mass Democrat voters.
Sorry, I’m not going to waste time hoping for a Republican win in Massachusetts.
He sounds like a great guy, totally wasted in such a blue state. Maybe we can convince him to move to Arizona and primary against McCain.
I’m pretty excited for the Senator that’s going to replace him. I hope we can get someone libertarian/Tea Party. Maybe in the Goldwater tradition.
Flake’s solid, but a owned by the est
Pfffft, es Massachusetts! Tio Tom, GOP simbolo, cordero sacrificial.
Our intellectual betters are constantly harping on how more cultivated and civilized Europeans are, and how we should emulate them in our governance, high unemployment and high taxes and all. One of the hallmarks of European citizens – oops, subjects – is that most of them are fluent in two or three languages. That’s natural when their countries are about as big as our states.
So I shall expect the Massachusetts elites to laud Gomez for his bilingual fluence. Should they not, their pretense to European sophistication is exposed as a fraud.
And for those above who are so aggravated at a few words of Spanish, please report back to your Democrat Party chairman for a new assignment in false-flag trollery.
And for those above who are so aggravated at a few words of Spanish, please report back to your Democrat Party chairman for a new assignment in false-flag trollery.
An unprovoked personal attack on people with whom you don’t agree.
Speaking of false-flag trollery…
The endless circle – attacking someone for speaking by speaking against their speech. So are you okay with making derogatory statements about a sentence or two spoken in Spanish but not a critique of the person who dislikes it?
The endless circle – attacking someone for speaking by speaking against their speech.
The above is a conflation of disagreeing with someone’s opinion and attacking that person’s good faith.
I leave it to the reader (if any) to conjecture the motive(s) behind such a conflation.
Gomez supported Obama over McCain. He also gave money to the left wing “crazy” Khazi campaign. He donated to Democrat candidates LAST year. So this Republican Senate candidate basically is a Democrat.
http://www.campaignmoney.com/political/contributions/gabriel-gomez.asp?cycle=12
http://www.campaignmoney.com/political/contributions/gabriel-gomez.asp?cycle=08
Good, maybe he’ll have a chance of winning after all.