Would-be Democratic governors speak of taxes, red lines, ‘fiscal mess’

KYLE CONSTABLE | CT MIRROR

There is little consensus in the General Assembly on how to craft the next two-year state budget even through the legislature adjourned its regular session last Wednesday.

Gov. Dannel P. Malloy, at a news conference Thursday, did not offer any direction to state lawmakers in the budget-making process beyond threatening to veto the existing Democratic and Republican proposals. He declined to state specific proposals that qualify as “make-or-break” issues for him.

Malloy’s would-be replacements on the Democratic side, however, were not as hesitant – though they understood why he might be.

At the Connecticut Democratic Party’s annual dinner Saturday, the CT Mirror caught up with five major Democratic candidates who have declared or are exploring a run for governor in 2018. They are, in alphabetical order:

Dan Drew, mayor of Middletown
Joe Ganim, mayor of Bridgeport
Jonathan Harris, former commissioner of the Department of Consumer Protection
Kevin Lembo, state comptroller
Chris Mattei, former chief of the financial fraud and public corruption unit for the U.S. attorney’s office in Connecticut.

They offered their thoughts on why they would want to lead Connecticut and what they would do if they were sitting in the governor’s office now.