“They are supporting me because they believe that I have the same values and vision that Debby Blumer had,” said Harkness of the Blumer family. “And it’s a very big deal around here.”
Blumer championed social justice issues as a legislator, and was a strong supporter of marriage equality.
But one endorsement Harkness won’t be getting is MassEquality’s. The organization endorsed Richardson, who was active in local Democratic politics, in the 2006 special election. And there’s no reason they won’t stick with her through the current election cycle given their oft-stated policy of endorsing pro-equality incumbents come what (openly gay challengers) may, a strategy that has served them well thus far. Richardson, of course, voted against the anti-gay marriage amendment at last year’s constitutional convention.
But Harkness would prefer MassEquality endorse her, or stay out of the race. She aims to muster the support of the Framingham gays with or without backing from the LGBT political machine.
“I understand the need to support incumbents who took a risk in order to support marriage equality rights,” said Harkness, who gathered signatures in support of marriage equality in Framingham as a MassEquality volunteer. But she added that Richardson wasn’t in a risky situation since all of the Dems running in the special election were marriage equality supporters. (However, it should be noted that not all of the Republicans candidates were pro-equality, and because of the haste of the special election, all of the candidates ran against one another in one general write-in election, regardless of party affiliation.) “Pam became an incumbent in an extraordinary circumstance, through the death of a strong advocate for LGBT rights,” Harkness added, noting that even Blumer’s family believes “I’m the better advocate.
“We’ll have a list of lesbians, gay, bisexual, transgender folks from Framingham who are saying, ’This is our candidate,’” Harkness predicted. “So it would be my hope that MassEquality would appreciate the community support an out lesbian has for this office.”
Harkness is one of three openly gay candidates looking to break into the Beacon Hill sausage-making biz this year: Democrat Sara Orozco of Needham has already announced her challenge to anti-equality GOP state Sen. Scott Brown in the Norfolk, Bristol and Middlesex District, while Steve Kerrigan of Lancaster, the openly gay former chief of staff to ex-AG Tom Reilly, announced this week he’ll be running for the 12th Worcester District House seat now occupied by Rep. Harold Naughton of Clinton, who is rumored to soon be moving on to bigger and better things.