BURLINGTON — David Zuckerman announced his re-election campaign for lieutenant governor on Monday with a call for less partisanship and more civility in the Statehouse.
Zuckerman, a Progressive/Democrat who is finishing his first term in office, is running for a second term and will likely face Republican House minority leader Don Turner in the general election. Both men hail from Chittenden County.
At a campaign launch held at Main Street Landing, Zuckerman told roughly 100 supporters, including U.S. Rep. Peter Welch and Senate majority leader Becca Balint, that lawmakers need to do more to reach across the aisle — literally.
Politics in the Statehouse and on the national level, Zuckerman said, needs to move away from “high school clique mode.”
“The cafeteria at the Statehouse is sometimes a little bit like high school, Democrat tables, Republican tables and you sort of float around — but whenever I would sit up in the Republican section I would hear little murmurs of what are you planning to do with the Republicans why are you sitting up with them, what’s going on,” he said.
In the next breath, Zuckerman reproached Republican Gov. Phil Scott for asking lawmakers to curb spending on public schools. The lieutenant governor said the special session Scott called was a “pretty clear attempt to destroy our public education system.”
“People say it’s about taxes but it’s actually fundamentally about education,” Zuckerman said.
Zuckerman complimented the governor for standing up when he needed to — alluding to Scott’s stance on gun control that led to a historic signing of new gun laws.
However, he urged supporters to vote for a more progressive Democratic candidate for governor.
Balint talked about Zuckerman’s leadership in the Senate where he previously served as a member. She said that Zuckerman is very fair with former colleagues — even to those who she said have had a negative political history with him — alluding to Zuckerman’s Republican opponent for lieutenant governor, Sen. Randy Brock R-Franklin. In the 2016 campaign, Brock alleged Zuckerman was not fit to serve as lieutenant governor.
Josh Wronski, executive director of the Vermont Progressive Party, said Democrats and Progressives alike will put their full weight behind Zuckerman because the GOP has targeted him as the liberal candidate to unseat this election season. While Turner could be a formidable challenger, Zuckerman beat Brock by about 20,000 votes in the 2016 election.
The Progressive Party has also endorsed state auditor Doug Hoffer. Wronski said U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent who is running on the Democratic ticket this year, did not seek the party’s nomination, but most likely would have received it if he had.
While Christine Hallquist, James Ehlers and Brenda Siegel all sought the party’s endorsement for the gubernatorial primary, Wronski said the party has not endorsed a gubernatorial candidate because none of the candidates have a history with the party.
Candidate for U.S. Congress Dan Frielich, a doctor from the Upper Valley who is running against incumbent Peter Welch, both of whom are Democrats, also sought an endorsement at the Progressive Party’s recent annual meeting, but the party declined to endorse Freilich.
More candidates sought endorsements from the Vermont Progressive Party this year than in the past, Wronski said. The party is focusing on House seats that could help the Democrats override gubernatorial vetoes in the next biennium on progressive legislation such as minimum wage.
Eric Davis, political science professor emeritus at Middlebury College, attributed the success of the Vermont Progressive Party to Sanders’ national rise in popularity as a result of his 2016 bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. While Sanders is an independent, he championed progressive ideas as mayor of Burlington in the 1980s that have propelled the party.
In the end, Davis said, “the party you run under is less important than the ideas you talk about.”
Correction: A previous version of this article gave the incorrect position for Josh Wronski. He is the executive director of the Vermont Progressive Party.
