PROVIDENCE – Voters are deciding between Gov. Dan McKee, running for his first full-term in the office he inherited in March 2021, and Rhode Island newcomer Ashley Kalus, his largely self-financed GOP opponent.
The results should start flowing in soon after the polls close at 8 p.m.
McKee had a double-digit lead over Kalus in the last public polls early last month. But both sides have spent a ton of money since then, done battle in debates and found themselves enmeshed in controversies. And both hop-scotched the state on Tuesday, making last minute appeals for votes.
In the final days, the Democratic Governors Association committed at least $260,000 to a final ad buy for McKee to shore up his support, as Kalus funneled another $1 million of her own money into her campaign.
The two sides ran an insider versus outsider race.
On one side: the 71-year-old McKee, a lifelong Rhode Islander who has been in public life since he was first elected to the Town Council in his hometown of Cumberland three decades ago on his way to becoming Cumberland mayor and then lieutenant governor. He ascended to governor in March 2021 when Gov. Gina Raimondo quit mid-term and mid-pandemic to become U.S. commerce secretary, marking the first time since 1950 that a Rhode Island governor quit and the lieutenant governor took over.
On the other side: the 40-year-old Kalus, a recent arrival to the state who came here in 2021 to manage a COVID testing and vaccination contract that ended under disputed circumstances; registered to vote in January; announced for governor in March and poured $4.7 million of her family’s money into an aggressive campaign to unseat McKee.
He accused her of running for governor as revenge for losing the contract. She insisted the time she and her husband spent in beautiful Rhode Island when he was in medical school made her want to move back permanently to tackle the “corruption, insider deals, abuse of power and incompetence.”
Her example: McKee’s tie-breaking vote for up to $60 million in public money for the proposed Pawtucket soccer stadium, which she called “a dirty backroom deal.” He called it a catalyst for economic development in a city hungry for growth and still smarting over the loss of the Pawtucket Red Sox.
But a deeper look at Kalus’ history found that she and her husband benefited as recently as 2021 from a “homestead exemption” reserved for Illinois residents that reduced her property taxes there while she was registered to vote in Florida. She did not terminate her Florida voter registration until the day after she declared for governor in Rhode Island in March.
And she left behind a trail of legal fights in both Florida and Illinois, including a lawsuit filed against her by a former business partner with whom she had worked in former Gov. Bruce Rauner’s administration in Illinois. The breach of contract lawsuit accuses Kalus and her husband, Dr. Jeffrey Weinzweig, of cheating the chief operating officer out of a salary – and a promised share of Adhereon, a company that marketed scar healing products and breast-implant devices – and diverting assets to Kalus’ campaign.
Last week, months of profanity-laced texts that Kalus sent a Chicago contractor with whom she was having a billing dispute surfaced. At one point, she ridicules him for wearing “Costco pants your mom picked out for you,” and says: “And remember your social status here Mike.”
Republicans hoped voters would see the race as a referendum on McKee and his alleged missteps, regardless of anything they learned about newcomer Kalus’ history.
Their list of grievances was long: from the soccer stadium, to his award of an education consulting contract that sparked an unresolved state and federal inquiry, to the $3,000 “retention bonuses” he gave unionized state employees to the eye-popping raises he proposed and then scaled back for the members of his Cabinet.
The voluble Kalus also relied on the same national GOP script that her fellow Republican, Allan Fung, relied on as a candidate for Rhode Island’s 2nd Congressional District seat: that inflation is driving up food, gas and other energy prices, and the Democrats in power – McKee and President Joe Biden – are to blame.
And if Twitter is any indication, Rhode Island Republicans, who make up little more than 15% of the electorate, and Republican-leaning independents were giddy at the prospect of electing the first Republican as governor since Donald Carcieri left office 12 years ago with the 38 Studios debacle in his wake.
McKee survived a tough Democratic primary competition, besting two solid challengers – R.I’s term-limited Secretary of State Nellie Gorbea and Helena Foulkes, a former top executive at the Rhode Island-based CVS – and two others. When it was over, Democrats and their traditional backers, including the state’s labor unions coalesced around McKee.
He went on what he called a Rhode Island momentum tour, mentioning at nearly every stop that Rhode Island went from “worst to first” in COVID-19 vaccinations, had one of the first economies to emerge from the COVID abyss and one of its lowest unemployment rates on record, even if it has inched up a bit in recent months.
He and his fellow Democrats also ran on the overarching issues that help voters distinguish between the Republicans and Democrats on the ballot, including what they call “sensible gun-safety laws [and] a woman’s right to choose.”
There are also three less-known independent candidates on the gubernatorial ballot: Zachary Hurwitz, Paul Rianna and Elijah Gizzarelli.
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