Reticent in primary, Lamont hits Fazio early in general-election ads

Gov. Ned Lamont, seldom comfortable with the grittier aspects of political combat, is regularly hitting Republican Ryan Fazio in a television advertising campaign that displays a rhythm and focus absent in his Democratic primary against Josh Elliott. On the air this week are paired 30-second ads by Lamont’s campaign: A positive piece features an amiable governor high-fiving kids as he walks through a school reciting highlights of his record on education; a negative one shows worried educators fretting about votes on education by Fazio in the state Senate. “Ryan Fazio — where do I even begin?” says one exasperated teacher in an ad that cuts to a second educator, who replies, “He voted against so many things that helped teachers, students and parents.” A third complains, “Ryan Fazio opposed giving free breakfast to kids in need.” The spot is titled “Report Card.” It follows two others that contrast Fazio’s positions with Lamont’s on measures the governor signed to counter President Donald Trump’s aggressive campaign to deport undocumented immigrants and the federal cutbacks that have raised the cost of healthcare coverage. “I found out during the primary, you get attacked, you get attacked pretty hard, and at some point, you’ve got to respond and defend yourself,” Lamont said in an interview this week. He spoke after an event highlighting another contrast: Fazio’s vote against an AI regulatory bill the governor promoted and signed. Fazio was one of only four senators to oppose the bill that passed with overwhelming bipartisan support, saying the state should defer to federal action that seems unlikely, given the opposition of the president. During the primary against Elliott, Lamont did not heed early warnings that the liberal lawmaker from Hamden was on track to qualify for a primary and public campaign financing unless the governor pushed back. His one hard shot at Elliott didn’t come until a week before the Aug. 11 contest. “Yeah,” Lamont said, acknowledging the campaign was slow to hit Elliott. “But we did.” Lamont won the primary in a landslide, 67.8% to 32.2%. Last week, a Quinnipiac University poll found Lamont leading Fazio by 17 percentage points, one of three public polls showing the governor with a double-digit lead. A fourth by co/efficient, a marketing and survey firm with a Republican clientele, found Fazio within 7 points. Fazio’s ads are trying to focus voters on the high cost of living in Connecticut, a concern identified in each poll, and suggest there is no reason to expect that the governor can accomplish things in a third term that he could not in the first two. Lamont’s two-track approach — promoting his record, while undermining his challenger’s — is hardly unconventional. Liz Kurantowicz, a former Republican campaign operative, said using the candidate’s face and voice for positive messages and third-party “validators” to deliver criticism was standard fare for the campaign of a relatively popular incumbent. Vinnie Mauro Jr., the New Haven Democratic chair, said neither campaign is running provocative ads designed to rile their base. The governor’s ads, he said, are what should be expected from a Democratic incumbent running in a blue state with high name recognition after eight years in office. “What he’s trying to do is say, ‘Look at me. I’ve been a steady hand on the wheel. You may agree with me on some things. You may disagree with me on other things. But in terms of what Connecticut needs and wants, I am the right guy.’ That message is the right message for the state of Connecticut,” Mauro said. “Is it going to make the left part of the party excited? No, it’s not. But that’s not his intention here.” But Fazio says the Lamont ads attacking him are evidence the governor views the race as competitive and that he has too little to say about a third-term agenda. “The governor, even though he’s an incumbent, even though everyone knows who he is already after eight years, is not focusing primarily on his record,” Fazio said. “He’s focusing primarily on misleading voters about me, which I think shows that despite his incumbency, he’s relatively weak.” Four years ago, when Lamont was seeking reelection to a second term in a rematch with Republican Bob Stefanowski, the governor frustrated his campaign staff by refusing to sign off on commercials attacking Stefanowski over his background as the former CEO of a payday loan company. A payday loan ad eventually aired, but it came from a SuperPAC funded by the Democratic Governors Association, not Lamont’s campaign. Lamont dismissed Stefanowski’s private-sector record at GE, UBS and the payday lender, DFC Global, as irrelevant, at least compared to a public record. “Last time around, I was running against somebody who had no record. He had done something at GE, not particularly relevant. Now I’m running against somebody who’s been in the state Senate for a lot of years,” Lamont said. Fazio, 36, was elected five years ago to the Senate from Greenwich, the governor’s hometown. The Report Card ad is based on Fazio’s vote against a budget that increased spending for education and school meals. Fazio said he supports higher spending for education but found other elements of the budget objectionable. He said the governor’s ad was an example of “taking big bills, complicated votes, and picking out one thing.” Elliott had attacked Lamont, a 72-year-old former business owner, as a beneficiary of multigenerational wealth, indifferent to the economic pressures on the poor and middle class. He also darkly suggested that Lamont’s wife, a successful venture capitalist, had profited from her marriage to the governor. While Lamont and Fazio are running attack ads, they largely have focused on policies. Fazio, who remains unknown to a significant portion of the electorate, is running several lighthearted ads with a dual purpose of raising his profile and criticizing the governor. Fazio is cast as a superhero in one ad, strong enough to save Connecticut from expensive electricity and high taxes tolerated by Lamont. Another portrays him as wielding defibrillator paddles in a hospital room over a patient flatlining from taxes imposed by Democrats. There are 15- and 30-second versions of the spots on television and digital media. “His are a little more cartoonish, but you know, they’re not attacking my wife or my family or my grandfather. It’s a little different tone than where I was four months ago,” Lamont said, referring to the more personal daily assaults from Elliott. “Let’s keep it to the issues. Let’s keep it to our records.” The governor, however, has not hesitated to draw an unpopular president into the campaign. His own healthcare ad publicizes the $500 million fund Lamont has used to offset actions by Trump or Congress undermining the Affordable Care Act. Fazio was one of eight senators, all Republicans, to vote against creating the fund. Humor is an element in most of Fazio’s ads, with at least two featuring clips of the governor. One of the spots dinging Lamont as failing to appreciably bring down electric rates featured a clip of him making a joke that did not quite land: If electric rates were so high, people would be turning out the lights. “My ads have employed some humor, and at the same time, in doing so, have tried to make the point that we need to cut taxes and cut electric rates to make Connecticut affordable,” Fazio said. “I’m trying to be myself. I’m trying to focus on the issues that I care about and my vision for the state, but also to try to have some fun in the process. And I think it’s attracting people’s attention, and it’s giving people a little bit of an introduction into who I am as a person.” Fazio said the tone of his ads is appropriate. “I’m critical of the governor’s failures to make the state affordable. I’m critical of the governor’s tax increases and electric bill increases,” Fazio said. “I don’t think politics needs to be nasty and performative.” Twice this year, Fazio has dismissed campaign strategists, most recently parting ways with a consultant known to favor more aggressive ads. Was a disagreement over ads a factor? “There’s been no change in tone or messaging on the campaign,” Fazio said. The question wasn’t had the tone changed. The question was whether a disagreement over tone and messaging had contributed to the departure. Pressed, Fazio declined to comment further. “My answer is my answer.”