Spencer Dickinson: 18 Who Made a Difference in 2018

Spencer Dickinson: 18 Who Made a Difference in 2018

The talk during the 2018 election season in Rhode Island was that Republican-turned-independent Joe Trillo would prove to be the spoiler in the general election, siphoning just enough votes from Cranston Mayor Allan Fung to give Gina Raimondo her second term.

Well, turns out Trillo was ultimately a non-factor garnering just over 4% of the vote.  Fung didn’t need Trillo’s votes; as Raimondo won overwhelmingly with 52.6% of the vote to Fung’s 37.2%. 

When Matt Brown jumped into the Governor’s race as a Democrat, the heated primary saw Brown take page after page from the Bernie Sanders playbook in his policy announcements, setting up a potential for a 2016 redux in Rhode Island when Sanders topped Raimondo-endorsed Hillary Clinton in the Rhode Island Democratic presidential primary. 

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However, former State Representative Spencer Dickinson — with little campaign infrastructure, proved to be just enough of a thorn in the side of Brown, garnering at voting block compromised of former teachers still reeling from Raimondo’s pension reform as General Treasurer, as well as other anti-Raimondo Democrats who didn’t want to go as far as Brown.
Make no mistake about it, the three (or four or five) way model with spoilers, which has been a mainstay in the Rhode Island gubernatorial race in recent elections, is here to stay.  And with Providence Mayor Jorge Elorza and Raimondo both term-limited, watch for primarypalooza for both seats start to take shape sooner rather than later — and the question of who the real contenders — and pretenders — are will soon be surfacing once again.