The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
GOP slate battles at debate
Five candidates differ on policy, unite in attacks on Malloy
FAIRFIELD — With 21 days before the primary, five Republican candidates for governor battled in a contentious debate Tuesday, lambasting each others’ business and political backgrounds and tax reform ideas.
The debate, hosted by Hearst Connecticut Media, Sacred Heart University and WSHU radio, filled an auditorium at the university in Fairfield with about 180 people, many of them seniors, eager to hear the candidates distinguish themselves. It was one of the few debates that drew all five GOP candidates: Mark Boughton, Tim Herbst, Steve Obsitnik, David Stemerman and Bob Stefanowski.
Throughout the 90-minute fight, Stefanowski drew the most heat from other candidates on his business resume, economic plan, voting record and support for Democrats.
“He should be ashamed for putting out (an economic) proposal that he knows the numbers don’t add up,” said Stemerman, a Greenwich hedge fund mogul.
That comment set off a fierce back and forth between the two candidates who petitioned onto the primary ballot and are pouring their personal wealth into their campaigns.
“You should be embarrassed, Mr. Stemerman and you should think before you speak,” said Stefanowski, rising to stand. “This guy has bought stocks his entire life. He’s never run anything. I’ve run many businesses.”
“That’s a quite a slam. I own stocks,” Stemerman, who founded Conatus Capital Management, said. “Most people in this room, that’s how we retire.”
Madison resident Stefanowski was CEO of DFC Global Corporation from 2014 to 2017, a payday lender that was ordered to refund money to clients after regulators found it was lending more to borrowers than it could afford to pay.
The company was “engaging in business practices that are illegal in the state of Connecticut,” Stemerman claimed. “Is that we need in our next governor? I don’t think so.”
Those bad practices occurred before Stefanowski got to the company, he said, and he cleaned them up.
“You know why the pension funds of the state of Connecticut are bankrupt right now? Because people like you trade in their stock, living in mansions in Greenwich with thousands of bathrooms, losing money for the people on the pension plans,” Stefanowski fired back. “I’m very proud of my track record.”
Cutting taxes
All the candidates pitched ideas to reduce taxes, but disputed how to do it.
Herbst, the former Trumbull first selectman, criticized plans by Boughton and Stefanowski to eliminate the income tax entirely.
“You’re not going to be able to reduce or eliminate any other taxes until you dig out of this hole,” Herbst said, noting Connecticut’s snowballing pension liabilities and union contracts that can’t be immediately renegotiated.
Obsitnik, a Westport tech entrepreneur, agreed that Connecticut has to “earn our way” in the direction of chopping the income tax. In the near future, the state can eliminate the estate tax, taxes on pensions and social security and phase out the corporate tax over three years.
Stemerman called tossing out the income tax an “empty promise” because it makes up more than half of state revenue. He backed reducing the income tax brackets from five to three.
The candidates embraced President Donald Trump’s economic approach, supporting his tariffs and his tax policies.
They blamed Gov. Dannel P. Malloy and legislative Democrats for the state’s fiscal condition, particularly harping on the opposing party’s support for tolls, which the five candidates all resoundingly rejected.
“If Dan Malloy is succeeded by (Democratic endorsed candidate) Ned Lamont, we will be looking at the good old days of Dan Malloy,” Stemerman warned.
Party allegiance
Stefanowski and Stemerman each have a record of supporting Democrats, which drew criticism from the three other candidates. Stefanowski received the brunt of the jabs because he has not voted for 16 years and changed his party affiliation from Republican to Democrat and back recently.
“What would make you become a Republican one month before you announced your candidacy for governor?” Herbst, former first selectman of Trumbull, asked Stefanowski.
Stefanowski did not directly respond to the questions, but dismissed Herbst as “desperate.”
“This guy knows he’s last in the polls and I’m in the lead,” Stefanowski said.
Stemerman took similar heat his own contributions to Democrats, like Barack Obama, and past registration as a Democrat. He defended himself by saying Donald Trump was only a Republican for four years before running for president and former President Ronald Reagan also changed parties.
“I have been a Republican for 14 years consistently supporting our party and I believe I have earned the right to represent our party,” he emphasized.
Boughton, Obsitnik and Herbst said they have been Republicans their whole lives.
“When I was out there serving in the United States military and you were a registered Democrat up in Massachusetts, I was all over this country defending your very right to be a Democrat,” jabbed Boughton, who is mayor of Danbury and the party’s endorsed candidate.
Political experience
The three candidates with no experience in elected office, Stefanowski, Stemerman and Obsitnik painted Herbst and Boughton as “career politicians.”
“Timmy, I know you’ve never had a real job in your life,” Stefanowski said. “At the same time I was overseas, you raised taxes.”
He noted Herbst’s recent commercials highlight the two times Trumbull homeowners had modest tax decreases, but not the six years in which taxes increased.
Stemerman, meanwhile, depicted Boughton as a perennial candidate who can’t win, noting he unsuccessfully ran for statewide office two times previously.
Hearst, Sacred Heart and WSHU will host a second debate for Democrats Ned Lamont and his challenger Joe Ganim on Thursday at 2 p.m.