Independent Walczak has nonpartisan vision

NEWTOWN — Bruce Walczak, who is waging a homemade campaign for Connecticut’s most competitive congressional seat, offers a nonpartisan vision to voters of the 5th District.

Walczak, a relocation consultant from Newtown, admits that his lowbudget and last-minute campaign puts him at a disadvantage with the Republican challenger and Democratic incumbent, who have been raising money and engaging voters since 2019.

But Walczak says his campaign is more about nonpartisan principles than being competitive in a “dysfunctional” two-party system.

“The biggest threat to our democracy is the polarization in Washington that has contributed to a stagnation where nothing is getting done,” Walczak said during a mid-October candidates’

forum. “As an Independent, I will have the luxury of crossing the aisle in a way that will not only result in legislation, but also break the stalemate in Washington.”

Walczak, who joined the race to represent greater Danbury and the 5th District with only 60 days before the Nov. 3 election, has managed to sit on most of the candidate debates in October.

As the Independent Party candidate, Walczak has been given

equal time with U.S. Rep. Jahana Hayes, a one-term Democrat from Wolcott, and Republican David X. Sullivan, a former federal prosecutor from New Fairfield.

“I’m a new kind of politician who puts country before party and solutions before ideology,” says Walczak. “I’m someone who doesn’t think politics is a win or lose game where if I’m right, you’re wrong.”

Challenges to the status quo by Independent Party candidates in

northwestern and central Connecticut is not new. Since 2006 – the last time a Republican represented the 5th District, two Independent candidates have made runs at the system, each collecting a few thousand votes out of a quarter million votes cast.

But if anyone has the numbers on his side in the 5th District, it’s Walczak. While Republicans have 100,000 registered voters and Democrats have 140,000 registered voters to the 6,300 registered to Walczak’s Independent Party, the largest block is voters who are unaffiliated with any party, who number 180,000.

Walczak says he’s the only candidate who can promise to “work on all sides of the aisle.”

“We can begin here in the 5th District to fix congress,” Walczak said. “We can start making government more responsible and break the logjam.”

Contributed photos