Battle lines starting to form in race for SJC Suffolk County clerk
State Sen. Lydia Edwards is backing Allison Cartwright for clerk of the Supreme Judicial Court, announcing her support in a social media post that appeared to take a shot at her former colleague on the
Boston City Council, Erin
Murphy.
Edwards made it clear in two separate posts on X this month that she prefers Cartwright, an attorney with 30 years of legal experience, over Murphy, an at-large councilor and former Boston school teacher, for the Suffolk County seat that opened up when longtime SJC Clerk Maura Doyle opted not to run for re-election.
Quoting a post shared by Cartwright, Edwards wrote on X, “Exciting to see such a qualified and professional candidate running for this position,” a statement that perhaps could be seen as a dig at Murphy’s lack of legal experience.
The outgoing clerk, Doyle, has been a member of the bar since 1981. She was a civil litigator in the state and federal courts for 11 years and an adjunct professor at Suffolk University Law School before joining the SJC clerk’s office as an assistant clerk in 1992. She became the court’s first female clerk four years later. Doyle earned $189,324 in 2023, Herald payroll records show.
Edwards, who sat alongside Murphy for a time on the City Council, later posted that she was out campaigning for Cartwright, who, according to her campaign announcement, is “currently serving as managing director of the public defender office for Suffolk and Norfolk Counties.”
Murphy is likely not deterred, however, particularly after picking up a big-name endorsement this week from U.S. Rep. Stephen Lynch, who cited her “record of providing constituent services across all neighborhoods, her successful efforts to uphold the voting rights of all Boston residents, and her commitment to helping those less fortunate,” her newsletter states. — Gayla Cawley
Ron DeSantis floats migrants on the Vineyard … again
Ears pricked up — and some eyes definitely rolled — this week when failed presidential candidate and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis floated sending more migrants to Martha’s Vineyard.
Lest we forget, DeSantis last year shipped dozens of Venezuelan migrants from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard, with a quick pitstop in Florida. It was a move that was derided as a political stunt and spurred a federal lawsuit by a pair of legal advocacy groups. So where is the legal challenge? It has been mostly dormant since August 2023, when the groups representing some of the migrants who landed on the wealthy enclave petitioned a judge not to dismiss the case or move it out of Massachusetts and to Florida.
“Defendants induced 49 destitute immigrants to fly across the country through fraud and misrepresentation and, after using them as unwitting props in a stunt devised for the personal political gain of defendant DeSantis, abandoned them on an island,” Attorneys with Alianza Americas and Lawyers for Civil Rights wrote in the latest court filing.
The lawsuit accused DeSantis and others of violating the migrants’ Constitutional rights and federal rights by luring them onto a plane in Texas and crossing state lines. But DeSantis and his officials have pushed back, arguing the legal groups “obviously disagree with Florida’s policies and political leaders.”— Chris Van Buskirk
Another ‘nationwide search’ for a Massachusetts judge
There’s been yet another “nationwide search” for a Massachusetts judge, in addition to Gov. Maura Healey handing her ex-romantic partner a $226,187-a-year spot on the Supreme Judicial Court.
On the same day the Governor’s Council confirmed that pick earlier this month, they also okayed for the District Court Marjorie Tynes.
In an amazing coincidence, the new Judge Tynes is the wife of Dorchester District Court Judge Jonathan Tynes, who is an appointee of ex-Gov. Deval Patrick and a proud graduate of the now-defunct Mount Ida College.
Mrs. Tynes returned to the public service after a 10-year hiatus as soon as the Democrats regained control of state government last year. Healey made her a $156,000-a-year “deputy executive director” of the Executive Office of Public Safety.
But that was obviously only a holding pen until the ultimate hack appointment opened up — a judgeship.
Mr. and Mrs. Tynes will now each be making $207,855 a year. Total hack family annual take: $415,710. — Howie Carr
MassGOP election loser update
The month of March just keeps getting worse for the faction of the state GOP led by perennial election losers Jim Lyons and Geoff Diehl.
After losing a slew of seats in the state committee races March 5, two days later another of their stalwarts was sentenced to a month in federal prison for income-tax evasion.
This time it was Christianne Mylott-Coleman, a former chief of staff for ex-Sen. Dean Tran of Fitchburg, another of the Lyons-Diehl cult’s serial election losers.
Mylott-Coleman made $52,489 on the state payroll working for Tran at the State House in 2019 before he was ousted from office in 2020, two years after Lyons and Diehl got the boot. He was then crushed for Congress in 2022, but still got a higher percentage of votes than Diehl did in his sad bid for governor.
In Springfield federal court, Tran’s aide Mylott-Coleman was found guilty of evading $269,209 in income taxes while she was running a home-services business.
Meanwhile, her old boss, Tran, is still awaiting his own day(s) in court. He’s been indicted on both state and federal charges, including COVID welfare fraud and theft of a firearm.
Prior to being lugged by both state and federal cops, Tran was ticketed to run on the Lyons-Diehl slate for GOP state committee. According to the federal indictment, at the time of his alleged welfare fraud, Tran was employed by another GOP election loser, Rick Green, who owns 1A Auto Parts in Pepperell. — Howie Carr
City Council avoiding a New Year’s Day hangover
The Boston City Council, in seeking to avoid a repeat of their New Year’s Day hangovers this past inauguration, voted in favor of a home rule petition that, if passed at the state level, would change the date of future inaugural ceremonies.
The petition, put forward by Councilor Brian Worrell and approved via an 11-2 vote last Wednesday, seeks to amend the city charter in a way that would prevent mayoral and city council inaugurations from falling on a federal holiday like what occurred with this year’s New Year’s Day ceremony.
If signed by Mayor Michelle Wu, the petition would be sent to Beacon Hill, where state lawmakers would have to approve two city charter changes — by moving the inauguration and end-of-term dates for the mayor and city council from the first Monday of January to the first weekday after Jan. 2.
Worrell pointed to the strain he felt the requirement placed on first responders, who “had to staff our inauguration 10 hours after First Night and New Year’s Eve.”
Not everyone was on board. City Councilors Ed Flynn and Erin Murphy both voted against the “unnecessary” change, speaking to the honor that they and their colleagues should feel in serving on the City Council, and the lack of frequency in which an inauguration falls on a federal holiday. — Gayla Cawley