Chris Shays Files Official Papers For U.S. Senate Primary on August 14

Former U.S. Rep. Christopher Shays filed papers Monday to officially force a primary for the U.S. Senate against Greenwich wrestling entrepreneur Linda McMahon.

Shays placed second Friday night behind McMahon, who won the Republican state convention’s endorsement by a two-to-one margin.

Shays has won 18 elections in a career in the state legislature and at the federal level, where he served for 21 years in the U.S. House of Representatives before losing in 2008 to Democrat Jim Himes. Shays had held off Democrats numerous times, but he was swept out of office as Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama generated a huge voter turnout in Bridgeport in 2008.

“I congratulate Linda McMahon for winning the convention, but this is really a round robin in the sense that we both qualified,” Shays told reporters in the Capitol press room in Hartford. “From now on, it’s winner-take-all. … Folks in Connecticut want good Yankee common sense. They’re not into ideology. Hopefully, they will hear a lot of good common sense from me.”

He added, “Some in the McMahon camp have said it would be nice if I didn’t run. … I made a promise back in December that win or lose the convention, I would go get signatures [to force a primary]. But we don’t need to get signatures. … That’s called democracy. It doesn’t divide a party. It strengthens us.”

Shays is now attempting a political comeback against McMahon, who has now won two consecutive Republican convention endorsements. She lost in 2010 in the race against Democrat Richard Blumenthal by 12 points after spending $50 million of her own money on the effort.

McMahon has repeatedly mentioned that there is very little difference in the voting records between Chris Shays and U.S. Rep. Christopher Murphy, who is running in the Democratic primary against former Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz. Shays, though, rejected the comparisons that have already been outlined in a brochure by McMahon. He said that McMahon could be compared to Murphy in the same way.

McMahon “supported Nancy Pelosi in 2006 by giving her thousands of dollars to make her speaker, and she supported her in 2008 to keep her speaker,” said Shays, referring to the San Francisco Democrat. “That’s a great little sound bite. I hope you use it. But in the end, it’s not going to determine how people vote. She says she wants to repeal Obamacare, but she helped elect a speaker who wrote Obamacare.”

“Chris Murphy and Chris Shays have the same first name,” Shays said of himself. “That’s the only thing we have in common.”

McMahon herself had said that the Republicans would be strongly unified against Murphy if Shays had dropped out of the race.

“Linda McMahon won the endorsement of Connecticut Republicans by a 2 to 1 margin because people are tired of the professional politicians in Washington and are ready for a proven job creator with a detailed plan to turn our economy around and get people back to work,” said campaign spokeswoman Erin Isaac. “Friday night sent a clear message that it is time to unite the party around Linda McMahon so we can focus on beating Chris Murphy in November.”

On the Democratic side, the primary will be on the same day as the Republicans – August 14.

Regarding the millions that McMahon has poured into her campaign, Shays said, “You never have enough money – unless you’re Linda McMahon. And then you have too much. But I’ll have what I need.”

Shays appeared Monday afternoon on the radio show of former Gov. John G. Rowland in the studio of WTIC-AM in Farmington. They both served together in the U.S. Congress in the late 1980s as Republicans representing Connecticut. Shays said he doubted that there would be a primary this year in the Fourth Congressional District, where he had previously served for more than two decades. 

“My departure was much more stark than yours,” Rowland told Shays.

“But you had a great career,” Shays responded, noting Rowland’s days as a state legislator, member of Congress, and 10 years as governor.

Speaking of his upbringing, Shays said, “My dad said, ‘I quit college. You’re going to college.’ ”

Shays said that both Obamacare and the Dodd-Frank financial regulation law must both be repealed. He also wants to reduce the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 15 percent, although critics say that so many loopholes means that virtually no corporations actually pay 35 percent.

Regarding his loss to Democrat Jim Himes in 2008, Shays said he would not blame the huge voter turnout in the cities. He said, ”I lost because I didn’t get my vote out. The bottom line is if I got my vote out in Darien and New Canaan and elsewhere, we would have won. I would not have lost.”