The past may indeed be prologue for Connecticut Republicans.
An 11th-hour movement is afoot to get Chris Healy, the former state party chairman, to run for his old post next Tuesday against current GOP boss Jerry Labriola Jr., Hearst Connecticut Newspapers has learned.
“People have been making calls. It looks like a Draft Healy movement,” Danbury Mayor Mark Boughton confirmed.
Boughton, who is seeking as seventh term as chief executive of the Hat City and is also believed to be mulling a run for governor, said it’s late in the game for Healy to enter the fray.
“I’m committed to the chairman, although I think Chris Healy did a good job as chairman,” Boughton said. “I think it’s a thankless task.”
Republicans make up the smallest bloc of the electorate in Connecticut after unaffiliated voters and Democrats, who hold every statewide office, all five congressional districts, both U.S. Senate seats and majorities in both chambers of the General Assembly. The last time a GOP candidate won a statewide race in Connecticut was 2006.
A message seeking comment was left Friday for Healy, who opted not to seek re-election as chairman in 2011 after leading the party for four years. A sound bite machine who runs his own political consulting firm, Healy maintains his own political blog, Make Blue Red, with his wife, Suzan Bibisi. He is a regular guest on FOX CT Sunday talk show, “Capitol Report.”
Labriola, a Wallingford lawyer who comes from a political family with roots in Naugatuck, beat out multiple party stalwarts for the chairmanship in 2011. He is considered the front-runner in a three-way race that includes former congressional candidate Wayne Winsley and Tea Party Patriots organizer Ron Wilcox.
A message seeking comment was left Friday for Labriola, who last week expressed confidence that the 72 members of the Republican State Central Committee would re-elect him.