GOP finally unseats Sen. Mark MacDonald, 34-year veteran of the State House

The Vermont GOP has been trying to win the Orange County seat held by Sen. Mark MacDonald for years.

But MacDonald, a Williamstown farmer and former social studies teacher who spent 11 years in the House of Representatives and 23 years in the Senate, bested a host of Republican rivals. Over the past decade, MacDonald had received no less than 52 percent of the vote in the general election until Tuesday.

Republican this year Larry Hart, A building materials salesman and former Topsham board of elections member eventually managed to unseat MacDonald — a decisive victory that came as voters frustrated by taxes and the state’s high cost of living ceded legislative seats in Vermont to the GOP.

In an interview Wednesday, Hart attributed his victory to “empathy” for Orange County residents: “Being compassionate to voters and asking them, ‘What are their biggest concerns?’ “And we listen to them,” he said.

Tuesday, boosted by an endorsement from Gov. Phil Scott and thousands of campaign donations from a handful of rich familiesRepublicans turned six seats upside down in the Senate, including Orange County’s. district It consists of 13 towns, including Randolph, Williamstown and Bradford.

Hart said he hears a lot of concerns from residents, especially those on fixed incomes, about getting by: “Are they going to be able to afford gas, electricity, food or medication, or do they have to make a choice about which of those can they afford?”

Hart won 54% of the vote to MacDonald’s 41%, according to unofficial figures from the Vermont Secretary of State’s Office. 3.5 percent of voters left the option blank.

READ MORE

with Erin Petenko
6 November 2024, 17:006 November 2024, 17:01

“Oh, I’m depressed,” MacDonald said in an interview Wednesday morning. But after watching the negative results come in from the polls Tuesday night, he said his loss was no surprise.

MacDonald expressed disappointment that, from his perspective, Republicans have managed to shift blame to Democrats for high costs and taxes, even though Governor Scott has not offered solutions to the problems facing the state.

“The two sides need to come together and the two sides have failed to come together and this has been to the advantage of one side and not the other side,” he said.

Will MacDonald run again in two years? Stating that he will turn 82 in December, he said, “Only in my wildest fantasies.”

For Orange County, the vote means the end of an era. MacDonald is the second-oldest sitting senator, according to Senate secretary John Bloomer. He is a day younger than retiring Sen. Bobby Starr (D-Orleans).

MacDonald was first appointed to the House in 1983 to fill the seat vacated by his late mother, Barbara MacDonald. He served there until 1995.

In 1996, MacDonald was elected to the Senate and served until his impeachment in 2000; It was one of several losses suffered by Democrats after the House held a historic vote to legalize civil unions. MacDonald supported the measure, saying: he couldn’t make it He will announce his “no” vote to his students.

MacDonald won back the seat two years later and has held it until now, despite repeated efforts by the Vermont GOP to oust him.

“This is a seat we’ve been focusing on for a while,” Paul Dame, chairman of the Vermont Republican Party, said last month.

Hart said Thursday that the victory, after years of Republican attempts, was due in part to his own efforts. low key personality.

“I’m a moderate, I’m not an ultra-conservative, and I wasn’t an in-your-face politician,” Hart said Thursday. He said some past Republican rivals were, and “I think it alienates a lot of people.”

Hart did not name any names. But in 2022, MacDonald easily turned down a challenge from farmer and rancher John Klar. hot writer someone who speaks out about important issues like race and gender.

Don Hooper, a longtime Orange County resident and a former secretary of state and state representative, said MacDonald’s longevity in the relatively conservative district is also because he’s a “terrific campaigner.” “No one in Vermont has knocked on more doors than Mark McDonald.”

During his tenure in the State House, MacDonald served as vice chairman of the Senate Finance Committee and the Natural Resources and Energy Committee for many years. According to Hooper, he has earned a reputation as a reliable policy expert with a knack for breaking down complex issues into digestible pieces.

“Mark was the person we assigned to report (to) the heaviest bills,” Hooper said: controversial legislation on recycling, underground fuel tanks, and legislation that would later become Act 60, a landmark law that equalized school funding across the state. It allows high-income and low-income areas to spend similar amounts on education.

Asked about his proudest accomplishment at the Statehouse, MacDonald pointed to that law, which provided the framework for Vermont’s school funding for nearly 30 years.

“It’s been a remarkable success by any measure,” MacDonald said, but “it’s certainly up for some work.”

Tim Ashe, the former Senate president pro tempore who chaired the Senate finance committee for four years when MacDonald was vice president, praised MacDonald’s ability to grasp complex issues, his principles and his ability as an administrator. sharp pencil cartoonist.

“Mark has been an unapologetic supporter and advocate for issues such as environmental protection, clean energy, protecting rural public education (and) many other issues,” he said. “Orange County benefits disproportionately from these things.”

Ashe said he has not met Senator-elect Hart, but “he has some very big shoes to fill.”