Bentz gets the nod to run in the 18th RD Special Election
Last Thursday night, the 18th District Democratic RD Committee selected David Bentz as its candidate in the upcoming state House of Representatives special election. Bentz will be seeking to succeed current Rep. Mike Barbieri, whose resignation will take affect at the end of July. A special election will held at some point in early to mid September according to law. Speaker Pete Schwartzkopf will announce the date of the special election early next week.
Bentz, 29, was the legislative aide for Barbieri, who announced his resignation earlier this month. Barbieri resigned to become the new director of the Division of Substance Abuse and Mental Health for the Department of Health and Social Services.
“I’m honored to have the committee’s nomination and plan to hit the ground running. I have worked closely with the residents of the 18th District on their issues, and I will be able to continue that high level of constituent services if I’m fortunate enough to be elected,” Bentz said in a written statement.
“We have a lot of challenging issues facing Delaware, and I intend to fight for our middle class by pushing for good-paying jobs and better educational opportunities, and making sure our economic policies don’t unfairly burden them. A strong middle class is essential to a healthy Delaware economy. That is where our focus must be.”
Bentz has been Rep. Barbieri’s legislative aide for 4 years, since 2011. Prior to that, he earned his Master’s Degree at the University of Delaware in Public Administration. He received his Bachelor’s Degree from Penn State. Other than that, non-Leg Hall insiders don’t know much about the young candidate. Hopefully we will get to sit down later in August to talk with him.
I have been told the Republicans will also have a candidate for the special election, which is good given the recent history of low turnout elections in New Castle County, Delaware (hint: the GOP usually wins those. But I am heartened to see that Mr. Bentz is already hitting the pavement in the district, using the Bryan Townsend method of retail politics.
Maybe we’ve learned not to take these lightly. By the way has Pete Schwatzkopf decided which party’s candidate he is going to support?
This was Terry Spence’s old district for those old enough to remember who he was. Barbieri took it first time with a slim margin (52-48) and the 2010 rematch (53-47).
This is a special election. There will be no voting day hoopla to carry the ticket. His uncontested office got 3261 votes in 2014; down from his uncontested results in an Obama-election turnout of 7294…. The Republican turnout in the last contested election was 2706, which was in the Tea Party election year, btw.
Mike Barbieri was one of three House members who voted against Opt Out (wtf?)… We now know his reward for doing so. (Putting a noose around your head and jumping off a building looks silly unless one knows for sure the rewards awaiting in another world. )
Bentz was an aide for 4 years. If the Republican can come out in favor of Opt Out or even better, the replacement of the Smarter Balanced Assessment with a test developed by teachers, and Bentz still carries the old corporate line from two years ago of towing the line for Charters, Corporate America, and the re-segregation of Public Schools, the Republicans pick up this seat and hold on to it over the next couple of cycles….
This seat will be decided over Common Core….. the Dems will win or lose it on whether Bentz follows the old line of his predecessor… or flips to mirror Kowalko and echoes Townsend, Williams, and Matthews in his vehemence against this test.
If the Republicans pick it up the 18th, it will be solely because they associate Common Core with Markell and the Schwartzkoph Democrats…. If Bentz gets out front of this issue as did Matthews or Townsend or Williams, there may be a brief glimmer of hope for the Dems.
It will be decided on one issue; and that is the broad umbrella of Common Core. People who’ve never voted Republican in their life, will do so if the Republican calls for the abolishment of the Smarter Balanced Assessment. (has have all Republicans by their voting records except turncoat Greg Lavelle….)
Right now, I see this district slipping away…..
You see the district slipping away because you’re looking through your ridiculous tunnel vision. And, you’re wrong about Mike’s vote/reward, but, no sense telling the tea partiers of the left that their preconceived narrative is wrong.
Yeah, the Opt Out Vote theory of him voting no and then getting a state job as a reward makes absolutely no fucking sense, Kavips. None at all. If Barbieri’s vote was the key vote in DEFEATING the bill so that it never got to the Governor’s desk, then you might have a point. But the vote passed both houses of the GA twice by overwhelming margins.
You might be right about Common Core and education being an issue, though. We will see.
You guys are idiots if you think this race is won because of Common Core. You do realize that is not a Democrat issue… anger against Common Core will be a tea party republican talking point… Which probably fits your description. Also, Bentz represents Jaques and Barbieri. Both fiercely against Opt Out.
Also, since when was Townsend a fierce advocate for Opt Out? He wasnt a sponsor for the bill and I thought his amendment almost killed it? Soooo how bout you pop his nipple out of your mouth and wake the hell up.
I have to remark briefly on the tunnel vision comment… Yes. It could be… because all of us have tunnel vision. The very reason you don’t see Common Core as a horrific imposition, comes from your own case of tunnel vision….
I remember a comment spun off by Colin Powell in regards to the Bush presidency. I posted it years ago but it remains hauntingly true today. He said: “Every day I wake up and look in the mirror and ask myself… am I really doing the right thing? But these guys (Cheney’s contingent) make up something on paper and go for it, and never question it again, no matter how bad the results come in…”
Which is why we invaded Iraq.
So I do look around, and from my perspective, Corporate Educational Reform is the most destructive of all possible current threats now because it destroys the brains of little children who will in our old age one day run things. It re-segregates our schools in to separate and unequal wiping out all those gains made since Brown vrs Board of Education. It destroys communities and community identities. It does it all for nothing gained, except the switching of money from the public to the private sector…
They too will grow up never questioning what they are told; never looking in the mirror to question whether they are right, and if they decide to lead this nation into oblivion, there will be no one to stop it…
Obviously many of you don’t know Corporate Educational Reform well enough. All you have to do is take the test. And that is why the tunnel vision exists on your side, not ours… I’m afraid you are the Cheney. We are the Colin Powells. But… neither us can know right now.
It will take events of history to determine who of us was living in a tunnel, and who was not.
Again… how does overriding the opt out veto solve any of that?…. That question still has not been answered. There is the tunnel vision. I think Corporate Education wins because instead of fighting for real reforms we are wasting time to get symbolic wins. What reforms are we fighting for. Kowalko even says that people can already opt out, this just protects them from being punished… which I dont even know if people get punished for it. Sooooo if I were Corporate Ed I would want to continue this fight because even if I lose, the status quo remains the same. Same test, same results, same evaluation formula… what do they really lose? Its stupid
Are you going to be Milli Vanilli or Joe Six Pack here? Pick one and use it.