Luke Bronin

But the most shocking part of it was a 78-year-old incumbent congressman named John Larson.

He won his first seat back in 1998, and he's run for office almost every two years since 1982, was defeated by Luke Bronin.

He is the former mayor of Hartford, Connecticut.

I think this is one of those things where Bronin had expected Larson, the congressman, to retire sometimes in 2022 or 2024.

But a couple of weeks ago, right in Connecticut, we saw a big upset.

Luke Bronin, former mayor of Hartford, defeated John Larson, a 20 plus year incumbent in the House.

And again, Luke Bronin was a bench candidate.

But one thing that was very different between Luke Bronin and Seth Moulton is that Luke Bronin ran on.

Yes.

John Larson.

And not only that, he's a creature of a broken institution and, you know, has taken $5 million in corporate PAC money.

And that's maybe why he's not taking action on these things.

Yeah, absolutely.

I think, I think a good case study of that was the race that we saw in Connecticut between, uh, Representative John Larson and Luke Bronin-

Yeah

... um, who challenged him, not from the left, but just from the issue of gerontocracy, the issue of how older representatives don't necessarily understand the issues that voters are facing today, and don't seem particularly open to understanding how to pivot for the world we're living in right now.

Yes

... was running against kind of a Moulton-ish Harvard mayor, a younger guy, and then the polls had that as a coin toss, and the, the younger mayor, Luke Bronin, ended up killing him by like twenty points or something.

And then you obviously-

Right

[upbeat music] If we are gonna fix this mess that we're in, we need to build a Democratic Party that's bringing a whole new energy to this fight.

Earlier this month, congressional candidate Luke Bronin won his Democratic primary in Connecticut by a landslide.

The former Hartford mayor denying incumbent John Larson a 15th term in Washington last night.

Many media outlets have painted Bronin's victory as part of this year's insurgency of younger candidates defeating Democratic incumbents in primaries.

They wanted to do something that was tech companies, you know, pay as they go, right? They get to set up their data centers with few restrictions.

There's a tax on them specifically to upgrade the underlying infrastructure of utilities, right? So it's this kind of middle path, and that kind of rhetoric we've seen pop up across other races where the bench and majority Democrats funded by Steve Mandel have invested.

Luke Bronin in Connecticut is another one that we can talk about.

But I think just to kind of step back here, right, and, you know, we can try to point to what the wizard behind the curtain here may want.

He added that Tallarico has a better chance than any Democrat has had of the state in a very long time.

In more primary news, last week we discussed the victory of former Hartford, Connecticut, Mayor Luke Bronin over 14-term incumbent Congressman John Larson.

That same day, the Lever published an exposé of Stephen Mandel, a Connecticut-based billionaire hedge fund manager and Democratic megadonor, who is the largest bankroller of a nascent political machine promising to redefine the Democratic Party.

Via two organizations, Majority Democrats and The Bench, Mandel and his wife have federaled tens of millions of dollars to candidates of their choosing in an attempt to form a new political center.

There's Representative Dan Goldman, defeated by pro-Israel former New York City controller Brad Lander.

And then Connecticut Rep John Larson, lost to the former mayor of Hartford, Luke Bronin.

I think that's one of those maybe age issues.

John Larson's been in Congress for a long time.

Yeah, pretty much.

And, uh, I was pleased to be able to deliver that, and, uh, it's not a reflection on, uh, how we think we'll do with the, his replacement, uh, Luke...

Is it Bronin, the last?

Luke Bronin.

Luke Bronin.

Uh, who's, who's also, uh, uh, very similar-minded in regard to policy.

I imagine he'll support Social Security.

but I'm sure it's in here.

Luke Bronin, you know, Greg would have known offhand because it happened in Connecticut.

And, you know, we heard the story and it was like basically a generational change type primary.

Bronin, this was good insight, I thought.

But in some particulars, it's misplaced.

As the smoke from the recent party primaries clears, it's proper to take stock in what we've lost alongside what we may gain from a changing of the guard.

For example, take, and they did, Representative John B. Larson of Connecticut, 78 said, who, not Connecticut's 78th district, they don't have that many, he's age 78, who was turfed out of his seat in his state's August 11th primary by his Democratic challenger, former Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin, just a tender 47.

Given that Larson is in his 28th year as a member of Congress, it sounds reasonable to suggest that it's his time to go.