WHEN IT COMES to winning the support of the state’s US senators, Ricardo Arroyo can now claim a twofer.
A week after Sen. Elizabeth Warren endorsed his run for Suffolk County district attorney, Arroyo picked up the backing of Sen. Ed Markey. Arroyo, a Boston city councilor serving his second term, is positioning himself as the candidate who will continue the reform agenda of former DA Rachael Rollins, who resigned in January after she was confirmed as US attorney for Massachusetts.
Gov. Charlie Baker tapped former Suffolk assistant DA Kevin Hayden to fill the vacant post, and Hayden and Arroyo are poised to square off in the September Democratic primary. No Republican candidates have yet emerged.
Hayden, who most recently served as chair of the state Sex Offender Registry Board, says he embraces much of the current reform thinking, which has emphasized alternatives to incarceration for lower-level offenders and efforts to steer those with mental illness and addiction problems toward treatment. But he has held back on support for all the changes being pushed by progressive activists. For example, unklike Arroyo, Hayden does not favor abolishing the Boston Police Department gang database.
In his endorsement, Markey touted Arroyo’s progressive platform.
“His leadership defending civil rights, fighting for equity in public services, and promoting transparency in law enforcement are exactly what Suffolk County needs in its District Attorney,” Markey said of Arroyo in a statement released Monday morning.
Arroyo worked as a public defender before his 2019 election to the district council seat covering Hyde Park and sections of Roslindale and Mattapan.
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Executive Editor, CommonWealth
About Michael Jonas
Michael Jonas has worked in journalism in Massachusetts since the early 1980s. Before joining the CommonWealth staff in early 2001, he was a contributing writer for the magazine for two years. His cover story in CommonWealth's Fall 1999 issue on Boston youth outreach workers was selected for a PASS (Prevention for a Safer Society) Award from the National Council on Crime and Delinquency.
Michael got his start in journalism at the Dorchester Community News, a community newspaper serving Boston's largest neighborhood, where he covered a range of urban issues. Since the late 1980s, he has been a regular contributor to the Boston Globe. For 15 years he wrote a weekly column on local politics for the Boston Sunday Globe's City Weekly section.
Michael has also worked in broadcast journalism. In 1989, he was a co-producer for "The AIDS Quarterly," a national PBS series produced by WGBH-TV in Boston, and in the early 1990s, he worked as a producer for "Our Times," a weekly magazine program on WHDH-TV (Ch. 7) in Boston.
Michael lives in Dorchester with his wife and their two daughters.
About Michael Jonas
Michael Jonas has worked in journalism in Massachusetts since the early 1980s. Before joining the CommonWealth staff in early 2001, he was a contributing writer for the magazine for two years. His cover story in CommonWealth's Fall 1999 issue on Boston youth outreach workers was selected for a PASS (Prevention for a Safer Society) Award from the National Council on Crime and Delinquency.
Michael got his start in journalism at the Dorchester Community News, a community newspaper serving Boston's largest neighborhood, where he covered a range of urban issues. Since the late 1980s, he has been a regular contributor to the Boston Globe. For 15 years he wrote a weekly column on local politics for the Boston Sunday Globe's City Weekly section.
Michael has also worked in broadcast journalism. In 1989, he was a co-producer for "The AIDS Quarterly," a national PBS series produced by WGBH-TV in Boston, and in the early 1990s, he worked as a producer for "Our Times," a weekly magazine program on WHDH-TV (Ch. 7) in Boston.
Michael lives in Dorchester with his wife and their two daughters.
Markey’s announcement is the latest in a string of contested Democratic primaries that have seen the state’s top two Democratic elected officials weigh in with endorsements. While officeholders often hold back endorsements in contested primaries, Markey and Warren have both broken with that custom in recent months.
Both senators backed Lydia Edwards in a December special election primary for state Senate. Meanwhile, earlier this month Markey endorsed former Boston city councilor Andrea Campbell in the three-way Democratic primary race for attorney general.
