Politics
Minogue lost Tuesday’s governor’s race to incumbent Gov. Maura Healey by more than 27 points, according to the Associate Press.
Incumbent Gov. Maura Healey coasted to reelection Tuesday evening, easily besting Republican challenger Mike Minogue.
According to the Associated Press, Healey leads Minogue by more than 27 points with 95 percent of the votes tallied as of 10 p.m. on Wednesday. AP projected Healey to win the race within one minute of the polls closing on Tuesday.
It’s no surprise that Healey and her Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll earned the victory in one of the country’s Democratic strongholds. But Minogue raised three times as much money as Healey, including more than $12 million out of his own pockets.
Massachusetts voters have shown a willingness to vote Republicans into the governorship in the past. In fact, since the turn of the century, it’s been the norm, with only two of the last seven governors being Democrats.
Minogue ran a campaign on affordability and accountability. But, despite his efforts, the Republican seemingly couldn’t escape his perceived ties to President Donald Trump — a figure with a 25 percent approval rating in the state.
With exceptionally strong results for Democrats across the country on Tuesday, the election was an uphill battle for Minogue, a former biotech executive and political newcomer. Despite the wide margin of defeat, the results showed Minogue and Republicans still dominated pockets of the commonwealth.
“The people made their choice and it is our responsibility now to respect the will of the people,” Minogue said to supporters Tuesday evening. “But remember, an election determines who holds the office, it does not determine what we believe in, what we stand for, and how much we care about the commonwealth.”
Minogue won 78 of the state’s 351 municipalities, according to AP results. One town, Monroe, is an exact tie between the two candidates, while 11 municipalities had not returned votes as of 10 p.m. Tuesday.
Republican Geoff Diehl won 72 municipalities when he squared off against Healey in 2022. However, Diehl and Minogue took the exact same 34.7 percent total share of the vote.
Minogue flipped 11 municipalities that Healey won in 2022 — Wrentham,Westport, Westminster, Seekonk, Savoy, Rowley, Marshfield, Fairhaven, Dartmouth, Bridgewater, Athol. However, he didn’t take home more than 52 percent of the vote in any of those flipped municipalities.
Healey, on the other hand, flipped two municipalities won by Geoff in 2022. She took a slight edge over Minogue in Whitman, but she swung Boxborough by nearly 50 points.
Minogue received more than 60 percent of the vote in 10 municipalities, but did not break 70 percent anywhere in the state. His best performances came at the polls in Oakham (67.7), Lakeville (66.4), Blandford (65.3), Granville (64.6), and Acushnet (64.3). These represent mostly rural towns with populations lower than 13,000.
Healey notched victories in a majority of the state’s most populated municipalities, such as Boston, Worcester, Springfield, and Cambridge. Minogue took slim victories in a few municipalities with populations over 30,000: Westfield, Dartmouth, and Dracut.
Healey, as expected, dominated every municipality between Boston and Worcester, as well as much of the western part of the state. But Minogue still found a few Republican strongholds.
Minogue took home a large swath of municipalities in the southeast corner of the state, such as Middleborough, Bridgewater, and Raynham. He also took firm control of the state’s center to the west of Worcester, such as Rutland, Warren, and North Brookfield.
Minogue won a small cluster of municipalities in southwest Massachusetts around Westfield, and a pair in the top left corner of the state. He nabbed a few municipalities in the North Shore as well, such as Saugus, Lynnfield, and Middleton.
Minogue only received 38 percent of the vote in Hamilton, where he lives. In nearby Danvers, where Minogue’s former company Abiomed is headquartered, the Republican lost by more than nine points.
Sign up for the Today newsletter
Get everything you need to know to start your day, delivered right to your inbox every morning.
