Bridgeport Mayor Joe Ganim will reportedly announce his bid for the Democratic nomination for Connecticut governor during the first week of January.
Ganim filed paperwork for an exploratory committee for governor eight months ago after Gov. Dannel Malloy announced that he would not seek a third term. According to a report in Only in Bridgeport, a blog published by former Ganim aide Lennie Grimaldi, the mayor is “on the stump raising money the old-fashioned way from large money donors” after the State Elections Enforcement Commission denied him access to public funding for his campaign due to his 2003 felony conviction on public corruption charges. A federal court upheld the state”™s decision.
Ganim previously sought statewide office in 1994 as the running mate to Bill Curry on a Democratic ticket that lost to Republicans John Rowland and Jodi Rell. He served as Bridgeport”™s mayor from 1991 until resigning in 2003 to serve a seven-year prison sentence after being convicted on 16 federal counts. In 2015, he defeated incumbent Bill Finch for the Democratic nomination as Bridgeport mayor and won the general election by a wide margin.
There are currently 21 gubernatorial candidates with active committees, according to the State Elections Enforcement Commission. Fourteen are listed as Republicans, four as Democrats and three unaffiliated.
