The five Democratic candidates for governor of Massachusetts faced off today in a final friendly debate before the convention.
At one point, Juliette Kayyem accused front-runner Martha Coakley of trying to avoid blame for ruling that a proposed ballot question to repeal the casino law is unconstitutional.
“When you go after banks or use the role of the Attorney General for something good, you always say 'I did this.' On this issue it’s 'we, 'my office.'"
This is as feisty as the debate got. The "rivals" even posed for a group selfie outside the studio.
They agreed on issues ranging from welfare fraud, to affirmative action, to scandals plaguing the administration of governor Deval Patrick.
Don Berwick was the hardest on the governor, blaming him for bad leadership of the department of children and families:
“That was a management failure and would not happen on my watch.”
Steve Grossman called the roll out of medical marijuana a "fiasco," while Coakley called it a "total disaster."
But as cordial as the candidates might have been in the debate the gloves might come off at this weekends democratic state convention in Worcester.
