Debunking the Debunking

The Lieutenant Governor sent an email to delegates this afternoon. She compared me to Donald Trump for “misstating reality,” then offered three myths she promised to debunk. I read it carefully, and her own debunking is the best evidence we have for the case we have been making. Here is what she wrote, and what it actually proves.

Myth 1: that Lamont killed universal free school meals.

The Lieutenant Governor writes that funding free school breakfast “has been a top priority for the Governor.” She then explains that in 2025 the legislature funded other programs instead, and that this year Lamont used his State of the State address to “call on lawmakers” to fund the program.

Read that paragraph again. Nowhere in it does she say that Lamont supports universal free school meals. She quotes him saying “no shame, no stigma, no empty stomachs,” which is a line, not a commitment. If Lamont supported free meals for every student in every Connecticut public school, he would say so. He has not, because he does not. Working families in this state can read the difference between governing and posturing.

Myth 2: that Lamont made only marginal adjustments to taxes.

The 2023 tax cut was, in a literal sense, an adjustment to marginal tax brackets. The Lieutenant Governor is technically correct to use that word. But the burden Connecticut families actually feel is broader than the income tax. Tax fairness is not measured by income tax alone. It is measured by the totality of what a family pays, and in this state property taxes are the regressive engine grinding down homeowners and renters every year.

Lamont is sending an additional $270 million to towns this year. Connecticut already sends billions of dollars back to municipalities every year, and every year that aid fails to keep pace with the actual cost of running a town. The new $270 million is a fraction of the need, and it is a one-time band-aid, not a structural fix. The shortfall lands on the property tax. The property tax falls hardest on people who are not wealthy. Connecticut residents are being squeezed out of their homes right now, and the answer cannot be a small bracket adjustment paired with a one-time gesture. That is not tax fairness; it is the appearance of tax fairness.

Myth 3: that Lamont sat idly by while ICE terrorized our communities.

The Lieutenant Governor lists actions Lamont took in 2026, including telling ICE to “go home” on opening day of session and calling for the firing of Kristi Noem after Renee Good was murdered. Those statements happened this year, after Lamont spent last year as the single reason Connecticut courthouses were not protected from ICE detentions while ICE was actively pulling people from those buildings. Saying ICE should leave is easy when ICE is not here in force, but what Lamont did when ICE was here is the record.

There is a deeper problem. Every time Lamont talks about defending Connecticut from ICE, he pairs it with the line that we need to keep working with federal immigration enforcement to “keep criminals off the street.” That is not a Connecticut value; it is the exact federal talking point ICE uses to justify targeting anyone it chooses, which is precisely the logic being used right now to carry out targeted strikes against people in our state who have done nothing wrong. A governor who repeats that line is not protecting Connecticut; he is laundering the federal justification for using it.

On the comparison to Trump.

The Lieutenant Governor compared me to Donald Trump for asking questions about the Governor’s record. A primary is the moment when Democrats look at each other’s records honestly and decide who should lead the party into a general election. Asking why Lamont vetoed striking workers twice, blocked the public option, killed the child tax credit, and built a childcare plan that does not come close to meeting the need is the work of a primary. If that makes me Trump, every Democrat in this state who has ever questioned an incumbent is Trump.

We welcome this debate. I look forward to more emails from Lamont’s surrogates, because each one further illuminates how he continues to fail our state.

Thank you for being in this with me.

Josh