CT Republican Primary 2022: Meet The Candidates

CONNECTICUT — Primary day is here in Connecticut, and that means that Republican and Democratic voters will get to choose their candidates for the November general election.

Republicans statewide will decide between three candidates for U.S. Senate to face off against incumbent Sen. Richard Blumenthal. They will also decide who will run for the open secretary of the state race.

Here is more about the Republican statewide candidates:

U.S. Senate

Themis Klarides (party-endorsed candidate)

Klarides was a state representative and served as the House Republican leader from 2014 to 2020. She currently practices law in state and federal courts, according to her campaign biography.

She cites the 2017 bipartisan budget deal as one of her biggest accomplishments.

Klarides lists driving down inflation, border security and public safety as some of the most important issues.

She opposes federalized elections and expanding vote-by-mail, but does support expanded opportunities to vote in-person.

Klarides touted her experience running and winning elections as something that gives her an edge over her opponents. She also said she would vote to codify Roe v. Wade if elected. Donald Trump shouldn’t run for president again because it wouldn’t be good for the country, she said after a WTNH debate.

Klarides is married to Eversource vice president and general counsel Gregory Butler.

Leora Levy

Levy received an endorsement from Donald Trump last week. He cited her work for the Republican National Committee and said she would be an advocate for Connecticut and conservative values. She was nominated by the former president to be the U.S. ambassador to Chile in 2019, but her nomination was never confirmed.

She has served as the finance chair for the past two Republican gubernatorial nominees, and has served as the Republican national committeewoman for Connecticut since 2016.

Levy holds a degree in international relations from Brown University and was a trader at Phibro Salomon, according to her campaign biography.

Levy said she would vote for Trump if he ran for president again and absolved him of responsibility for the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, according to the New Haven Independent.

She is a mother of three sons and lives in Greenwich with her husband, Steven. Her family escaped communist Cuba in 1960.

Peter Lumaj

Peter Lumaj is an attorney who works on immigration matters. He escaped communist Albania and worked as a porter and doorman and later as a fraud investigator in former New York Mayor Rudy Giulani’s administration, according to his campaign biography. He earned a law degree from the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law.

Lumaj has run for statewide office three times, but hasn’t been elected, according to the CT Mirror.

He is an outspoken supporter of Trump and bills himself as the only true conservative running in the primary.

He resides in Fairfield with his wife, Mary, and three children.

Secretary of the state

Dominic Rapini (party-endorsed candidate)

Rapini is a longtime Apple employee and has won the company’s salesperson of the year award twice. He previously ran in the Republican primary for U.S. Senate in 2018, but he lost to Matthew Corey.

He has testified in Hartford several times regarding election laws and sued former Secretary of the State Denise Merrill over the decision to allow absentee ballot voting for anyone due to the pandemic. Rapini’s campaign website alleges problems with voter rolls in Connecticut and other issues.

Rapini distanced himself from the Fight Voter Fraud organization and told the Connecticut Mirror he mainly did data work for the group.

He is also a member of the Connecticut Republican Assembly, Branford Republican Town Committee and a board member of Grass Roots East, a federal political action committee that focuses on the Second Congressional District.

He is also a longtime Pop Warner football coach.

Terrie Wood

Wood is currently the state representative for the 141st House District, which includes parts of Norwalk and Darien. She was re-elected for a 7th term in 2020 and serves as the policy chair for the House Republican Caucus.

Her goals for the secretary of the state position if elected are to reduce business filing paperwork and modernize state elections, according to her campaign biography.

She previously acted in television commercials and founded her own BMW portrait photography business.

Wood is a longtime Darien resident and lives with her husband, Jay. She has three children.