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Nesi’s Notes
1. A big question is looming over Rhode Island politics: can Dan McKee turn things around in 2025? The latest poll from Salve Regina University’s Pell Center had grim tidings for the governor , with his job approval rating at only 34% — the fourth survey since last spring to peg his public standing at roughly that level. McKee is actively fundraising for a reelection campaign in 2026, when he’ll be 75, and has given no indication of second thoughts. But he and his advisers have serious work to do if they want to win the Democratic primary, especially when they know they’ll face a well-funded and well-connected rival in Helena Foulkes . Incumbent Democratic governors have lost renomination before — it happened in 1994 to Bruce Sundlun , whose approval rating was 27% a year out from the primary, and it might have happened to independent-turned-Democrat Lincoln Chafee if his 30% approval rating hadn’t led him to step aside in 2013. Other leading Democrats are increasingly hedging their bets; House Speaker Joe Shekarchi is making no secret about his appetite to run if McKee doesn’t, and this week Secretary of State Gregg Amore said publicly that he’d be interested, too . Our political analyst Joe Fleming argues that even with his current numbers, McKee might have a path to victory if more candidates enter the primary and deprive Foulkes of a head-to-head contest. But Fleming was candid about the peril McKee faces, particularly as the administration continues to struggle with the Washington Bridge crisis . “The governor is in a difficult position right now,” he said. “He has to come up with something major to try to improve these numbers over the next six to seven months. Up to this point we have not seen that.”