Rhode Island Gov. Dan McKee has lost his Democratic primary, making him the first elected governor since 2014 to be denied re-nomination by his own party.
McKee, 73, fell to former CVS executive Helena Foulkes, 62, in a rematch of the state’s 2022 Democratic gubernatorial primary, which the incumbent had narrowly won. The result came Tuesday, with Foulkes projected to prevail by a commanding margin that reflected deep voter frustration with the incumbent’s tenure.
The governor’s approval rating stood at a dismal 24% last month, according to a University of New Hampshire poll that also showed Foulkes with a 38-point lead. That collapse in public standing traced directly to the nearly three-year partial closure of the Washington Bridge, which spans the Seekonk River and connects Providence to eastern suburbs and Massachusetts. The structure also serves as a critical summer artery for travelers heading to Cape Cod.
McKee ordered the bridge shut down in 2023 over safety concerns, and the pace of construction work became the dominant issue of the campaign. The incumbent sought to defend his record in a campaign advertisement, arguing, “The Washington Bridge was a disaster. I shut it down to keep us safe, secured federal funding and we’re on pace to complete the bridge ahead of schedule.”
Foulkes seized on the same project to define McKee’s administration as dysfunctional. During a fiery debate last month, she described the bridge as “a poster child for mismanagement” under the governor’s watch. The challenger, whose grandfather Thomas Dodd and uncle Chris Dodd both represented Connecticut in the Senate as Democrats, channeled broader public exasperation over costs and delays into a populist critique of state government.
“People feel like state government just works with a powerful few,” Foulkes said. “They don’t think it’s working for them.”
McKee responded by casting Foulkes as an out-of-touch corporate elite who had ignored the opioid crisis during her 25 years at CVS. “The option here is somebody who wants to buy this state office who doesn’t have any credibility with their policy thoughts and someone like myself, who has a strong record in terms of working people,” he told the outlet.
The personal attacks failed to reverse the governor’s political fortunes. McKee becomes the first elected governor to lose a primary since Neil Abercrombie, a Democrat from Hawaii, suffered the same fate in 2014. The last sitting governor of any kind to be denied re-nomination was Jeff Colyer, a Kansas Republican who ascended from lieutenant governor following Sam Brownback’s resignation only to lose his primary in 2018.
Foulkes now advances to the general election as the Democratic standard-bearer, having transformed a narrow 2022 defeat into a decisive victory built on infrastructure grievances and an anti-establishment message.