Don Roach: You Bet Cicilline is Sorry

Don Roach: You Bet Cicilline is Sorry

David Cicilline’s contrition act has finally come to Providence, albeit years too late.

That’s the first thought that came to mind last week when I heard Cicilline apologized for his 2010 statement claiming Providence was in excellent fiscal condition. He said, “I should have been much louder in the consequences of the state cuts and to the extent anything I did contributed to the challenge the city faces, I'm sorry for that and I accept full responsibility for it.”

Notice how he continues to shirk responsibility and blame the state cuts versus accepting the responsibility for his response to the same state cuts every other city and town faced at the time? The apology comes about five hundred days after saying the city was in such great financial shape, it comes about a year after Mayor Tavares considered Providence’s situation a category 5 Hurricane, and it is also after numerous analysts, political hacks, and the general population called upon Cicilline to take responsibility for his role in the city’s finances.

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I guess it took all of that for Cicilline to realize he was wrong OR maybe it was the fact that recent poll numbers have him well behind Brendan Doherty. I’m thinking it was probably the latter.

Cicilline has lost the people’s trust

Is it too little too late for Cicilline? As I have said in the past, Rhode Islanders are very forgiving so we’ll see. Over the next few months Cicilline is going to try to convince voters that they should judge him on his first two years in Congress and not the eight he spent as mayor of Providence. The problem is he has (rightfully) lost the trust of the electorate and he’s facing an opponent in Doherty who doesn’t have the baggage Cicilline carries. That’s going to be very difficult to overcome and what’s worse, Cicilline will have a difficult time portraying Doherty as a rightwing nutjob because he’s about as far from a rightwing nutjob as it gets. Therefore, the Cicilline must have finally realized Cicilline’s dire situation and the need to make amends with an electorate that is fed up with the former mayor’s refusal to accept responsibility for the capital city’s current economic woes.

The timing of Cicilline’s apology could not be better from a political standpoint. The race isn’t quite at the level it will be over the summer and into the fall. There’s time for Cicilline to make the rounds apologizing and turning the conversation towards his exploits in Congress. He can do his spaghetti dinners at senior halls, kiss a few babies at spring pinics, and send out a few e-mail blasts regaling the bad Republicans in Congress. In other words, the apology gives him time to take fallout and pivot onto other topics that don’t hurt him as much.

I am convinced his team hopes to discuss this issue now and make it less of a distraction as the primary and general elections draw closer. It’s a hope but I don’t believe Cicilline’s decisions in Providence won’t be anything but center stage throughout this election. His lapse in addressing the economic pressures brought about not primarily through cuts in state aid, but the economy bottoming out, are legitimate concerns amongst first district voters. That he didn’t take responsibility until well over a year after questions were raised also contributes to people not trusting him.

If Cicilline is truly sorry he will have to accept the fact that he must earn voters' trust. A sound bite apology may help, but it’s a drop in the bucket. Cicilline’s actions over the next few months will demonstrate if the apology was sincere or a political ploy by a desperate politician.