Baker stands by his brand of republicanism

Colin A. Young
State House News Service

Presented Sunday with a handful of things that are a bit out of the ordinary for a Republican governor — being sued by conservative groups, coming under fire from the right, polling better with Democrats than with the GOP — Gov. Charlie Baker said he thinks the people of Massachusetts understand his style of politics even if a traditional label doesn’t apply. “I think the criticisms about, about my politics, are just that, they’re political criticisms and people, I think, in Massachusetts — I mean, I’ve been in this job now for five years, many of them have seen me on TV more times than they probably care to — and I think they’ve got a pretty good sense of what my brand of Republicanism is about,” Baker said during an interview with Jon Keller on WBZ-TV. Keller had asked Baker, “aren’t you, right now, the very definition of a RINO, Republican in name only?” Baker referenced two Republican governors he learned from — Govs. William Weld and Paul Cellucci — and said he believes in “a pragmatic approach to governing, wherever you can, relying on the best data, and the best advice you can get and then making the decisions you think make the most sense.” As the interview ended, Keller asked Baker — who did not vote for President Donald Trump in 2016 — whether he would consider voting for Democrat Joe Biden in this fall’s presidential election. The governor declined to say whether he would consider voting for Biden. “I’m worrying about what matters most to voters here in Massachusetts right now and what worries most voters in Massachusetts is jobs, the economy, and the virus, and the civil justice stuff and that’s really been where our focus has been,” he said.