Bush to be GOP State Senate Candidate

Republican candidate Barbara T. Bush is running unopposed in the primary election for the Middlesex, Suffolk and Essex State Senate seat. She will face either Democratic incumbent Sal N. DiDomenico or his challenger Timothy R. Flaherty following the Sept. 14 primary for the state seat.

According to Bush, her political platform rests on three points—lowering taxes to incentivize self-sufficiency, providing more private sector jobs, and encouraging a small, fiscally conservative government to minimize business regulations.

“Lower taxes enable more citizens to have more of their money, which enables businesses to have more money to work with, which will expand business,” Bush said. “I will do whatever I can to ensure that we have laws that people will support and that we spend money wisely—after all, it’s the people’s money.”

Bush, a resident of Charlestown who has lived in both Boston and Cambridge for more than 40 years, decided to run for the Senate after a conversation she had at the Massachusetts Republican Party Headquarters.

“I was getting concerned with the way things were going in the state as well as in the country,” Bush said. “As a result of the conversation, I thought ‘Why shouldn’t I run?’”

“I wanted to do something myself,” she added.

Chairman of the Cambridge Republican City Committee Henry R. Irving said he fully supported Bush’s straightforward platform, noting that she “sticks to basic Republican principles” and “feels the call of public service.”

“I admire her energy and willingness to get out there and put herself forward; it takes a lot of nerve,” Irving said. “She approaches [campaigning] in a sensible way, she’s a good candidate, and I think she has a chance, given Scott Brown and the enthusiasm for conservative values, but time will tell.”

Bush said she considers her lack of political work experience “a big plus,” as it allows to contribute her experiences from working in the private sector. Bush taught high school and middle school in Nigeria as a Peace Corps Volunteer, then worked for 30 years in the mainframe computer industry before retiring in 2002.

Bush’s largely self-run campaign team consists of a close friend’s husband serving as treasurer and various volunteers who help her stuff envelopes. Their biggest challenge in the campaign will be pushing for greater visibility in governance, she said.

“I go knock on doors myself,” Bush said. “I think people want to meet me and not people working for me. I care about what they have to say.”

—Staff writer Nadia L. Farjood can be reached at nadiafarjood@college.harvard.edu.