Politics & Government
Tierney Spokesperson: Negative Effects of Redistricting Overstated
A spokesperson for US Rep. John Tierney (D-Mass.) said the effects of redistricting on the congressman's reelection bid are marginal.
A spokesperson for US Representative John F. Tierney played down the negative effects of redistricting on his bid for a ninth consecutive term—in response to an article written on Reading Patch last week—and reiterated that the eight-term legislator from Salem had no knowledge of the illegal gambling business run by his in-laws.
Tierney spokesperson Kathryn Prael pointed out that while it is true that Billerica, Tewksbury and the portion of Andover that joined the 6th Congressional District did vote heavily for Scott Brown last year, President Obama and Sen. John Kerry won the areas by roughly 58 percent, and the addition of the territory only changes the Democratic Performance Index (DPI) by under one percent. The DPI uses voting history to predict the percentage of the vote an average democrat can expect in a given election.
Tierney has faced recent calls from his two GOP challengers to come clean about exactly how much he knew of the Antigua-based illegal gambling venture run by Daniel and Robert Eremian, his wife’s two brothers. The representative's spouse, Patrice Tierney, served 30 days in jail for willful blindness in the filing of false tax returns for Daniel Eremian. During her trial, Patrice Tierney invoked spousal privilege, provoking many to question what Rep. Tierney knew and when.
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According to Prael, the congressman had no knowledge of the illicit undertaking, and no reason to suspect anything.
“During that visit, John saw nothing to contradict Robert’s claim that he was running a legal software licensing business,” she said.
Find out what's happening in Readingwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
Prael also pointed out that Rep. Tierney has never been implicated in this matter and that a federal judge said as much. Federal Judge William G. Young stated from the bench during his wife’s trial that: “he is not implicated in this in any way, shape or form.”
Rep. Tierney faces republican challenger and former state House Minority Leader Richard Tisei, who has had to field questions about his own family’s conduct recently after it was revealed his sister was arrested in Reading on cocaine charges in August, and Tea Party backed republican Bill Hudak—who tried unsuccessfully to unseat Tierney in 2010—in his bid for reelection, and many are predicting the 6th Congressional District to be one of the closest races in the state next November.
