Diehl Switches “Office Sought” to State Senate
After a pair of unsuccessful statewide campaigns, veteran Republican candidate Geoff Diehl of Whitman might now be eyeing a second pass at joining the Massachusetts Senate.
Diehl filed paperwork Monday updating the office sought on his campaign account from governor, for which he challenged last year, to the Senate’s Second Plymouth and Norfolk District.
The potential campaign could be a rematch. While serving as a state representative, Diehl lost to current Democrat Michael Brady of Brockton in a 2015 special election for the Second Plymouth and Bristol Senate District.
Brady continues to represent the district, which is now the Second Plymouth and Norfolk District following the latest decennial redistricting. He cruised to reelection in 2022 over Republican challenger Jim Gordon with nearly 64 percent of the vote.
In 2019, the Senate voted to strip Brady’s $15,000-per-year post as Senate chair of the Public Service Committee because of his conduct during a 2018 drunk driving arrest.
Diehl, who could not be reached for immediate comment Monday, spent four terms in the House. He won a three-way primary for the U.S. Senate in 2018 before losing to U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren in the general election.
The GOP nominee for governor in 2022, Diehl lost to Gov. Maura Healey, receiving nearly 860,000 votes, or about 34.6 percent of all votes cast. He last won a general election in Massachusetts in 2016.
Good luck to him. I think he should have run for his old state rep seat against the self absorbed drama queen who represents that district.