Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey is expected to seek a second term next year. In the meantime, some state Republicans are kicking the tires ahead of the gubernatorial contest in 2026. WAMC spoke with a local state senator who says he’s “taking a look” at the race himself.
For over a decade, Peter Durant has represented part of Central Massachusetts in the legislature, mostly as the 6th Worcester’s House representative before winning a special election for the Worcester & Hampshire State Senate seat in 2023.
He won the seat again in 2024 and currently serves as the senate’s Assistant Minority Leader – advocating for matters along the way such as getting support for homeowners stuck with faulty concrete in their foundation or repealing the state’s recently-passed gun bill.
Now, he’s mulling a run for statewide office.
“We're taking a look at the race and we are certainly open to it,” he told WAMC, affirming a story first reported by WBUR. “For me, it's kind of come about through just in the past 14 years, but really, the past two years of running for this state senate seat and being more involved in statewide issues, and in seeing the direction that we're heading in.”
The Spencer Republican, whose district includes much of rural Worcester County, as well as Ware in Hampshire County, says he and his team will be spending the next few months seeing which way the wind blows.
Reports, such as one from the Boston Herald, suggest Mike Kennealy, the state's former housing secretary during the Baker administration, is also weighing a run. The Herald also reports a petition has been going around, calling on Worcester County Sheriff and Republican Lew Evangelidis to run himself.
In Durant’s case, the senator tells WAMC one of his biggest motivators is the state’s rising cost of living.
“We're coming into a period where we have extreme income inequality here in Massachusetts, and what that means is that, in order to live in Massachusetts, you're going to see that you either have to be rich to live here or you're going to have to be subsidized in order to live here,” he said in a phone interview. “And so, we're seeing that our state is losing 50,000 people per year. Think about that. 50,000 people are speaking with their feet and leaving Massachusetts for greener pastures. And they're not all heading to Florida for warm winters - they're heading to lower cost-of-living states and it’s because we have such a challenge here.”
Outmigration has been an ongoing issue for Massachusetts, worsened by the pandemic.
Citing Census Bureau data, a 2023 Boston University study indicated annual, net domestic migration hit nearly 57,000 people in 2022, though that number's come down every year since, including 39,000 in ’23 and, according to the UMass Donahue Institute, 27,500 outmigrants by 2024.
The Boston University study found housing and income tax levels were among the top three factors that contribute to outmigration. Looking at 2022 figures, it also found 52 percent of outmigration cases involved moves to other states in New England.
For context, Massachusetts has, for the most part, continued to see its overall population grow over the years. The Healey administration has also been making attempts at tackling cost of living issues –including a billion-dollar-tax relief package approved in 2023, with massive housing bond and economic development bills signed into law a year after that, among other measures and legislation.
Durant acknowledges those actions, but from his point of view, the timing has not been great. One example he gives includes Healey’s handling of the state’s overburdened emergency assistance programs – something he’s been a fierce critic of.
“What I see is a governor who's relatively disengaged and, oftentimes, isn't even making good or bad decisions, but is making no decisions until the absolute worst time to start making them,” he said. “And so, we see that this shelter crisis, for example, has been a problem that we've been talking about for two years now, and she hasn't made a lot of really tough decisions until maybe just recently, as we start talking about her reelection, as we start talking about what's going to happen in ’26. All of a sudden, maybe some decisions are being made.”
The senator has previously called for the state’s Right to Shelter law to be revisited. It’s been at the center of Massachusetts accepting and finding shelter for thousands of residents as well as migrant families that arrive in the Commonwealth, running up to a billion dollars in annual costs.
The governor’s already implemented and proposed a number of policy changes over the past year, including limitations to stays in the shelter system, though Durant contends that’s not enough.
In the meantime, with a new session underway, Durant adds he remains focused on what’s to come in the legislature, and has indicated he plans to decide on a run sometime this spring.