In organizing a State House ceremony for Tuesday to mark the sixth anniversary of Sept. 11, 2001, planners said yesterday they never envisioned they would set off a political firestorm by not inviting Jim Ogonowski, whose brother was killed in the attacks and who is now engaged in a heated race as he seeks to become the state's first Republican congressman in more than a decade.
Ogonowski, who has been a speaker at the ceremony the past four years, was not asked to come back. However, added to the program as the keynote speaker was Martin Meehan, a former US representative whose wife is chairing Democrat Niki Tsongas's campaign against Ogonowski...
Governor Deval Patrick did not get involved in putting together this year's program, according to a spokesman, and left the planning up to the Massachusetts 9/11 Fund, a Boston-based nonprofit that had a secondary role in the previous anniversary ceremonies. Still, Patrick, who will be speaking at the event, spent several hours last week walking the streets of Lowell shaking hands and imploring voters to support Tsongas.
Patrick's chief of staff, Doug Rubin, was a political consultant for Tsongas before joining Patrick's staff in April. The spat was first reported by the Boston Herald yesterday.
UPDATE: More from the Globe, Hub Politics and Red Mass Group.
SECOND UPDATE: More from Scott Allen Miller and Jon Keller.