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Nutter and Evans endorse Williams for governor (Updated)

State Senator Anthony Williams, left, with Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter before Nutter endorsed Williams for governor on Thursday. State Representative Dwight Evans, who also endorsed Williams, is at back.

PHILADELPHIA—Mayor Michael Nutter and state Representative Dwight Evans both threw their support behind Democrat Anthony Williams’ nascent gubernatorial bid, giving the state Senator the backing of two of the city’s top political leaders.

The endorsements, delivered after all three took a tour of labs at the business-incubating Science Center here, came a couple months after Williams unexpectedly started making noise about a run, and with less than two months before primary voters go to the polls. In the short time he’s been in the race, Williams has quickly built up a staff and raised money at a pace that’s turning heads.

Nutter described Williams as “a great public servant” and a “very good friend.”

“But for the efforts of Senator Anthony Williams, the city would not have been successful last year in our efforts to stabilize our financial situation,” Nutter said.

Evans, who chairs the state House Appropriations Committee, called Williams “someone who will call it like they see it … and not just pander to people.”

Even before the three elected officials took the podium, one of Williams’ rivals, Montgomery County Commissioner Joe Hoeffel, had questioned why Nutter would endorse someone whose positions on school vouchers is well known.

“I understand the realities of Philadelphia politics,” Hoeffel said in a statement. “But I am surprised that the Mayor would support a candidate whose primary goal, shared by his principal funders, is to use public money for private school vouchers. I believe that using tax dollars for private school vouchers would greatly weaken public education and would be a direct threat to the Philadelphia and Pennsylvania public schools.”

In responding to Hoeffel’s comments, Evans and Nutter both reiterated their longstanding opposition to school vouchers, but said that didn’t change their support for Williams.

“I’m not going to allow that to be some wedge between us,” Nutter said.

And Williams pushed back against what he said were attempts to “box” him into a narrow position. He emphasized that he supports the “full menu” of choices for public education, and argued that he has a longer record of increasing funding for public education than anyone else in the race.

“I guess that Mr. Hoeffel and other will try and put me in a box,” he said. Reading a letter from teachers, Williams said “public school teachers understand that choice is not a threat to them.”

See a video clip of Nutter’s endorsement below.

March 25, 2010 at 11:15 am

--Dan Hirschhorn

Tags: Anthony Williams, Joe Hoeffel

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