Dan McKee, the Democratic governor of Rhode Island — a small New England state with a strong Democratic tradition that has not elected a Republican governor in over two decades — has lost his party's primary election, becoming the first sitting governor in the United States to lose renomination since 2014 and the first in Rhode Island since 1994. McKee was defeated by Helena Foulkes, a former senior executive at CVS, the Rhode Island-based retail pharmacy giant, in what the Associated Press called on Wednesday.
The central issue driving McKee's defeat was his handling of the Washington Bridge, a major east-west artery connecting Providence and East Providence that carries roughly 100,000 vehicles per day. McKee closed the bridge in December 2023 after inspectors discovered serious structural flaws. By March 2024, authorities had concluded that repairs were not feasible and that the structure would need to be demolished and entirely rebuilt. What was initially projected to be a swift resolution has since stretched into a years-long project, with completion now not expected until November 2028. Foulkes made the governor's management of the crisis a cornerstone of her campaign, accusing him of mishandling both the repairs and public communication around the delays.
The race was also shadowed by a 2024 joint investigation by the state attorney general and state police, which found that McKee had "personally and directly intervened" in the awarding of a multimillion-dollar state contract, though investigators concluded he had not violated bribery or campaign finance laws. The state attorney general subsequently endorsed Foulkes. McKee, for his part, sought to draw attention to Foulkes' corporate record at CVS, pointing to the company's alleged role in fuelling the opioid epidemic. Foulkes outspent McKee by nearly two to one in campaign fundraising, and polls consistently showed her ahead throughout the year.
In her victory speech in Providence, Foulkes pledged a broad, unifying approach to governing. "Tonight, we may have won the Democratic primary for governor, but let me be clear about what happens next: you will have a governor for everyone," she said. McKee, also speaking in Providence, promised to support Foulkes in the November general election. The seat is widely considered strongly Democratic, giving the primary winner a significant structural advantage in the autumn contest.
The result was not the only upset of the night. In Providence, David Morales, a 27-year-old democratic socialist backed by Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont and multiple labour unions, defeated incumbent mayor Brett Smiley in the Democratic primary. Together, the two results signal a broader mood of anti-establishment discontent in the state, even if — unlike many insurgent victories elsewhere this cycle — McKee's defeat was driven less by ideology than by a concrete governance failure that affected tens of thousands of commuters every day.