Alyson Sullivan wins House seat

By Josie Albertson-Grove
The Enterprise

Abington – Abington Republican Alyson Sullivan defeated former Abington selectman Alex Bezanson to claim her father’s seat in the 7th Plymouth District in Tuesday’s election.

At a victory party at her father’s Abington home, Sullivan said she is looking ahead to the start of the legislative session.

“January’s not going to wait,” she said. “It’s going to be about meeting more folks and getting more involved throughout the district.”

Bezanson conceded shortly after 9 p.m. “We gave it our all,” he said outside a gathering of supporters in Abington.

He attributed Sullivan’s victory to her father Michael Sullivan, who once held the Seventh Plymouth seat.

“Like I said from the beginning, if it hadn’t been Michael Sullivan’s daughter, we’d have done much better”

The race was the first campaign for Sullivan, 30.

Although she does not have experience in elected office, Sullivan has been working as a legal assistant in the Executive Office of Administration and Finance, but will leave the job by the end of the year, she said. She is in her final year at the New England School of Law.

She succeeds Whitman Republican Geoff Diehl, who did not seek re-election to challenge Sen. Elizabeth Warren.

Her father, Michael Sullivan, held the seat from 1991 to 1995. He went on the serve as Plymouth District Attorney and U.S. Attorney.

The Seventh Plymouth seat was once held by Sullivan’s father, Michael Sullivan. He went on to be the U.S. Attorney for Massachusetts District and served in President George W. Bush’s administration as the director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. Michael Sullivan served as the treasurer for his daughter’s campaign.

Bezanson, 62, runs a contracting business in Abington. He spent two decades onthe town’s conservation commission and in 2015 was elected as a selectmen. He served one term, but decided against running again so he could focus on the campaign for state representative.

Both candidates ran on the issue of bringing more state funding to the district. Of particular interest to both was the school funding formula, called Chapter 70. Both Sullivan and Bezanson said that if elected, they would work to change the formula, which they agreed was outdated.