Guest MINDSETTER™ Warren Tolman: Candidate for Attorney General

Monday, September 01, 2014

Warren Tolman, GoLocalWorcester Guest MINDSETTER™

Warren Tolman

This race for Attorney General is about leadership. Massachusetts needs an Attorney General who will lead on important issues like gun violence, the scourge of opiate abuse, and campus sexual assault. I will utilize the powers of the Attorney General's Office to aggressively tackle these challenges that families across the Commonwealth face every day. As Attorney General, I will be a leader in pushing progressive public policy and standing up to powerful special interests.

My father was a union railroad conductor and my mother was a telephone operator. My family started in a Boston housing project and moved over to Watertown where I went to public school. As the seventh of eight kids, I was the first in my family to graduate from college, heading to Amherst College and Boston College Law School. My parents taught me to stand up for what I believe in, work hard and listen. I have made these lessons guiding principles in my life and career.

As a state legislator for eight years, I took on powerful special interests and won. I took on Big Tobacco at the height of their power because they were preying on young kids. I authored a significant domestic violence law which is still saving lives. I led the fight to get money out of politics and authored the last major campaign finance and ethics reform to pass on Beacon Hill. I’m ready to take on the NRA to reduce gun violence, lead colleges and universities in addressing campus sexual assault, and use all of the powers of the office to combat opiate abuse.

I am the only candidate, Democrat or Republican, willing to use the Attorney General’s Office to mandate smart gun technology on all new guns sold, something the Attorney General can do under existing state law. Every hour of every day somewhere in America, a young child suffers a gun injury. It has been 18 months since Newtown. We've seen 74 school shootings and 52,000 deaths to gun violence since then. I won’t wait any longer to take action to prevent gun violence.

As a father of two daughters, I am deeply concerned about campus sexual assault, as statistics show that a young woman is more likely to be the victim of sexual assault if she goes to college than if she doesn't. I won’t wait to protect our students, and I will bring together colleges and universities to develop best practices to ensure that our campuses are safe.

I will take direct action to stem the epidemic of opiate overdose and abuse. As Attorney General, I will enforce mental health parity to ensure access to mental health and substance abuse treatment, so we can find beds for those who need them. I will stand up to Big Pharma and push for opiates to be sold in tamper-resistant form. I will improve education and outreach about the dangers of opiates and hold doctors accountable for over-prescribing.

I will build a multicultural, multilingual Attorney General’s Office to reach out to residents, bringing the office into our neighborhoods to protect consumers from unscrupulous merchants. Consumers need to know that they have a resource, no matter where they live or what language they speak, and I will be that fighter, standing in your corner.

As your next Attorney General, I will be a progressive, proactive leader, using the power of the office to protect our communities and fight for our families. I ask for your vote in the September 9th Democratic primary for Attorney General so that I can continue to fight for the progressive ideals we share.