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The two Republicans campaigning to be state representative for the 9th Bristol district have a lot in common.
Both Chester Tam and Henry Bousquet say they’re focused on addressing the rising cost of living in Massachusetts. They say they want to lower utility bills by rolling back carbon emissions targets, and reduce local property taxes by increasing state aid. They both support an audit of the Legislature that voters approved in 2024.
The Massachusetts primary election is Sept. 1, with polls open 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.The voter registration deadline is Aug. 22. The vote by mail application deadline is Aug. 25 at 5 p.m. The early voting period is Aug. 22 to 28.
Tam, 51, and Bousquet, 50, both say they were inspired to run partly by the struggles of their Gen Z children, who they say have fewer opportunities to succeed than previous generations.
Republican voters in the 9th Bristol, which includes all of Dartmouth and parts of Ward 1 in New Bedford, will choose between the two candidates in the upcoming state primary on Sept. 1. Whoever wins the Republican primary will face the winner of the Democratic primary, which includes candidates Stephen Medeiros and Edward Pacheco.
It’s an open seat this year because the current representative isn’t seeking another term. Chris Markey, the Dartmouth Democrat who has held the office since 2011, is now running for Bristol County District Attorney.
No Republican has represented the 9th Bristol under its current borders, and Dartmouth hasn’t had a Republican state representative since 1956. But that could change this year. Republican candidates have been gaining popularity on the South Coast, and the 9th Bristol voted for President Donald Trump by a narrow margin of 247 votes in the last federal election.
This campaign season, the local GOP has doubled down on messages around the cost of living and transparency as it pushes to get more Republican lawmakers in the Statehouse.
Where the candidates differ
Tam is relatively new to politics — this is his second run for public office, after an unsuccessful bid to fill a seat on the Dartmouth Board of Health. He said he decided to launch a state House campaign after other Republicans at town committee meetings urged him to run.
“I never saw myself as a politician,” he said. “I’m a career IT guy, always sat in the closet somewhere behind the scenes.”
Tam said he previously worked in information technology for Mass General Brigham, but he was terminated in 2022 because he wasn’t vaccinated against COVID-19. The candidate said his firing didn’t make sense because he was working in a fully remote capacity.
That’s why, if elected, Tam said would take an interest in health policy, advocating for “personal medical freedom.”
“You should be able to choose what you do with your own body with your doctor’s recommendation,” he said.
Mass General Brigham did not respond to The Light’s request to confirm Tam’s employment details. Since leaving the health system, Tam said he has supported his family through investments and a side business developing websites.
Tam said he would also try to help the state “get back to the table” to find common ground with federal regulators on health issues. Massachusetts is issuing its own vaccine guidance after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention rolled back nationwide vaccine recommendations. Tam didn’t back one set of recommendations over the other, but he said both regulators need to review the science together and come up with shared recommendations to avoid confusing the public.
Asked about bills he would want to file, Tam didn’t have an immediate answer. He later texted a proposal to provide more state funding for sewer upgrades to reduce so-called combined sewer overflows that pollute local waters.
As of the latest campaign reports filed in early August, Tam had raised $14,223 for his campaign and had $9,483 cash on hand. Bousquet had raised $8,606 and had $2,422 cash on hand.
Bousquet is more experienced in politics. He represented Ward 3 on the New Bedford City Council from 2011 to 2017, has served on the city’s Election Commission intermittently since 2017, and was one of the frontrunners to fill a vacant School Committee seat earlier this year.
He comes from the restaurant business and currently teaches culinary arts at Greater New Bedford Voc-Tech high school. He said his experiences in the classroom have shaped his views on education policy.
Bousquet said he’s seeing fewer students engaged in class, which he believes is the result of “technology addiction” and a state-mandated lottery admissions system for vocational schools. As a legislator, he said he would try to reverse the 2025 mandate.
Advocates for lottery admissions said merit-based admissions unfairly exclude low-income students, students of color, and English language learners. But Bousquet said that vocational school admissions should be “something to strive for, to achieve” and a lottery isn’t fair to students who work hard to get in.
“It’s not that I’m anti-lottery,” he said. “I just don’t think that that is truly equitable.”
Bousquet said schools, and society in general, should back away from tracking demographic data — such as race and ethnicity — because it “just creates division.”
The candidate’s views on lottery admissions were one reason why Mayor Jon Mitchell pulled his support for Bousquet as a School Committee appointee.
Outside of education policy, a top priority for Bousquet is shrinking the $63.4 billion state budget by cutting spending.
“There is a priority problem at the Statehouse,” he said.
The candidate said the state is “wasting money on illegal immigrants” to the tune of $2 billion. He later cited Google search results pegging the total cost of the state’s emergency shelter system at “well over $1.8 billion” since mid-2023, relying in part on 2025 reports by the Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance and Boston Herald.
The state’s emergency shelter system was stressed by an influx of immigrants in recent years, though the “right to shelter” extended to all families in Massachusetts. Less than half of shelter recipients were new migrants, state data showed in 2025. State officials responded to the crisis in March 2025 by limiting eligibility for the program, including by requiring legal immigration status.
Bousquet said he also opposes spending on renewable energy initiatives, such as developing wind farms and expanding the use of electric vehicles.
Both candidates say they would prioritize reducing local property taxes by increasing state aid. But they had different ideas for where to find more state money.
Tam said he wanted to reallocate revenue collected through the state’s so-called “millionaire’s tax” that currently funds education and transportation. Bousquet said he would seek to increase so-called “payments in lieu of taxes” on state-owned properties — while state-owned land is legally tax-exempt, the state government agrees to make these payments to local governments to make up for the lost tax revenue.
What the candidates agree on
Bousquet and Tam say affordability is top-of-mind for them and voters they talk to.
“I feel like the state is in a death spiral,” Bousquet said. He said he’s concerned about young, educated residents fleeing in search of cheaper living.
Tam said he thought about moving out of Massachusetts a few years ago because of high costs, but decided to stay to avoid uprooting his three kids, who were all in grade school at the time.
Both candidates say they would lower utility bills by cutting ratepayer-funded green energy programs and relaxing or eliminating emissions goals — state law limits carbon emissions to “net zero” by 2050.
They said they favored natural gas and nuclear power over renewable sources as a way to bring down costs, though Bousquet took a harder line than Tam. Bousquet doubted that wind and solar could generate enough power to help the state meet its energy needs. Tam said he was “not saying we shouldn’t go green,” but downplayed Massachusetts’ contributions to global emissions.
Housing costs have also contributed to the high cost of living in Massachusetts. Experts say strict zoning restrictions and building regulations are partly to blame.
The state Legislature has tried to incentivize construction by passing statewide zoning mandates in recent years, and this November’s ballot will include a question about lot size restrictions, but both candidates say they prefer to keep zoning under local control. They both expressed general support for cutting red tape from state regulations that make it harder to build homes.
Both candidates see auditing the Legislature as a path to see “where our money is going” and root out wasteful spending. Residents voted in 2024 to authorize the state auditor to conduct the audit, but the Legislature has resisted. Its leaders argue that the audit would violate the separation of powers.
Tam and Bousquet said the pushback makes them suspicious that lawmakers are “hiding something.”
The candidates acknowledged that they would be joining a Legislature dominated by Democrats, but both said they were prepared to work across the aisle. Tam described himself as an “easygoing” mediator who can listen well and find common ground. Bousquet said it should be easy to work with Democrats on the shared goal of reducing the cost of living for all residents.
Email Grace Ferguson at gferguson@newbedfordlight.org
