Boston, MA – Barney Frank Easily Wins Re-election

Boston, MA – US Representative Barney Frank, the powerful House committee chairman and influential Democrat, easily won re-election today after holding off a challenge from Republican Sean Bielat.

After a scare, Frank surged to victory, winning 61 percent of the vote to Bielat’s 36 percent, with 62 percent of precincts reporting, according to the Associated Press.

Through 15 elections as a candidate for Congress, Frank has survived charges of carpetbagging, two rounds of redistricting, and a personal scandal that nearly doomed his career. This time, he battled economic instability, voter unrest, and the rise of the Tea Party.

Frank’s geographically and economically diverse Fourth District stretches from Brookline and Newton down through Taunton to New Bedford and part of Fall River. He arrived in Massachusetts more than half a century ago to attend Harvard. The whip-smart, wise-cracking, and perpetually disheveled son of a New Jersey Turnpike truck-stop operator soon drew notice as a top aide to Boston mayor Kevin White and Congressman Michael Harrington, before winning election in 1972 to the first of four terms as a state lawmaker.

Bielat, a 35-year-old Marine Corps reservist and businessman, is a political newcomer. He grew up in Rochester, N.Y., and now lives in Brookline. He served as a congressional page and earned a bachelor’s degree from Georgetown before serving as an active-duty Marine Corps officer. He later earned master’s degrees in public policy and business administration and worked as a management consultant for McKinsey & Co., as a program manager on defense projects for iRobot, and as an independent consultant.