MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) - Vermont’s former Education Secretary Rebecca Holcombe announced Tuesday that she’s running for governor.
Holcombe is seeking the Democratic nomination, raising the possibility that she could face her old boss, Republican Gov. Phil Scott, in the 2020 general election. Scott has not said yet whether he will run.
Holcombe made the announcement in a release posted on a website that went live Tuesday morning. A formal kick-off event will be held later this summer.
She is the first person to declare her candidacy for the Democratic nomination.
Holcombe, 52, of Norwich, served as education secretary for four years under former Democratic Gov. Peter Shumlin. She continued in the position when Scott administration took office in January 2017, but she resigned in March of 2018.
“I joined Governor Scott’s administration because I took him at his word that he was serious about working to make Vermont more affordable and more equitable,” Holcombe said in the statement. “I resigned when I realized that was just talk.”
She also said Scott was pushing for a statewide school-voucher program that she said would “take millions from our public schools and funnel it to private schools that mostly serve privileged families.”
Scott, the Republican in his second, two-year term as governor, has not announced whether he will seek re-election next year. He has no election apparatus in place, said gubernatorial spokeswoman Rebecca Kelley. She did not respond directly to Holcombe’s criticism of the governor.
“The governor is only seven months into his term, so he remains solely focused on his goal to improve the lives of Vermonters by growing the economy, making Vermont more affordable and protecting the most vulnerable,” Kelley said.
In her release, Holcombe said her years at the Education Agency was focused on implementing a state law that requires some single-town school districts to merge with other districts. People in some of those towns felt the law, which is being challenged in court, was an assault on local control.
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