The Love Life Details That Would Destroy a Male Politician — But Haven’t Touched Maura Healey – RedState– redstate.com

Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey is up for reelection next month. Some details of her personal life have drawn far less scrutiny than they likely would have for a male politician in the same position.

Critics argue the media coverage has been noticeably softer, if not outright absent, due to the fact that she is a woman and has been celebrated as the first openly lesbian governor in the United States. As if that is some sort of qualification for the job.

Healey spent roughly a dozen years in a relationship with Massachusetts Appeals Court Judge Gabrielle Wolohojian that ended in 2019, while Healey was still attorney general. A few years later, she nominated Wolohojian to the Supreme Judicial Court, a move the Boston Globe’s editorial board at the time called dreadful on optics grounds and one that raised obvious questions about recusal.

“Surely a smart politician like Governor Maura Healey knows that optics count. And surely she also had to know that the optics around nominating her former longtime partner to the state’s highest court are just dreadful,” the board wrote, though it contends Wolohojian had the qualifications.

Rumors have circulated about the reasons for Healey and Wolohojian’s 2019 split, though none have been confirmed. Regardless of that background, the Globe contends that it’d be nearly impossible for bias not to creep into Wolohojian’s work.