Salvatore DiMasi was easily elected to his third full term as House speaker yesterday, but ethics questions that have dogged him for months cost him support from some fellow Democrats.
The Boston lawmaker won the votes of 135 Democrats in the 160-member chamber.
DiMasi said he broke with tradition by not asking members of his leadership team to nominate him. One of them, House Majority Leader John Rogers, D-Norwood, has been openly seeking support to succeed DiMasi should he step down, against the speaker's wishes.
State Rep. Robert DeLeo of Winthrop, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, also claims to have the support needed to succeed DiMasi, but both he and Rogers voted in favor of the incumbent speaker.
DiMasi said he was not punishing people like Rogers by bypassing him for a nominating speech. Instead, he said, he was seeking to show the breadth of his support by asking conservative and liberal, black and white, male and female, suburban and urban members to nominate and second his choice.
One of those supporters, state Rep. James Fagan, D-Taunton, said, "We need someone who will do that's right because it is right, not because one media outlet or another proposes it."
All local House Democrats - Rogers, Paul McMurtry of Dedham, and Louis Kafka of Sharon, whose district includes a part of Walpole - voted for DiMasi.
Richard Ross, the Wrentham Republican whose district includes a part of Walpole, voted for Republican Bradley Jones Jr. of North Reading.
Seven Democrats voted "present" instead of supporting DiMasi, including Rep. Thomas J. Calter of North Kingston.
"We need a renewed confidence in leadership and a clear agenda for reform in many areas," Calter said. "I believe that a change in House leadership is needed."
Besides Calter, other Democrats to oppose DiMasi were reps. Jennifer M. Callahan of Sutton, Stephen R. Canessa of Lakeville, John F. Quinn of Dartmouth, Thomas M. Stanley of Waltham and David M. Torrisi of North Andover. Cory Atkins of Concord also voted "present," but she routinely does so in the speaker's race. Democrat Bill Greene of Billerica voted for himself, an alternate form of protest to DiMasi's re-election.
Another seven members, all Republicans, also voted "present" to object to the re-election of Jones Jr. as minority leader over Lewis Evangelidis of Holden.
Some of the Democratic defectors were backers of former House Speaker Thomas Finneran who fell out of grace under DiMasi. But the speaker had appointed Torrisi as chairman of the Labor and Workforce Development Committee. Torrisi now risks losing that post, and a $7,500 chairman's stipend, for openly rebelling against the speaker. Quinn sits on the powerful Ways and Means Committee.
A DiMasi spokesman said at a later date the speaker would announce committee reassignments, and potential leadership changes.
Opposition to a sitting speaker is not unprecedented. In January 2003, Finneran won re-election with just 118 votes. State Rep. Byron Rushing, D-Boston, who challenged him, gained 17 votes. The twist this year was that so many Democrats declined to endorse of DiMasi, at risk to their political careers, when he was unopposed by a fellow Democrat.
DiMasi made light of the defections as he consoled Jones for losing the speaker's race and some support within the Republican party caucus.
"You lost a few votes here and there," DiMasi said from the House rostrum. "It's OK. So didn't I."
DiMasi's troubles stem in part from his relationship with Boston accountant Richard Vitale, who has been indicted by a grand jury on charges of using his friendship with the speaker to benefit ticket brokers seeking to shape ticket-scalping legislation.
On Monday, Vitale succeeded in delaying his arraignment and blocking the release of detailed information in his influence-peddling case until next week.
Other friends of DiMasi are under investigation after allegations they used their friendship with DiMasi to gain payments from a Burlington software company that won a $13 million state contract. Gov. Deval Patrick subsequently canceled that contract.
The speaker has denied any involvement in either activity.
DiMasi was emotional yesterday morning after his fellow Democrats set in motion his re-election as speaker by voting among themselves to support him as their party's nominee for speaker. The vote assured DiMasi's re-election as speaker, since Democrats outnumber Republicans by a 144-16 margin in the chamber.
DiMasi told the Democrats that when he became speaker four years ago, he thought he was assuming a lonely job with little prospect for friendship because he would inevitably disappoint hopeful members at one time or another.
"I found out that I had a lot of friends, and that was important to me, because in this job, you need a lot of friends or at least 81 friends," he said to laughter, alluding the majority needed to win the speaker's post.
