Tierney Ousted From Congress by Political Newcomer Moulton

U.S. Rep. John Tierney, who has represented the North Shore in Congress for the past 18 years, was ousted from the Sixth Congressional District seat by first-time candidate Seth Moulton in the Democratic Party primary Tuesday.

Tierney conceded the race to Moulton in a speech delivered at his election night party.

“It was always about making sure people had opportunity,” Tierney said in the speech.

At the time of the concession, Moulton was leading 49-42 percent.

Moulton had little name recognition and trailed significantly in the polls to start the summer. But in recent months he closed in on the incumbent Tierney,according to the Emerson College Polling Society. Tierney had a 53 point lead in April, 64 to 11 percent, and a 42 point lead in June, 59 to 17 percent.

Moulton is an Iraq war veteran who is a Marblehead native now living in Salem.

In the past two weeks, though, two polls had the race a toss-up and within the margin of error. As polls showed it could be close, both candidates exchanged a high-profile war of words, mostly through TV ads and mailers.

Tuesday was the second close election in less than two years for Tierney, who beat Republican Richard Tisei of Wakefield by a percentage point - about 4,000 votes - in 2012. Tisei is again running for Congress and will meet Moulton in the November general election.

Tierney has represented the Sixth District, which includes much of the North Shore, including Beverly, Danvers, Lynn, Newburyport, Peabody, Gloucester and Salem, since he was first elected in 1996. The district runs from Salisbury and Newburyport in the north to Lynn and Swampscott in the south. From east to west, it stretches from Rockport to Bedford.

Also on the Democrat’s ballot was Marisa DeFranco of Middleton, John Devine of Woburn and John Gutta of Groveland, who all had a combined 9 percent.

Tierney has faced a tough times at the polls since 2001 when his wife Patrice served 30 days in jail after pleading guilty to helping her brother Robert Eremian funnel money from an illegal gambling operation into a Massachusetts bank account and then filed false tax returns on that money. That has been an issue for Tierney’s two Republican challengers - Bill Hudak and Richard Tisei - during Tierney’s past two successful campaigns for reelection, but this year Moulton didn’t raise the issue, even if it was on voters minds.

In 2012, Tierney’s brother-in-law Daniel Eremian told reporters that Tierney had lied, and that Tierney knew everything about the illegal gambling business and that Patrice Tierney was forced to plead guilty in 2010 in an attempt to save her husband’s political career. Patrice Tierney said her brother’s statement was “demeaning” and that it shocked and saddened her “to learn that my brother would say something so utterly false about me and my husband in a moment of desperation and anger.”

Moulton and Tisei with advance to the general election ballot on Nov. 4.