John Robitaille

John Robitaille ( /roʊbɨˈtaɪ/ roh-bə-TY; born August 14, 1948 in Central Falls, Rhode Island) was the Republican party nominee in the 2010 election for governor of Rhode Island, which he lost to independent candidate Lincoln Chafee on November 2, 2010.

Background

Robitaille graduated from North Attleboro High School in 1966 and from Providence College in 1970 with a Bachelor of Sciences in Business Management. At Providence Robitaille was a member of the ROTC, and Pershing Rifles. He continued his education at the University of Utah from 1974-1976 with a Masters of Sciences in Human Resource Management.

John Robitaille was born in 1948 in Central Falls and was the second of the three children of Roland and Alice Robitaille. They were Catholics who traced their ancestry back to French Canada. The Robitaille family moved to North Attleboro when John was six years old.

Personal life

Robitaille lives in Portsmouth, Rhode Island with his second wife Lynda. He has three children from his first marriage and five grandchildren.

Career

Military service

Robitaille served the United States Army as an officer from 1970-1976. He was recognized for distinguished performance as the most outstanding second lieutenant commissioned in the US Army through the ROTC program nationally. He was a paratrooper where he served in Germany with the First Armored Division and later with Headquarters Special Forces Command at Ft. Bragg where he was promoted to the rank of captain.

Private sector

After his armed service, Robitaille worked in the realm of labor and employee relations. From 1976-1981 Robitaille worked as an Employee Relations Manager for Frito Lay. Next, from 1981-1986 he worked as an Area Manager in Labor Relations for Continental Can Company. After, from 1985 to 1987, Robitaille worked for in the public relations and communications industry as the General Manager for Total Communications. In April 1987, Robitaille founded his own small business. He was the President and CEO of Perspective Communications Group in Middletown, Rhode Island. In 2008 Robitaille left the company to work for Rhode Island governor, Donald Carcieri where he served as his Senior Advisor of Communcations.

Gubernatorial candidacy

Robitaille first became involved in Rhode Island electoral politics in 2006 when he ran for State Representative but lost by four votes to Amy Rice (D-RI). In December 2009, Robitaille announced his decision to run for Rhode Island governor as a Republican. He has since resigned his position as Senior Advisor of Communications for Governor Carcieri in order to campaign full time. Again he was involved in another close race. Robitaille moved from consistently placing in third place in pre-election polls to an election night where at moments during the count he was the high vote getter. According to the state of RI the results in the race for governor, with 100% of the precincts reporting, were Lincoln Chafee (Independent) with 123,398 votes (36.1%), Robitaille (Republican) with 114,761 votes (33.6%), Frank Caprio (Democrat) with 78,776 votes (23.0%), Kenneth Block (Moderate) with 22,116 votes (6.5%), Joseph Lusi (Independent) with 1087 votes (0.3%), Todd Giroux (Independent) with 880 votes (0.3%), and Ronald Algieri (Independent) with 792 votes (0.2%).