Allen Waters, a former Republican, Democrat, and now independent, is running for Providence mayor with a focus on classical liberalism and fiscal conservatism.
Republican-turned-Democrat-turned-Republican-again-and now independent Allen Waters, 70, is making his first run for the Providence mayor. (Courtesy of Waters for Mayor)
A new video from Allen Waters has officially launched his fifth election campaign in seven years. This time around, he’s running not as a Democrat or Republican, but as an independent.
And instead of a congressional bid, the frequent and familiar face in Rhode Island elections has entered Providence’s mayoral race.
But that’s not all. Unlike in past years when Waters granted few interviews and even skipped candidate debates, he’s brought on a campaign manager, Christopher Olean, who sent five pages on the candidate and his positions in response to questions from Rhode Island Current.
“AW has never had real representation or true campaign infrastructure, until now,” Olean, who works for consultancy The 401 Group, said via email Wednesday. Upgrading Waters’ political machinery this time around, Olean added, “has blown the doors wide open on what is possible for his campaign.”
November’s mayoral race has already begun to shape itself around the outcome of a somewhat heated primary between Democratic incumbent Mayor Brett Smiley and his challenger, state Rep. David Morales.
Waters — a Republican-turned-Democrat-turned-Republican-again who now frames himself as an independent shaped by classical liberalism — is asserting a “Providence First” ethos for his campaign, and hoping to set itself apart from the city’s blue milieu.
The campaign video uploaded Feb. 6 shows the 70-year-old resident of Providence’s West End narrating from the Pedestrian Bridge off South Water Street.
“I’m a financially conservative candidate and will hunt out the fraud, waste and abuse that damns our citizens,” Waters says in the video, the frozen Providence River behind him. “I will stand as a pillar of freedom of speech and freedom of ideas in the Providence marketplace.”
Board of Elections paperwork from July 2025 shows Water filed as a Republican for the mayoral role. Olean said Wednesday that the campaign is currently “looking over paperwork and options to make the change.”
Whatever the ultimate label attached to Waters’ campaign, the candidate has expressed a clear dissatisfaction with the longstanding liberal Democratic order in Providence and in Rhode Island at-large.
I will stand as a pillar of freedom of speech and freedom of ideas in the Providence marketplace.
– Allen Waters, Providence mayoral candidate
“Waters sees classical liberalism rooted in individual liberty, natural rights, limited government, the rule of law, free markets, and the protection of property and speech as the philosophical antidote to Providence’s one-party decay,” Olean wrote.
Providence has not elected a Republican mayor since 1978, when Vincent “Buddy” Cianci’s mayorship won a second term. Prior to Cianci, Providence’s last Republican mayor held office in 1939. Cianci himself later rebranded as an independent, and remained so when reelected in 1991, thereby making him the city’s last independent mayor.
Mayoral campaigns like Zohran Mamdani’s successful bid to lead New York City have embraced leftism — an outside framework that has already been applied to Morales’ campaign.