NH-SEN 2022 Megathread: General Dysfunction

[JMT]

https://twitter.com/jdistaso/status/1458735297148112900?s=21

[Sir Mohamed]

TBH, Sununu's decision kind of makes sense if you prefer implementing actual policies rather than become a member of McConnell's caucus with almost the lowest seniority possible. Assuming you win the election you're giving up your current job (he may have been favored, but not a shoe-in).

Several govs have expressed dissatisfaction with becoming a senator in the past as they no longer were in the driver's seat as you typically are. NH doesn't have term limits and he's popular enough to win more terms in office.

[Holmes]

Lean D, you can't beat someone with no one

You can actually. Especially in New Hampshire where nobodies win races for State House all the time.

[Roll Roons]

Lean D, you can't beat someone with no one

You can actually. Especially in New Hampshire where nobodies win races for State House all the time.

I really don't think you can compare a state house race, especially in New Hampshire of all places, to a U.S. Senate race.

[Roll Roons]

https://twitter.com/Politics1com/status/1458844951438102534

Yeah, the GOP clearly has much better targets than New Hampshire...

[Schiff for Senate]

Lean D, you can't beat someone with no one

You can actually. Especially in New Hampshire where nobodies win races for State House all the time.

I really don't think you can compare a state house race, especially in New Hampshire of all places, to a U.S. Senate race.

Yeah, the State House has 400 members and each of them represent some 6,000 people. It's mainly retirees and people who have a side job and are known in the community who run for the House of Representatives. It's exactly nobodies who run for a state legislature where their vote is 0.25% of the total. Now, if it was a New Hampshire State Senate race, that may be a different matter, since there are 'only' 24 of them, but the biggest experience I'd expect a candidate for state representative to have is maybe some city council experience. To be honest it's quite likely in some cases that serving in the state house is actually a step down from serving on city/town council (it depends). But I think the main qualifications for running for New Hampshire House isn't prior experience, but rather, you need to be very well known in the district and have lived there for a while, so you have enough name recognition. This is true for not just the NH State House - it's true for a lot of other state houses of representatives, but it's especially true for NH, which has the largest State House by far (and to add to that it has a very small population when compared to most other states).

[MargieCat]

https://twitter.com/Politics1com/status/1458844951438102534
Yeah, the GOP clearly has much better targets than New Hampshire...

I think Trump's name is written all over Sununu not running.

I also think he was involved in Perdue choosing not to challenge Warnock despite saying he might.

[Schiff for Senate]

All that is fine, but your point of comparison is the TXGOP. They've been there, done that, and much more. I mean, maybe it's got to do with the fact that TX is much bigger and therefore is more important to the media than NH, but I don't see controversial actions the NH legislature/governor have taken cropping up in the news on a regular basis. TX is, as I said, one of the craziest GOP's even otherwise. The NH legislators may be terrible, but they still, no matter what their motivation, have not done nearly as much damage as the TX legislature has.

But I still stand by much of what I said. I'd invite you to name bills the NH legislature have passed that are as terrible in magnitude as TX's. TX has passed terrible bills on masks (schools and businesses), guns, abortion, critical race theory, to name just a few. If you can, name what the NH legislature has done that is as bad on each of those issues. And if you can't (which, quite frankly, I suspect to be the case), you've proven my point that the NH legislature is still much better than TX's.

I was going to ignore this, but you're still condescending to me like you have any sort of idea what you're doing, so here we go:

The main thing is the 2021 state budget, which includes a vague anti-CRT provision and one of the strictest abortion bans in the country (aside from the term). While it's a ban for up to 24 months, it forces ultrasounds before abortions, weakens the life-of-mother exception, and doesn't include exceptions for rape and incest. It also has a similar ban on "divisive concepts" - again - attached to the budget.

The NHGOP has also passed a controversial voucher program that gives away public school funding to private schools. It's based on Betsy DeVos's "education freedom account" policy, and has been radioactively unpopular. Instead of costing $130,000 as advertised, it cost $7 million. It's a massive giveaway that's being balanced on the backs of our towns. (And we haven't even mentioned Sununu nominating Edelblut, a political hack with no education experience like DeVos, as EdSec)

Nothing on voting rights passed this session, but SB3 from 2017 was very, very bad. HB 1264 attempted to change the residency definition, but did little to suppress voting. SB3, however, required new voters to sign a lengthy form to prove their residency. Sununu notably admitted that the law suppressed the student vote, yet signed it into law anyway. His own Supreme Court agreed, unanimously striking it down.

They have also prevented state or local governments, or public facilities, from issuing vaccine mandates.

And that doesn't even get into the Executive Council's $27 million rejection of federal vaccine funding and defunding of Planned Parenthood. The latter is the first time PP has been defunded in 8 years.  

It's funny, because if you actually followed NH politics closely enough to be an expert, you'd know all of these things. I've posted these bills, at length, on multiple occasions and how it would hurt Sununu in a Senate run. I've even done it in this thread! Yet somehow, after our last conversations about NH politics, you're still condescending to me like your entire opinions on my state aren't based on a false assumption.

Fair enough. I should not have doubted the essence of what you said; you are completely correct inthat you know a lot more about NH politics than I do. I apologize again if I came off as condescending, but now that you've provided meaningful examples of far-right bills instead of just saying the NH legislature is as bad as the TX legislature, I believe you. I owe you an apology, but I still stand my what I said: the reason I'm apologizing is because you were right and were able to name multiple examples of the NH legislature passing very right-wing legislation, NOT because you are from NH. Being from NH does of course give you greater knowledge about NH, but I questioned what you said because you made a statement I considered incredulous without providing any evidence whatsoever except for the fact that you are from NH. Having said that, you've now given a lot of evidence. In any case, I apologize again for the language I used in the first post ("delusional" wasn't the right thing to say), and I apologize if you considered what I wrote in my second post to be condescending toward you (most certainly not my intent).

[Roll Roons]

It should also be noted that NH has a very late primary for non-presidential elections, so I wouldn't be surprised if we get a clown car of lower-tier candidates who try to out-crazy each other, causing the eventual nominee to be damaged for the general with little time to recover.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

NH is safe D without Sununu

[2016]

NH State Senate President Chuck Morse is now seriously thinking about running for Senate against Hassan.

This will be Hagan vs Tillis reloaded if Morse runs. Hassan would make this Race about the NH State Legislature while Morse would likely nationalize the Race and make it about President Biden & Congressional Democrats.

[I’m not Stu]

Who wins the primary without Sununu?

[Nyvin]

NH State Senate President Chuck Morse is now seriously thinking about running for Senate against Hassan.

This will be Hagan vs Tillis reloaded if Morse runs. Hassan would make this Race about the NH State Legislature while Morse would likely nationalize the Race and make it about President Biden & Congressional Democrats.

Morse is probably "the" most anti-marijuana politician in NH.   He's also not all that charismatic if you ever heard him talk.  I don't think he's all that good of a candidate.  He runs in a super Safe R district in the southeast.

[2016]

NH State Senate President Chuck Morse is now seriously thinking about running for Senate against Hassan.

This will be Hagan vs Tillis reloaded if Morse runs. Hassan would make this Race about the NH State Legislature while Morse would likely nationalize the Race and make it about President Biden & Congressional Democrats.

Morse is probably "the" most anti-marijuana politician in NH.   He's also not all that charismatic if you ever heard him talk.  I don't think he's all that good of a candidate.  He runs in a super Safe R district in the southeast.

Republicans may not even need New Hampshire. Sure, it would be a nice Bonus to them but they can retake the Senate by winning the 3 Senate Races in the States where Biden won by less than 30K Votes. Biden won AZ by 10,457 Votes, GA by 11,779 Votes and WI by 20,682 Votes. Republicans win all 3, they have the Senate IMO.

That being said if New Hampshire is really close without Sununu or any other high profile Republican running it would pretend bad things for Democrats on November 8th 2022.

NH has 43 % Independent Electorate. Of Course one year can be very long but right now in every Poll we look Indies going against Democrats and if Republicans would win Indies in NH there is no reason to believe that they won't win them elsewhere.

[BigSerg]

https://twitter.com/kerpen/status/1460626655735648258?s=20

[Gracile]

The title is misleading because many people will assume this is about Gov. Sununu when it's actually his brother, the former Senator John Sununu.

[Woody]

The Sununu name and his brother's coattails would carry him through the finish line.

[TML]

The Sununu name and his brother's coattails would carry him through the finish line.

Tell that to incumbent Senator Evan Bayh.

[BigSerg]

The title is misleading because many people will assume this is about Gov. Sununu when it's actually his brother, the former Senator John Sununu.

I assumed this, is this guy popular in NH?

[Woody]

The Sununu name and his brother's coattails would carry him through the finish line.

Tell that to incumbent Senator Evan Bayh.

Well.. if he had the same overperformance Bayh had in 16' he would win.

[Mad Deadly Worldwide Communist Gangster Computer God]

The title is misleading because many people will assume this is about Gov. Sununu when it's actually his brother, the former Senator John Sununu.

I assumed this, is this guy popular in NH?

He hasn't been in the Senate for thirteen years now. He lost to Shaheen in 2008.

[kwabbit]

I think he would be a good recruit. The Sununu name is popular and although he lost in 2008, he wasn’t unpopular. Definitely stronger than any of the Trump crazies.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

John Sununu is definitely weaker than Chris SUNUNU

[Suburbia]

I think he would be a good recruit. The Sununu name is popular and although he lost in 2008, he wasn’t unpopular. Definitely stronger than any of the Trump crazies.

[free my dawg]

Cope