Newfields, New Hampshire – After six months of competitions, Last states to hold primaries Voters in Delaware, New Hampshire and Rhode Island will go to the polls on Tuesday in the 2024 election cycle.
And drawing the most attention is the competitive and fierce gubernatorial primary between Republicans and Democrats in New Hampshire, the race to break through for the Republican Party. Governor Chris SununuJoe is not running for re-election after winning four consecutive two-year terms as governor of the Granite State.
And New Hampshire, a perennial general election swing state, is considered by political pundits to be the only competitive gubernatorial election in the nation this year.
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Chris Sununu, Republican Governor of New Hampshire, is interviewed by Fox News Digital on July 11, 2024 in Newfields, NH (Fox News – Paul Steinhauser)
Leads in polling and fundraising for the Republican nomination Former Senator Kelly Ayotte, A former state attorney general who lost her Senate reelection in 2016 after breaking with former President Trump following the release of the infamous “Access Hollywood” video.
But this year, Ayotte endorsed Trump as he runs to get his old job back in the White House.
What did Ayotte tell Fox News during her New Hampshire campaign trip?
His opponent, former state Senate President Chuck Morse, has highlighted his conservative credentials and his political stability. Support for Trump. But the former President remained neutral in the race.
Ayotte, who received Sununu’s endorsement this summer, told Fox News earlier this year that “the path that Governor Sununu has put us on is one of prosperity, of greater freedom. … I want us to continue on that path. I appreciate his leadership and the work he’s done, and I want to continue his success for this state.”
Former Senator Kelly Ayotte, the front-runner for the Republican gubernatorial nomination in New Hampshire, speaks to voters at the Hampton Beach Seafood Festival on September 7, 2024. (Kelly Ayotte Campaign)
Morse has repeatedly questioned Ayotte’s conservative credentials as a senator and her support for Trump.
“I think there’s a huge difference between me and Kelly Ayotte,” Morse said this summer. “I started out as a conservative, and ended up as a conservative as Senate president, and I promise you, I will be a conservative governor. … Kelly did not do that when she went to Washington.”
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Ayotte hit back at Morse’s attacks, pointing to Morse’s failed bid for the GOP Senate nomination in 2022, and said “I’ve known Chuck for a long time and this is a sad way to end his political career.”
Former New Hampshire state Senate President Chuck Morse, who is running for the Republican gubernatorial nomination, shakes hands with voters at the Milford, NH, Labor Day Parade on September 2, 2024. (Chuck Morse gubernatorial campaign)
The winner of the Republican nomination will face off in an eight-week race for the general election against either former Manchester Mayor Joyce Craig or Cinde Warmington, the only Democrat left. of New Hampshire The Executive Council, which is an elected five-member panel, approves state agency heads, judges, and major state contracts.
Like the Republican gubernatorial primary, the Democrats’ nomination battle has devolved into a war of words.
In a state hit hard by the opioid crisis, Craig recently released an ad criticizing Warmington’s past work as a lobbyist for Purdue Pharma, a drugmaker known for producing the controversial painkiller OxyContin.
Warmington responded with an ad of his own, accusing Craig of launching the attack to distract from his record in leading New Hampshire’s largest city out of crime and homelessness crises.
New Hampshire Democrat Rep. Annie Kuster marches in the Independence Day Parade on July 4, 2022 in Amherst, NH (Fox News – Paul Steinhauser)
There’s something else making headlines in New Hampshire, too: an ugly primary battle in the race to replace the retiring six-term Democrat. Representative Annie Kuster In the 2nd Congressional District, which covers the western half and northern region of the state.
Kuster is backing former staffer and former Executive Councilman Collin Van Ostern, who lost the 2016 gubernatorial election to Sununu by a slim margin.
But Senator Maggie Hassan, Former Gov. and four-term governor John Lynch is backing Van Ostern’s opponent, Maggie Goodlander, a former top lawyer in President Biden’s administration who served as deputy assistant attorney general at the Justice Department and is married to Joe Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan.
Maggie Goodlander and Colin Van Ostern, Democrat candidates in New Hampshire’s 2nd Congressional District, participate in a primary debate in Manchester, NH on June 7, 2024 (NH Today Show)
Goodlander was targeted in the Democratic congressional primary with an attack ad for past donations to “pro-life” Republicans. Accusations of carpetbagger have also been leveled at Goodlander, who was born in the district but has not lived there for decades and, through her husband, is also connected to top national Democrats, including former President Clinton and former Secretary of State and 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.
Goodland has also previously faced criticism for taking a negative stance when a super PAC took aim at Van Ostern in an ad.
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Vikram Mansharamani, who ran unsuccessfully for the 2022 GOP Senate nomination, and Lily Tang Williams, who is making her second straight bid for the congressional nomination, are considered frontrunners in the crowded Republican primary field.
Delaware Delaware also has an open seat race for governor, as Democrat Gov. John Carney is term-limited. Carney, who won three terms as Delaware’s only U.S. House member before serving two terms as lieutenant governor and later winning election and re-election as governor, is running as mayor of Wilmington, the state’s largest city.
Delaware Governor John Carney (Rachel Wisniewski/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Lt. Gov. Bethany Hall-Long, New Castle County Executive Matt Meyer and Collin O’Mara, CEO of the National Wildlife Federation and former state Natural Resources Secretary, are running in the Democratic primary to replace Carney.
Retired police officer Jerry Price, state House Minority Leader Michael Ramone and small-business owner Bobby Williamson are seeking the Republican Party’s nomination for governor.
In addition, primaries are scheduled for the lieutenant governor’s seat and for the state’s U.S. House seat, as Democrat Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester — who made history in 2016 as the first Black person to represent Delaware in Congress — is running to replace fellow Democrat, retiring Sen. Tom Carper.
In the race to replace Blunt Rochester, Democratic state Sen. Sarah McBride is expected to easily clinch her party’s nomination as she takes another step toward becoming the first transgender member of Congress in the deep-blue state.
In Rhode IslandDemocratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse is facing a primary challenge from former Republican gubernatorial candidate Mike Costa.
State Rep. Patrick Morgan is the front-runner for the Republican Senate nomination and will face a tough challenge to defeat Whitehouse in the November general election.
