James Fieseher went to the Dover Democrat’s Gubernatorial Forum on Tuesday to figure out who he would support in the Democratic primary for the next governor of New Hampshire.
The retired doctor and Dover resident is leaning towards one of the two women in the race , former mayor of Manchester Joyce Craig and Executive Councilor Cinde Warmington. While policy, particularly healthcare, is important to him, he said he’s looking for the “total picture.”
“How are they going to appeal to independents? Because that’s what’s going to make the difference in the race,” said Fieseher. “What are they looking for? Some emotional qualities, they’re looking for, is this somebody who’s a good speaker, who’s going to keep their attention?”
One way to sum up what he’s looking for, Fieseher said, is who is the most electable candidate: who can beat their Republican opponent and win the governorship in November. Voters like Fieseher are looking at this “electability” factor in part because the two leading candidates have very similar stances on Democrats' top issues. Their top priorities include the housing crisis, reproductive rights, and strengthening public education. They both say they will refuse to sign an income or sales tax, and they both want gun violence prevention laws.
“You would have to be a Democrat who has gone over their records with a fine-tooth comb, I think, to make some sort of distinction between the two,” said Dante Scala, a professor of politics at the University of New Hampshire. With such similar agendas, Scala said that primary voters’ decision may come down to factors like name recognition and notions of electability.
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Newmarket restaurant owner Jon Kiper is also running for governor, and he differs from the two leaders in a few ways. He’s a man with no background in politics, he supports a sales and income tax, and he does not go as far in the gun violence prevention measures he supports. But Kiper trails the candidates in funding , having raised about $37,000 compared to Craig’s about $2.3 million and Warmington’s $1.8 million, as well as in the polls .
“I think he’s got a future in the party, but it’s not yet,” said Dover resident Jim Verschueren of Kiper. “Either one of the other two, I think we've got a great shot of getting back the governorship.”
The candidates are running to succeed Gov. Chris Sununu, who has been governor since elected in 2017 and is not seeking a fifth term . He flipped the seat to red from now US Sen. Maggie Hassan, D-NH.
More: Morse all in on Trump, spurned by Gov. Sununu endorsing Ayotte in NH governor's race
Who has the right kind of 'executive experience?'
Verschueren is leaning towards voting for Warmington in the primary because of her executive experience and her strong speaking ability.
“I really think that her Executive Council experience sets her up better to run the state government, because she knows everybody, I mean she’s been working with every department head, pretty deeply for a long time,” he said. “And she’s shown herself to be a real fighter for what she believes.”
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Verschueren wasn’t alone: Shawn Lee, also a Dover resident, also mentioned executive experience as the reason why he was leaning towards Warmington. But this idea of “executive experience” is something used by both candidates to make their case.
“I have the executive experience going into this job as governor, so leading the largest city in the state, implementing evidence-based programs, taking on the tough fights and delivering for residents,” said Craig. “The executive experience I have as mayor is similar to the executive experience as governor.”
Craig’s arguments for her case often revolve around her experience as the mayor of New Hampshire’s largest city. She was elected the first female mayor of Manchester in 2017 and served until 2024. While in office, she said she addressed the housing crisis with 2,000 housing units in development, reduced violent crime by 40%, brought new jobs into the city, and supported the largest Planned Parenthood in the state.
Warmington, on the other hand, tends to emphasize her experience across the state.
“I have represented eight out of our 10 counties in our state, so I really understand the issues of our state statewide. The issues in our state are very different in urban areas than they are in rural areas, very different in Cheshire County than they are in Coos County and than on the Seacoast,” said Warmington. “I also have already worked in the executive branch of government. This job of executive councilor is truly four years of on-the-job training to be governor.”
Warmington has served as an Executive Councilor since 2020 and represents District 2, a fifth of the state that includes Grafton, Merrimack, Sullivan, and Cheshire counties. As the lone Democrat on the five-person body, she is the only member to have consistently voted for funding for Planned Parenthood and said she has worked with the other councilors to get funding for things like mental health resources and sexual education programs for vulnerable youth in New Hampshire.
Name ID and electability
In primary races, which usually see lower voter turnout, name recognition can play a big role. But neither of them can claim much of that, Scala said. Not many people know what the Executive Council is and while Warmington may be known in her district, “that’s a far cry from having statewide name ID.” Craig was the mayor of New Hampshire’s largest city, but Manchester “isn’t that large.”
Whoever wins the nomination will face the Republican nominee and if it’s former U.S. Sen. Kelly Ayotte, who is leading in the polls against former State Senate President Chuck Morse, the name ID factor will be particularly important as she is well known from her time in Congress. In that way, name recognition connects to electability.
More: Ayotte and Morse seek Republican nomination for NH governor: What voters need to know
“If one is better known to Democratic primary voters than the other, my guess is that will help with the electability question, because I think voters tend to transfer that,” Scala said. “It's like, ‘Okay, I've heard of one, but not really the other. Therefore, I'm going to automatically default and say, well, I assume this person is better known, so she probably has a better shot than the other person.’”
Electability is especially important to Democratic primary voters who want to take back the governorship for the first time since 2017.
“When I became mayor of Manchester, I beat a popular incumbent Republican mayor, and I was the first Democrat elected since 2003,” said Craig. “I know what it takes to win tough elections, and I'm the only candidate who flipped a seat from red to blue, and I'm telling you right now, I'm going to do it again.”
![https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?url=4TN6bu_0uzzBd6V00](https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?type=thumbnail_580x000&url=4TN6bu_0uzzBd6V00)
Warmington said the reactions from members of the New Hampshire Republican Party like Sununu and GOP chair Chris Ager to her candidacy “have made it clear” that they don’t want to run against her, suggesting that she is the more dangerous opponent. Sununu, she said, called her a “formidable opponent.”
“I do think that my opponents would like for this race to be about homelessness and drugs and crime in Manchester, and if that is the case, I am very concerned about the race,” she added. “But if I am the nominee, this race will be about reproductive freedom, public education, mental health, childcare and affordable housing.”
Homelessness and opioids: The electability attacks
Warmington’s allusion to Manchester’s homeless population and problems with opioids is part of what Scala called an “X factor.” He described a Warmington ad that flashed to pictures of Manchester.
“I'm curious whether she tries to make the city itself and Craig's tenure as mayor, tries to cast that in a more explicitly negative light over the next month, and tries to make the case like, Craig's unelectable because Kelly Ayotte is going to make the City of Manchester a campaign issue,” he said.
On the other side, a similar argument could be made against Warmington, as she has faced criticism for her past defenses of OxyContin as a lobbyist for Purdue Pharma.
Craig said that people should look at her results in Manchester, like bringing the National Alliance to End Homelessness into Manchester and other work she did to address homelessness in Manchester. Warmington told Seacoastonline earlier this year that the attacks on her are “attacks launched by Joyce Craig as a distraction to not be talking about opioid problems in Manchester” and, in an ad released in June, she discusses her own father’s substance use disorder.
But those electability-related arguments are resonating with supporters. Verschueren said that at first, he thought Craig would be the better candidate because of her experience as the mayor of Manchester. But now, he’s not sure “her Manchester case is so strong.”
State Sen. David Watters, D-Dover, on the other hand, has endorsed Craig, emphasizing what he sees as her successful record on the opioid crisis in Manchester.
“One of the issues I've been most interested in is substance use disorder, and particularly the opioid crisis,” Watters said. “[Craig] has never taken a dime from pharma and from the companies that are responsible for all the deaths in our state for opioids. And I think that distinguishes her entirely from the great vulnerability that another candidate who's running for Democrats who I think that is just a millstone around the neck of that candidacy. And unfortunately, we gotta win.”
This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Democratic voters in NH weigh electability and name recognition in primary for governor
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