Politics

Secretary of State Bill Gardner returned to New Hampshire Thursday after traveling to Washington earlier this week for his first meeting as a member of the Trump administration's election commission.

Secretary of State Bill Gardner used his opening remarks at the inaugural meeting of the Trump administration’s voting integrity commission to call for closer examination of the value of photo ID laws and other measures that, he says, improve public confidence in elections.

State Senate candidates David Boutin, Republican and former state Senator, Kevin Cavanaugh, Democrat and Manchester alderman, and Jason Dubrow, a Libertarian active in town government in Dunbarton, joined The Exchange to discuss issues important to New Hampshire voters. Voting takes place on July 25. 

Secretary of State Bill Gardner is on his way to Washington to participate in the first official meeting of the Trump administration’s Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity, scheduled for Wednesday.

Governor Sununu's pick to lead a lead a new state department dedicated to economic development had his day before the Executive Council today.

The Governor likes to describe the goal for this new department, which would oversee business development and travel and tourism, as being a "one stop shop" for folks doing business in New Hampshire.

That sounds simple, but it touches areas as diverse as education, housing, and labor policies, all of which can get complicated, as can the business-speak of Sununu's pick to spearhead development efforts, Taylor Caswell.

Governor Chris Sununu has issued his first veto since taking office in January, on a bill aimed to set statewide standards for votes on zoning variances.

Donald Trump Jr. tweeted images of emails regarding his 2016 meeting with a Russian lawyer on Tuesday.

An intermediary said he could connect Trump Jr. with people who had information "that would incriminate Hillary [Clinton]... and would be very useful to your father." 

A legal challenge to the New Hampshire’s plans to share voter data with the Trump administration has been put on hold, pending other legal challenges at the federal level.

On The Exchange, Governor Chris Sununu addressed the uproar over the White House request for voter information and defended his decision not to join an alliance set up by states pledging to uphold the Paris Accord on climate change. He reaffirmed his support for the Northern Pass project and called for a "smart portfolio of renewables," including geothermal.  As for the political dimension of these and other debates,  Sununu had this to say: "I do my best to throw politics out." 

Update: The hearing was postponed Tuesday morning at the request of the New Hampshire ACLU, pending further legal action at the federal level.

One of the first legal challenges related to the Trump administration’s request for state voter files will go before a judge in Nashua Tuesday, as part of a lawsuit filed last week by the New Hampshire ACLU and two state lawmakers.

Former U.S. Attorney Emily Gray Rice will be Manchester’s new interim city solicitor. Rice was officially confirmed Monday by the city’s alderman through a phone poll.

As N.H. Deputy Secretary of State David Scanlan explained on The Exchange, the voter information requested by the Commission on Election Integrity is already publicly available and has been for about ten years -- though there are laws governing who gets access to that voter information, as well as how it is accessed and used.  For election-law attorney Paul Twomey, the Commission's request, in addition to being politically suspect,  does not fall within that legal framework and could lead to major security risks.  

Both Scanlan and N.H. Secretary of State Bill Gardner have seemed somewhat taken aback by the uproar over the Commission's request. Scanlan places some of the blame on a polarized political climate.  Since our conversation, as NHPR's Casey McDermott reports here, the ACLU has joined with two N.H. lawmakers in suing Gardner over his plans to comply with the Trump Administration's request for voter information.

Two state lawmakers are joining the New Hampshire chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union to sue Secretary of State Bill Gardner over his plans to comply with the Trump administration’s request for voter information.

When New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner said he intended to share information from the state’s public voter checklists with a newly launched Trump administration commission, plenty of people were quick to decry the move as an “invasion of privacy.”

Governor Sununu says New Hampshire should turn over public information on voters to a Trump administration voter fraud commission, a view shared by the state's top election official, Secretary of State Bill Gardner. But Gardner says the matter is under review by the Attorney General.

You don’t have to look far for examples of deteriorating civility between opposing sides of the political aisle, in New Hampshire and nationally. But one local lawmaker is pitching a new tradition meant to bring Republicans and Democrats together — by pitting them against each other on the softball field.

Governor Chris Sununu has been busy over the past few days signing more than 30 bills into law including the state’s next two year budget.

Manchester Mayor Ted Gatsas officially kicked-off his reelection campaign Tuesday night. The event was held just as news of how city officials handled a rape at a Manchester high school in 2015 is creating controversy.

In a short speech at the St. George Greek Orthodox Cathedral in Manchester, Ted Gatsas struck an upbeat tone to start his campaign.

“I hope everybody has the ‘I love Manchester’ patch on," said Gatsas, "because that’s what were going to run on this time. About I love Manchester and the great things that are happening in this city.”

Governor Chris Sununu says he remains committed to reforming Obamacare but opposes the plan proposed by Senate Republican leaders.

The governor's opposition comes as the Senate's top Republican says he is pushing off a scheduled vote on the Senate's version of the bill.