Rebecca Farr
With 8,300 votes from the city of Keene in support of Maggie Hassan, she has officially been declared the Governor of New Hampshire and with that win became the country’s only Democratic woman governor.
A monumental election, especially for Cheshire County Democrats, marks a day in history. At Ramunto’s Pizza on Keene’s Main Street, about 50 locals held the Democratic Watch Party to observe and celebrate election results.
“I oppose a lot of Republican candidates because they want to go back in time,” Concord Attorney Ken Barnes said. “His [Ovide Lamontagne’s] policies on women’s and social issues will take us back to when things were worse for women.”
“Hopefully Maggie will lessen the Bill O’Brien Tea Party. I don’t say that in a partisan way,” Barnes said. “Like I said, I just don’t want to go back in time.”
Also at Ramunto’s, N.H. State Rep. and former Keene State College professor Gladys Johnsen said, “She [Hassan] gets it. She’s raised a family and understands the middle class. She knows about how they function. I think she’s going to follow the lead that Governor Lynch has, but she is also open to new topics like decriminalizing marijuana.”
Johnsen also said she thinks Hassan will help the House of Representatives quite a bit. “Another great woman is Molly Kelly,” she said. Johnsen will return to the state house since her district seat was unchallenged.
Upon Molly Kelly’s arrival to Ramunto’s, speaking over the “Molly! Molly!” chant, the now fourth-term N.H. Senator said she looks forward to working with Hassan and especially fighting for women’s rights. Both Kelly and Hassan seemed to be nowhere short of appreciative of the election results.
“Thank you to the people of New Hampshire for the trust you have placed in me. I will not let you down,” Hassan said at Hassan Headquarters in Manchester Tuesday night on WMUR’s election show. “I will work as hard as I can every day to serve you and to build a stronger, more innovative New Hampshire, where our business can grow, flourish, and create great jobs for our people.”
As a former state Senate Majority Leader and succeeding outgoing Democratic Governor John Lynch, Hassan plans to allow businesses to hang on to their workforce while also relieving workers during the hard times New Hampshire, as well as the United States, have been facing. This program is known as New Hampshire Working.
The new governor hopes to freeze college tuition while strengthening science, technology, engineering and math curriculum to ensure N.H. personnel has the necessary expertise.
While New Hampshire moves forward, the Granite state cannot forget where Hassan’s political career all began. The mother of two received her Bachelor’s degree from Brown University and her Juris Doctorate from the Northeastern School of Law. In 1999, governor at the time, Jeanne Shaheen asked Hassan to serve as an advocate on the Advisory Committee of the Adequacy in Education and Finance Commission. Hassan is also a three-term state Senator and during her six years in office she was chosen by her colleagues to serve as President Pro Tempore in addition to Senate Majority Leader.
With a woman governor on a mission to strengthen New Hampshire, Chair of Cheshire Country Democrats Sam Hawkes said, “I’m very concerned about the war on women. It’s not responding to the very diverse needs of a woman.” Hawkes also described what he sees as the main difference between Republicans and Democrats.
“Republicans in this election are saying the government doesn’t have a place. Democrats say they do and [it’s] a very important place. Not a dominant place, but a partnership of the community, the government, and all society.”