Is the NH GOP's Old Guard Eating Its Young?

If anyone thought the New Hampshire Republican establishment had been asleep of late, they thought wrong.

Political heavyweights including former governors Steve Merrill and Craig Benson, Senate President Chuck Morse, state Senate Majority Leader Jeb Bradley, Executive Councilor Chris Sununu, and others lined up to support businessman Walter Havenstein’s run for governor even though Andrew Hemingway, a noted Young Republican who barely lost the NH GOP chairmanship to Jennifer Horn last year, has been in the race for months.

One aspect of Hemingway’s candidacy that is appealing to some in the Grand Old Party is the fact that he is young, a fresh face, who has pulled together a broad coalition of support at a time when every Republican in the country readily admits that it needs to appeal to women and young people in order to win elections.

So Patch asked the obvious question: Is the old guard eating its young by backing Havenstein and what does the candidate think of Hemingway?

Benson and Merrill both grimaced and giggled when hearing the question but Havenstein said he had “no problem” with Hemingway running and would support him if he won the nomination and hoped he would do the same.

Hemingway, in a statement, welcomed Havenstein to the race, saying he looked forward to “a lively debate on the issues that matter most to New Hampshire citizens,” adding that it was no time for the status quo.

“We can no longer go back to the same old recycled concepts politicians have used in the past,” Hemingway said. “Let’s get creative and put New Hampshire on stronger footing.”