Libertarian-Democrat leader challenges Republican John Coughlin for Hillsborough County Attorney
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Oct. 31—A Free State Project supporter running on both the Democratic and Libertarian tickets is challenging incumbent Republican John Coughlin to be the top prosecutor in Hillsborough County.
Nicholas Sarwark, 43, former committee chairman of the national Libertarian Party, orchestrated a write-in campaign in the Democratic Party primary this past September. He received 1,023 votes, which landed him a spot on the Democratic ticket.
Coughlin, who also tried to get on the Democratic ticket, received 98 votes.
"The vote totals show my approach to criminal justice — a focus on violence and property crimes — aligns more closely with the Democratic Party than it appears to align with the Republicans," Sarwark said.
Sarwark, 42, lives in Manchester. He runs a political consulting company, Wedge Squared Strategies. He has experience in criminal law, working for five years as a public defender in Colorado.
The election will decide whether Coughlin will continue as Hillsborough county attorney. The Republican was elected two years ago, ending two years of tumult in the office under his predecessor, a Democrat who was elected with no prosecutorial experience.
Coughlin, 69, is a retired district court judge whose resume includes 11 months as county attorney in the early 2000s and deployment with the National Guard in Iraq.
Sarwark cites a number of issues with Coughlin: crushing caseloads for his staff, numerous staff departures and a judge's sanction against the office last year, mostly because of prosecutors missing deadlines.
"The only real difference between him and me is he's had two years to do a better job and hasn't," Sarwark said.
Coughlin blamed the sanctions on scheduling issues. Prosecutors would resign, and cases would be reassigned, but calendars and deadlines were not always transferred with them.
The office has purchased Microsoft 365 scheduling software, which has addressed those issues.
"We're getting better in transitions as people leave," he said.
Coughlin said his biggest accomplishment is addressing the backlog caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Also, his office has better relationships with law enforcement: He has assigned a prosecutor to every police department.
"We even have Windsor covered," Coughlin said.
But he acknowledges that departures have continued. In October, he lost the director of his Special Victims Unit. Some of the departures cite the treatment of his prosecutors in the superior court in Manchester, but he said that is improving.
Sarwark said backlogs could be addressed with more aggressive hiring practices. He wants to narrow the pay gap between city prosecutors, who earn higher salaries prosecuting misdemeanors, and county prosecutors.
He would report regularly on the operations of the office. And he would reduce high caseloads and backlogs by looking at drug arrests. Drug crimes involving simple possession and no violence need to be quickly settled, usually with probation and treatment.
Coughlin said that's already being done. He hires experienced prosecutors and assigns them to the Early Case Resolution Unit.
The prosecutors know the system and what program would best help a defendant.
"As prosecutors, we can effectuate positive change in people's lives. We're in a better position to do that than defense lawyers," Coughlin said.
Sarwark said he was one of the earliest signers to the Free State Project pledge, in 2002 when he lived in Maryland and before activists selected New Hampshire as their base. He lived in Colorado and Phoenix before moving to Manchester in 2019.
His nomination as a Democrat has irked party leaders.
"He is not 'on the ticket,' as he is not a Democrat," said Alan Raff, chairman of the Manchester city Democrats. The party is not advising Democrats to vote for him, he said.
Sarwark ran in 2020 as a Libertarian only. He earned nearly 12,000 votes, about 5% of the vote. If elected, Sarwark said he would take an oath of office to prosecute violations of all laws, but would prioritize violent and property crime.
"The Libertarian ideal," he said, "is you don't hurt people and you don't take their stuff."
