Smith sets Senate announcement date, campaign website
Jan. 13—LONDONDERRY — Republican Kevin Smith will make his formal announcement to run for the U.S. Senate Jan. 22 at the Lions Club Hall at 256 Mammoth Road.
Smith, 44, took several steps to ramp up the campaign a day after he announced his resignation in March as Londonderry town manager to devote all his time to the effort.
The first obligatory step Tuesday was to file papers about his candidacy with the Federal Elections Commission.
Smith also created a campaign website.
"As a kitchen table conservative, I'm a strong believer in local values which is why I have been a community leader in Londonderry for most of my life," Smith said.
"We need a senator who will take our local values of working together to get results to Washington DC. We don't need a politician like Maggie Hassan who protects the Party bosses and power brokers in Washington while simply standing by as New Hampshire and America suffocate under the weight of record-breaking inflation, exploding gas prices, and the failure to have a competent plan to shut down the COVID pandemic."
In a related development, Senate President Chuck Morse, R-Salem, announced his hiring of a seasoned political operative to serve as finance chairman for his own GOP Senate run.
Manchester consultant Jim Merrill helped run both of Mitt Romney's New Hampshire presidential primary campaigns as well as that of Florida Sen. Marco Rubio in 2016, along with working on the campaign of former President George W. Bush.
"Jim is one of the best political operatives in New Hampshire and we know that with him heading up the finance operation of our campaign that we will have the resources we need to compete," Morse said in a statement.
Merrill heads up the consulting and lobbying unit at the Bernstein Shur Group in Manchester.
"I've known Senator Morse for a long time and I'm proud to be a part of his team. As a successful small businessman and an accomplished conservative leader, he has what it takes to deliver common-sense New Hampshire solutions to Washington, DC," Merrill said.
