Trump looks at becoming kingmaker in U.S. Senate GOP primary

Feb. 4—The first Republican contest in New Hampshire's very competitive U.S. Senate campaign will be the fight for Donald Trump's endorsement.

Vying for the former president's approval will be Senate President Chuck Morse of Salem, Londonderry Town Manager Kevin Smith and retired Brig. Gen. Don Bolduc of Stratham.

None looks to have a lock on it.

"I would believe each one would do just about anything that's legal in order to get Trump's endorsement," said Neal Levesque, executive director for the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at Saint Anselm College.

"What a difference that could make in this race."

Corey Lewandowski of Windham, Trump's 2016 campaign manager and close adviser, said last week that Trump asked him to identify someone who can beat incumbent Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan.

"And so the president is tasking me with ... making sure we've got a great candidate in the U.S. Senate race up here in New Hampshire who can beat Maggie Hassan, another failed hack, you know, Washington, D.C., politician who has never delivered," Lewandowski said during a Boston radio talk show interview last week.

Meanwhile, sitting in the wings are another half dozen Republicans hoping to take out two-term Democratic 1st District congressman Chris Pappas. Half of them have big Trump connections.

Matt Mowers of Gilford, who lost to Pappas in 2020, worked in Trump's State Department; Karoline Leavitt, 24, of Hampton, was on Trump's White House communications team; and Gail Huff Brown's husband, Scott, was Trump's ambassador to New Zealand and Samoa.

State Rep. Fred Doucette, R-Salem, one of the first to sign up for Trump in 2015 and still among his closest advisers, said "all three are solid Trump people."

"How can you pit one against the other?"

The Sununu factor

State Democratic Party Chairman Raymond Buckley said all the Republicans who go on bended knee to Trump risk upsetting Gov. Chris Sununu.

Lewandowski also said last week Trump would love to see another Republican run for governor against Sununu, who he believes has never been loyal to him.

"We know that every Republican running for U.S. Senate or House is tripping over themselves to win Donald Trump's toxic endorsement, but now they must make a choice between Trump or Chris Sununu," Buckley said.

"No matter how you slice it, this beef between Trump/Lewandowski and Sununu is going to make things extremely uncomfortable for Republican candidates who have ties to both sides," Buckley said.

Each Senate Republican hopeful has something in their background that might rub the mercurial Trump the wrong way.

Over 20 years at the State House, Morse has been the quintessential establishment Republican.

In the 2016 New Hampshire presidential primary, Morse supported former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush who, after losing, vowed not to vote for Trump in the general election.

To underline his conservative bona fides, Morse had leading conservative and two-time GOP nominee for governor Ovide Lamontagne introduce him at the Senate kickoff announcement in Atkinson last month.

Meanwhile, no one could malign Smith's credentials with social and fiscal conservatives as an ex-aide to former Gov. Craig Benson and someone who helped build Cornerstone Action back into a powerhouse special interest group.

After the 2020 election in December, however, Smith tweeted to Trump supporters that the election was lost.

"I remember the feeling of exasperation after the 2000 election when it seemed as though Gore and his supporters would not accept defeat, but eventually for the good of the country they did," Smith tweeted.

"It's time for Trump supporters to do same. We're a nation of laws and the laws have spoken."

As for Bolduc in 2020, Trump abandoned him to endorse wealthy trial lawyer Corky Messner of Wolfeboro, who won that primary and lost badly to Sen. Jeanne Shaheen.

Last November, Bolduc took credit for Sununu calling off a Senate run.

Bolduc said he exposed the Sununu family's investments in China and Saudi Arabia and referred to Sununu as a communist sympathizer.

"The communist sympathizer comment was a bit of an exaggeration... I probably went too far there. I have reached out to the governor... to come together to do the right thing for the Republican Party," Bolduc told Manchester radio talk show host Chris Ryan last week.

Trump wants 'loyalty today'

The Institute of Politics' Levesque said he thinks any of the three could overcome the past and win Trump's endorsement.

"With Donald Trump, it's all about loyalty today — are you 100% in his corner now? He's been Democrat, Republican, he's been pro-choice, anti-abortion, he's been pro-gay rights, anti-gay rights," Levesque said.

"All his endorsement decisions aren't perfect, but each one is a moment in time. If he thinks the time and candidate is right, Trump will go all in for that person."

It's also hard to imagine Trump would sit out the process of determining who the GOP runs against Pappas.

Nationally, the 1st District race is seen as a path to a pickup that would increase the odds of ousting Democrat Nancy Pelosi as speaker of the House.

As assistant press secretary, Leavitt said she fought the "fake news media" that attacked Trump ever day.

"I will say that I am the only candidate in this race to say that President Trump won in 2020 and I will work my hardest every single day to get to the bottom of it," Leavitt said last fall.

Huff Brown and State Rep. Timothy Baxter, R-Seabrook also have said Trump won or have questioned the election outcome.

Scott Brown said Trump "absolutely" bore responsibility for the Capitol Hill riot, but his wife says she's "much more conservative" than he is.

The other GOP hopefuls are Julian Acciard, 33, a former Marine from Derry, and Gilead Towne, 32, a jeweler who lives in Salem.

Mowers said Biden won, but since has amended that to say there clearly were "irregularities" in that election.

Last week, Mowers began a "Beat Biden Back" tour.

And in a familiar stump speech riff of his, Mowers evoked Trump's signature slogan.

"The biggest problem right now is the politicians down there don't understand what's truly made America great," said Mowers, 32.

"They believe that America needs to fundamentally change. Well, I say the only thing that needs to change are the politicians running America."

klandrigan@unionleader.com