Yesterday on WMUR’s Close Up Steve Negron formally announced his intention to challenge Incumbent Democrat DC Insider Ann Kuster to a rematch. Steve (whom GraniteGrok endorsed for the 2018 race) but lost the general election says “we’re getting the band back together.”
Steve said he would be filing with the FEC Monday, today so he could take on Ann Kuster for a second time. And that’s actually pretty special. Since winning the seat, Kuster has never faced the same candidate twice in a row. Both Jim Lawrence and Marilinda Garcia took a shot in CD-2 and lost. Neither opted for a rematch.
Steve points to name recognition as a hurdle the first time around something he has more of by default as a repeat contender. He also told WMUR’s Adam Sexton that his campaign would need to spend some more time on broader issues with a wider appeal like the national debt.
He also said that by announcing early he hopes to get everyone geared up to challenge Kuster by getting behind a single-candidate but welcomes primary challengers if that’s how it shakes out.
The subject of Ann Kuster’s apparent support for or at least partial alignment with Freshman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Is Ocasio-Cortez’ openly socialist approach a negative for Kuster. We think so. Mr. Negron agrees that those are not New Hampshire’s values and it sounds like that might be something to explore during the campaign.
And what about Wall Money and the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard? That was something of a softball for Steve who has a lot of experience in military budgets and procurement. The Pentagon has money laying around all over the place. Plucking dollars from one line item in one calendar year is never the last conversation when it comes to funding. Playing it that way is disingenuous.
I’d personally be interested in how we can clean that mess up so taxpayers aren’t getting bilked up front for what amounts to billions in couch-money laying around for bureaucrats and politicians to find. Yes, I’ll ask him.
Having spent time with Steve and helped on his last campaign, I’m excited to see him run again. He’d be a great voice for New Hampshire down in Washington. And if you hadn’t noticed our delegation could use a bit of diversity (ha!).
I look forward to talking to Steve about the issues he wants to focus on and what that means for the Granite State.
Stay tuned.
