On January 11, 2024, the AG’s office issued a Cease and Desist Order to Mayor Donchess for electioneering during the 2021 campaign. Electioneering is a criminal misdemeanor under RSA 659. That year, against the vote of the Board of Alderman, the Mayor led a ballot initiative to change how the police commissioners would be appointed.
The Mayor was campaigning to win public support to permit him to appoint the Police Commissioners.
The AG’s office also cited 3 Board of Alderman members for electioneering as well and issued cease and desist orders to President Wilshire, Vice President Michael O’Brien, and Alderman at-large Ben Clemons.
Where did they go wrong? They used governmental equipment associated with the public funded TV stations in Nashua to individually promote their positions on politics.
The Mayor’s remarks to the New Hampshire Journal show his all too visible lack of leadership, ownership, and responsibility for his actions. He believes that going on the governmental TV station six days before the election to campaign for his position to change the appointment of the commissioners was merely engaging in a debate. Mind you, the “debate” ran about 26 times.
Apparently, the mayor believes that a debate involving only me, myself, and I, namely Hizzoner, constitutes the proper deliberations for the legislative body. Did he really go to law school?
The Merriam-Webster dictionary describes a debate relative to law and government as the formal discussion of a motion before a deliberative body according to the rules of parliamentary procedure. Mr. Mayor, do you really believe that holding a debate with only yourself constitutes a debate? Should the public trust you to fairly pitch both sides or the argument?
Next, the mayor criticizes the AG’s office for violating his First Amendment rights. That accusation is particularly laughable given what’s been going on in Nashua for the last three years. The mayor feels very comfortable violating the First Amendment rights of the people who participate in their government and seek redress.
The city is involved in numerous lawsuits for civil rights violations centered on criminalizing a citizen for accessing records and also for an Aldermen, while in the PUBLIC Chamber, brandishing his degree as a licensed social worker to call out a citizen, whom he has never treated as a patient, as a child predator.
Nashua’s Aldermanic Chamber is a place for gaslighting, mobbing, and bullying, designed to marginalize citizens and take away their rights.
The mayor simply fails to show the leadership qualities that the citizens of Nashua deserve. As my Ward Aldermen representative stated to me, the Mayor can do whatever he wants. He doesn’t have to follow the law. Certainly, Nashua’s leadership has had free reign for years and operates with impunity. Isn’t it time for Nashua to operate within the Constitutional and State Statutes?
Holding your government accountable is a basic right of every citizen.
