One could be forgiven for mistakenly believing that Jennifer Mandelbaum was running unopposed in the Rockingham District 21 special election. The 32-year-old contender for a seat in the NH House of Representatives, whose race reaches its conclusion on March 12, is virtually ubiquitous both online and in signage.
How has a hitherto unknown candidate in an obscure contest established such sudden name recognition? I suspect the answer is a progressive advocacy group known as 603 Forward, which has hosted public events with Mandelbaum and invested in the election, according to campaign finance reports.
Founded in 2019 by Lucas Meyer and Elizabeth Wester—both hotshots in the realm of liberal political causes—the youthful organization has quickly grown into a veritable factory of progressive candidates for state and local office. Since its inception, 603 Forward has boasted over 150 successful elections, an unmatched success rate for an NH advocacy group.
We want to thank D. S. Dexter Tarbox Jr. for this Contribution – Please direct yours to Steve@GraniteGrok.com.
You can review our ‘Op-Ed Guidelines‘ on the FAQ Page.
For his part, Meyer was well-equipped to launch an effective electoral machine. Not only was he a principal player in Chris Pappas’ Executive Council and Senate campaigns, the former Deputy Communications Director of the NH Democratic Party, and a consultant for the energy and tech industries (among others); he currently leads a public affairs strategy firm called Catalyst Advocacy.
Wester is likewise no small player in the world New England politics. Best known as the NH State Director for Elizabeth Warren’s 2020 presidential campaign, the Massachusetts native is also an alumna of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign and several Democrat congressional offices.
It should come as no surprise that both of these rather flourishing characters were also accomplished collegiate athletes — a vigor they have seemingly carried into their hale and hearty careers in activism. But to call 603Forward a purely grassroots organization would be an error. Like most movements, its true origins can be traced to the ever-entangled and endlessly-moneyed powers.
Although it solicits donations, 603 Forward is mainly funded by grants. In fact, grants were the sole source of funding used to launch the group in 2019, according to its 501(c)(4) IRS filings.
From whom do these funds derive?
Reports from 2022 alone indicate that 603 Forward was the recipient of hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash awards from leftist donor clearinghouses like the New Hampshire Progress Alliance (“NHPA”), Run for Something, and the Rural Democracy Initiative (“RDI”). Indeed, RDI awarded two grants to this and other progressive NH causes in the same year.
RDI boldly proclaims its ominous objectives in no uncertain terms:
“We establish multi-year relationships with grantees. We invest in efforts that have the power to change immediate statewide and local electoral, public opinion, and policy outcomes, and at the same time RDI extends our impact by building sustainable organizational infrastructure that will support rural people working to transform America—and therefore the entire country—for decades to come.”
A review of the states and communities targeted by the Rural Democracy Initiative (i.e. AK, AZ, GA, NH, NC, ME, MN, MT, MI, OH, PA, TX, VA, and WI) plainly reveals the ultimate objective of their efforts: to strike at the rural conservative bases in key swing states and establish an enduring liberal majority. Ignore the many platitudes they espouse about the country worker. Radical entrenched transformation is RDI’s actual ambition.
The origins of RDI itself are obscure, but not untraceable. One name emerges especially from amidst the fog: William Carter.
Carter is a West Virginian string musician and wealthy financial manager who operates the firm of McKinley Carter Wealth Services and is a key founder of RDI. Carter’s business manages approximately $2 billion in total assets between its purported 5,262 clients, placing it among the largest firms of its type in the United States.
Naturally, Mr. Carter is not the only apex predator in the jungle of donor dollars. Run for Something and NHPA are backed by several shadowy nonprofits connected to billionaire megadonor George Soros (including the North Fund, Open Society Policy Center, and the Sixteen Thirty Fund).
But RDI’s expressed mission to develop a wide-reaching “network of donors” bent on “transforming America” seems to be the most keenly focused on impacting local elections in communities like NH, and Carter is an apparent fountainhead of this comprehensive program.
Billionaire-hating liberals be warned: you are far from immune to their influence.
That rich men have coopted our essential civic processes is no bombshell. On the conservative side, the Koch family’s Americans for Prosperity (AFP) operates a relatively powerful branch in NH, which advocated for Nikki Haley during the 2024 Primary almost to the point of nausea.
But the comparison is hardly equal. While 603 Forward is successfully recruiting and advancing candidates at all levels of government, conservative-minded political prospects are hardly supported by the Republican Party itself. While liberal syndicates have effected hundreds of local victories over the course of a few short years, the conservatives have all but completely abdicated their role in the process.
During the hotly contested November 2023 election, even the local Republican Committee hosted no recruitment events or candidate forums, had no social media activity, published no direct mail, posted very limited signage, and offered no sample ballot to voters in contested cities like Dover and its environs. Meanwhile hardly any Democrat candidate was lacking in any essential support.
The subsequent liberal victories in diverse House special elections—and now, the accelerated rise of Jennifer Mandelbaum against her GOP challenger—evidence the same pattern.
Where is our knight in white satin armor? Will our state ever bring forth a conservative Meyer, Wester, or Carter who will effectively organize GOP money and energy into a fruitful statewide operation? There is no reason why both sides should not be able to participate with equal strength, if certain Republicans will consent to desist in their genteel fantasies about American society and agree to truly involve themselves in the necessary civic mud.
If Republicans fail to learn the lesson of past defeats, the sway of local elections will ever more incline away from the right. It’s behind time for Republicans to learn from their shrewder Democrat counterparts by recruiting, training, and supporting bankable candidates.
