New Hampshire’s attorney general recently made the news by becoming the new National Association of Attorneys General (NAAG) president. I’m going to rain on his parade for the moment and point out a few things, one of them being that his predecessor in that very position got elected in NY on a “get Trump” platform. Keep that in mind when thinking about NAAG and why the honor was bestowed upon Formella instead of Ken Paxton or any other of Formella’s more desirable peers. The other thing is that nowhere in the NH Constitution does such an accolade guarantee job security.
Unlike the 43 states that elect their attorneys general the ordinary way, ours is a 4-year term appointed by the governor and confirmed by the executive council. To those who are new to NH, Kelly Ayotte was the attorney general before going to Washington and she has been willfully silent(before and after the primary) about her plans for when Formella’s appointment is set to expire in just a few short months. Wanting to know exactly when he is to turn into a pumpkin, I consulted Article 46 for clarity to no avail. The most recent people holding that office have vacated it in varying amounts of time prior to their 4th anniversary of being sworn in and moved on for different reasons, so I sent a text to our expert, Daniel Richard. His prompt reply was “it’s a great question, I honestly never have been asked that so I don’t have a good answer for you off the top of my head.”
Seeing that Formella was the replacement for Gordon MacDonald, who created the vacancy by joining the supreme court on 3/4/21, it won’t be long before our next governor goes public with her plans. Formella wasn’t sworn in until 4/22/21, leaving a time gap of 1.5 months. I could ask Meagan, the always friendly and informative executive council secretary, for important dates of interest, but I try not to bombard her with too many questions that I could ultimately get my own answers for after much digging. The dates of interest would be when Formella was nominated, when the hearing with pubic comment occurred, and when the body voted him in. I’m also interested in finding the very unfortunate date in which the executive council approved Gordon MacDonald. All those dates matter because together they show a time line of how slow or fast the wheels turn in that branch of government. Don’t think, even for a moment, that the legislature gets to have all the sadistic fun with their stalling and expediting of bills!
Now for some questions for the readers: Shall we tell our executive councilors, if applicable, to reject a reappointment of Formella? If yes, please share your favorite reasons with your fellow readers. Who would you want his replacement to be and why? If you want Formella to keep his job, which I suspect is going to happen anyway, what are the arguments in his favor?
