Senate Democrats Push Back on State of the State Address
Contact Name: Marina Altschiller
Phone: (603) 271-3375
CONCORD – Today, Senate Democratic Leader Donna Soucy (D-Manchester) issued this response following Governor Sununu’s State of the State address:
“In listening to the Governor’s address one thing was made abundantly clear – none of the progress made in the past two years would have been possible without the hard work and dedication of our federal delegation. We are extremely grateful to Senator Shaheen, Senator Hassan, Congresswoman Kuster, and Congressman Pappas for fighting every day to ensure New Hampshire has the resources we need to improve the lives of all Granite Staters.
What the Governor failed to mention in his platitudes about freedom is who exactly has been made more free under his Republican leadership. Women are decidedly less free, as they now face the first abortion ban in modern NH history, which includes no exceptions for rape, incest, or fatal fetal diagnoses. Certainly, our educators are not more free, as they are battling the impacts of the Republican gag rule banning conversations about sexism, racism, and implicit bias. This chilling legislation has already created confusion, halted classroom conversations, and has led to the vilification and actual bounty hunting of our hard-working educators. Low-income New Hampshire workers are not more free, as they continue to work for an unlivable minimum wage, which is among the lowest in the country. They’re also grappling with an affordable housing crisis and a lack of access to child care. Certainly, Granite State property taxpayers who are being forced to foot the bill for the most expansive school voucher program in the country are not more free.
Today, the Governor painted a rosy picture of a job well done and took credit for the hard work of our federal delegation, while, in the same breath, criticizing them for not getting anything done. The truth is that if it weren’t for the efforts of our federal delegation, the years of work done by Senate Democrats to bolster our state’s mental health system, Senator David Watters’ tireless advocacy to expand offshore wind, and the individual efforts of small businesses who fought to keep their doors open despite a woeful lack of leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic, what do you have left? An ineffective administration that has prioritized the desires of the far right and the ultra-wealthy over the real needs of the majority.”
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