Media Ignored Gen. Don Bolduc’s Rise After Democrats Bankrolled His Primary

LACONIA, NH - SEPTEMBER 10: Republican Senate candidate Don Bolduc greets supporters at a
Scott Eisen/Getty
Wendell Husebø

New Hampshire Republican Gen. Don Bolduc holds momentum in the final stretch of the Senate race against Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-NH) after Democrats assumed they had the race won.

During the GOP primary, Democrats presumed Gen. Bolduc would not have the ability in the general election to come from 13 points behind in six weeks when they propped him up with $3.2 million.

Yet that’s what occurred. Gen. Bolduc only won the GOP primary by less than 2,000 votes with the support of Democrats airing running ads against his GOP primary opponent. Six weeks later, Gen. Bolduc now has a slim, two point lead going into Tuesday’ general election with huge support from Hispanics.

The Democrats plan to prop up Gen. Bolduc backfired. It appears Gen. Bolduc’s charismatic, down to earth, and relatable personality has greatly aided his campaign. His ability to connect with Granite Staters is evident at his numerous town hall events. His willingness to listen and answer questions is a stark contrast to Hassan, who has been far less publicly accessible.

The Democrats’ strategy of bankrolling Gen. Bolduc in the primary because he was a long shot in the general election appears to have suppressed the media’s coverage of his surging campaign in recent weeks. Perhaps accepting the Democrat talking point that the Republican was “too extreme,” the establishment media have mostly ignored Gen. Bolduc’s rise and have preferred to focus its attacks against Republicans in Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, and Pennsylvania.

The media have not spent significant time reporting on the New Hampshire Senate race, dismissing the general as an “extreme” Republican who has not raised nearly enough money to compete against a career politician, such as Hassan.

But since the race became a tossup last week, with RealClearPolitics forecasting a Gen. Bolduc’s upset win predicated on polling that captured Gen. Bolduc’s momentum, the media have begun to cover the race.

Its coverage reeks of surprise that Gen. Bolduc has a good chance to dethrone Hassan.

“Republican Don Bolduc is threatening a major upset against Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan,” Huffington Post’s Igor Bobic admitted just on Friday. New York Magazine’s Gabriel Debenedetti acknowledged Gen. Bolduc is “within striking distance of the Senate — and Democrats thus forced to spend money on defense that they’d prefer to be using in offensive territory.”
The New York Sun’s Caroline McCaughey correctly reported Friday that “[f]ew outside the Granite State were talking about the U.S. Senate race there until last week.”

The “candidate that Democrats backed in the GOP primary — to the tune of $3.2 million in ad spending against his opponent — because they thought he was ‘too extreme’ to win the general election may be going to Washington,” she wrote.

File/U.S. Army General Donald Bolduc delivers a speech during the inauguration of a military base in Thies, 70 km from Dakar, on February 8, 2016 on the second day of a three-week joint military exercise between African, US and European troops, known as Flintlock. (SEYLLOU/AFP via Getty Images)

While the establishment media play catch up, Democrats continue to insist Gen. Bolduc is a bad candidate.

“There’s no doubt that Republicans nominated the worst crop of Senate candidates that I’ve probably seen in my lifetime,” a Democrat strategist told New York Magazine. “The fact that Arizona and New Hampshire have come back into play, that’s devastating,” he added.

The New Hampshire Senate race is one of seven battleground states that will determine which party controls the Senate. To retake the Senate, the GOP needs to hold Wisconsin and Pennsylvania and retake either Arizona, Nevada, Washington State, New Hampshire, or Georgia to have a one-seat majority in the Senate.

Follow Wendell Husebø on Twitter @WendellHusebø. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality.

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