Exclusive — Candidate Gail Huff Brown: Rep. Chris Pappas Votes with Pelosi Even Though ‘New Hampshire Is Nothing Like California’

PORTSMOUTH, New Hampshire — Gail Huff Brown, a longtime TV journalist and wife of a former senator, is running for Congress in hopes of taking one of New Hampshire’s four Democrat-held seats in Washington back for Granite State Republicans.

Huff Brown sat down with Breitbart News at a diner in Portsmouth and spoke about her ambitious plans to win in a crowded GOP primary of about ten candidates in her state’s battleground First District and then unseat Rep. Chris Pappas (D-NH) in the general election.

“I want to be New Hampshire’s voice because I have a very big, loud voice, and I want to use it to advocate for everybody in New Hampshire that has no seat at the table,” Huff Brown said. “We’re forgotten. We’re completely forgotten. Chris Pappas, our congressman, votes nearly 100 percent of the time with Pelosi. New Hampshire is nothing like California. Almost opposites.”

Huff Brown is up against several competitive Republicans in New Hampshire’s late primary, taking place September 13, including former Trump-appointed State Department official Matt Mowers, former Trump assistant press secretary Karoline Leavitt, and state Rep. Tim Baxter.

The winner will go on to face Pappas, a congressman since 2019 who won his initial election and reelection in close, single-digit races. Pappas edged out Mowers in the latter by five points.

The First District is expected to be even more competitive this year and is one of just five in the country that election analyst Cook Political Report rates as a dead even toss-up.

“I’m running because we need a seat at the table,” Huff Brown said. Mowers, she said, cannot beat Pappas.

“He tried,” she added.

At the diner, Huff Brown did not order coffee, as she had already had it hours ago. Her early mornings working as a Boston-based news anchor for nearly 20 years, where she would arrive to her office by 3:00 a.m., have her programmed to rise before the sun.

“I am wide awake every day at five o’clock. … I’ve had my coffee, walked the dog, worked out, taken a shower, read some material. I’m well into my day,” she said.

Huff Brown left her career in journalism in 2017 and lived in New Zealand for about four years when her husband, former Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA), served there as a Trump-appointed U.S. ambassador to New Zealand. Her husband was also active in the Army National Guard for more than three decades and later sat on the Senate Armed Services, Veterans’ Affairs, and Homeland Security Committees.

Huff Brown, whose family became well acquainted with certain aspects of overseas intelligence and military operations amid her husband’s work, said she was driven to run for office after witnessing President Joe Biden’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan. Huff Brown noted she and her husband fielded numerous calls from friends attempting to leave Afghanistan as the chaotic evacuation transpired.

Huff Brown recalled saying at the time, “I’m getting tired of complaining. I’m tired of complaining. I either step up, or I just shut up, so here’s my promise to my family. If I don’t go to Washington, I will shut up. I will shut up.”

No public polling has been done on the primary race and Huff Brown has not polled internally, but in terms of fundraising, she is in the top three, behind only Mowers and Leavitt.

Former President Donald Trump has not weighed in on the race. Mowers is carrying endorsements from the Trump administration’s former Director of National Intelligence Ric Grenell and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and Leavitt has the backing of House Republican Conference chair Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY).

Huff Brown is backed by Trump’s former national security adviser Robert O’Brien and Fox News’s Sean Hannity, and she also picked up a key endorsement from the U.S. Border Patrol union. Union President Brandon Judd praised her for her “tenacity” and willingness to address the border crisis during a radio appearance in March:

President of @BPUnion, Brandon Judd, talked about why they endorsed me for #NH01 on @thepulseofnh this morning.

Listen to what he had to say about my candidacy below ⬇️

To learn more or join our campaign go to https://t.co/LlsHgGGVoa #NHpolitics pic.twitter.com/aYqXsKQpKj

— Gail Huff Brown (@gailhuffbrown) March 30, 2022

Amid the Biden administration’s lax border posture, Huff Brown vowed to push to “close the border, finish the wall, [and] close the asylum loophole” to address the ongoing surge of 200,000-plus migrants illegally crossing the border monthly. Many of those migrants go on to claim asylum and live freely in the U.S. for years or indefinitely.

“I want to get on Homeland Security so that I can bug the shit out of Joe Biden until he does something about the border,” Huff Brown said.

The border and curtailing federal government spending are two of Huff Brown’s three top priorities. The New Hampshire Republican is also a mother of two and grandmother of one — a granddaughter whom she is “desperately in love” with — and said that with her granddaughter in mind, passing a “parental bill of rights” for parents of schoolchildren is also critical for her.

Huff Brown, who lives in Rye, has been advertising her campaign on the radio and has a digital ad out highlighting that she visited the border. Other primary candidates are also on the radio and a couple are already advertising on TV.

Asked how Huff Brown is campaigning to set herself apart from the First District’s packed GOP candidate field, she said, “I’m going everywhere — everywhere, anywhere, talking to everyone, being everywhere, anywhere all the time.”

She said, “Every single person out there is a competitor, and I don’t look at anyone as being more competitive than the other. I’m telling voters that I have life experience, and experience matters. … I don’t talk rhetoric, no political rhetoric. I don’t even know half the jargon they use these days. I really don’t.”

Huff Brown is a firm believer in Trump’s America First agenda but does not call herself labels like a “Trump Republican” or “Reagan Republican.” In a nod to New Hampshire’s famed motto, she said she is instead a “live free or die” Republican.

She added, “‘Live free or die’ is my motto that I also live by, and those are the values I’ll take to Washington.”

Write to Ashley Oliver at aoliver@breitbart.com. Follow her on Twitter at @asholiver.