Confident Sununu calls for cooperation, local control

By HOLLY RAMER

Republican Gov. Chris Sununu was sworn in for a fourth term Thursday, exuding confidence and calling for increased cooperation, civic engagement and local control.Sununu defeated Democrat Tom Sherman in November, becoming only the second governor in...

NH political leaders want Democratic Party to call off attack on first-in-the-nation primary

By WILL WEISSERT

New Hampshire Democrats on Thursday asked the national party not to “punish” them while overhauling its 2024 presidential primary calendar, arguing that implementing the proposed shakeup may amount to a “poison pill” against their state's traditional...

Housing, child care to get special attention this session

By ETHAN DEWITT

House Speaker Sherman Packard will launch special legislative committees on housing and child care next year, bringing new focus to two persistent issues for the state.The special committees will join the House’s 24 existing standing committees and...

In a new legislative session, everything old is new

By AMANDA GOKEE, ETHAN DEWITT and ANNMARIE TIMMINS

It’s a new legislative year and a new Legislature, and once again New Hampshire’s lawmakers have carved out a daunting workload. The House and Senate will take up more than 800 unique bills this year.Lawmakers are likely to spar over many of the same...

McCarthy fails in marathon votes for speaker, House adjourns

By LISA MASCARO, FARNOUSH AMIRI and KEVIN FREKING

WASHINGTON — Failing to elect party leader Kevin McCarthy as the new speaker of the House, Republicans adjourned in disarray Tuesday night, ending a raucous first day of the new Congress but hoping to somehow regroup on Wednesday from his historic...

House votes on spending plan

 Here’s a look at how area members of Congress voted over the previous week.The 118th Congress will convene on Tuesday, Jan. 3.HOUSE VOTES2023 SPENDING: The House has agreed to the Senate amendment to the Consolidated Appropriations Act (H.R. 2617),...

Details emerge on N.H. legislative proposals ranging from taxes to legislator pay

By RICK GREEN

New Hampshire’s minimum wage would eventually increase to $15 per hour, business taxes would be cut by millions of dollars and guns could be taken from people posing an extreme risk under bills that will be considered when legislators return to the...

Granite Geek: Another election, another win for gerrymandering

By DAVID BROOKS

Last week’s election includes some perfect examples of why political parties don’t want to give up the job of drawing the boundaries of voting districts.Start with the five-person New Hampshire Executive Council, a poster child for the power of...

On the trail: DeSantis edges Trump in 2024 NH primary poll

By PAUL STEINHAUSER

The Granite State’s affection for Donald Trump appears to be wearing thin.Trump’s decisive 2016 victory over the crowded Republican field in New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation presidential primary once propelled him towards the nomination and...

New law to help students with disabilities register to vote

New Hampshire students with disabilities will get help registering to vote under a new law that will take effect in August.The new law requires school officials, parents, and students with disabilities who are 17 or older to discuss voter registration...

Should landlords be able to discriminate based on vouchers?

By MIKE DUNBAR

This month, the New Hampshire House of Representatives will vote on a measure prohibiting landlords from discriminating against renters who use Section 8 housing vouchers. While the bill got a thumbs-down from the committee that worked on it, the...

Analysis: The top 10 GOP presidential candidates for 2024, ranked

By AARON BLAKE

In the nascent jockeying for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024, it’s Donald Trump and everyone else. Or, if we’re leaning into this being a contest, it’s Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and everyone else.A CNN poll released over the...

Should NH increase the littering fine?

By MIKE DUNBAR

Chances are, you can’t drive down any street in your neighborhood without being confronted by this issue: litter. New Hampshire is famously picturesque, but it seems many are intent on changing that given the number of discarded cans and fast food...

Section 8 recipients face barriers

By ETHAN DEWITT

By the time Susan Bell accepted her parents’ offer to live with them, she had already experienced one of the hardest months of her life.Back in October, the 55-year-old had endured two stays in the local hospital, first for double pneumonia and later...

How to participate in the legislative session at home

By ANNA BROWN

The New Hampshire Legislature is not allowing public testimony via Zoom this year, but there are still ways to follow along and participate from home.Send opinion via webformIf you go to the legislative homepage and scroll to the bottom of the page,...

Retired Supreme Court Chief Justice Robert Lynn now active lawmaker

By KATHIE RAGSDALE

Colleagues praise Hon. Robert J. Lynn for his layered understanding and appreciation of legal intricacies, skills that may well have been shaped by the complexities of his own life experience.The son of a single mother who worked as a grocery store...

A new attempt to end child marriage in New Hampshire

By TEDDY ROSENBLUTH

Dawn Tyree was a child back in 1985 when she married the man who impregnated her.A couple years later, after years of physical and sexual abuse, she decided to leave her husband at just 17.As Tyree made her way into the world as a child herself with...

New Hampshire House considers bill to call gender reassignment surgeries child abuse

By ETHAN DeWITT

For Alison Breault, the hormone treatment for her son wasn’t just a medical procedure. It was a new beginning.As a teenager, Breault’s son, who was assigned female at birth, had self mutilated and contemplated suicide, uncomfortable with his birth...

New legal protections for sexual assault victims in N.H. take effect this week

By ETHAN DeWITT

New Hampshire’s protections for victims of domestic and sexual violence were widely expanded this week, after a broad package of reforms pushed by lawmakers and signed by Gov. Chris Sununu this summer took effect.House Bill 705, known as the “Crime...

Sununu vetoes red flag law, mandatory PFAS testing bill

By ETHAN DeWITT

Gov. Chris Sununu vetoed a “red flag law” Friday, quashing a Democrat-led effort to allow for the temporary confiscation of firearms when a court deems a person at risk to themselves or others. The veto, which Sununu said he issued as a result of...