Dartmouth College has seen a handful of declared presidential candidates this year, most notably U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, a 1988 graduate who held a rally in February on campus in Hanover.
And other candidates, including Washington Gov. Jay Inslee and former U.S. Rep. John Delaney, D-Md., also have been on campus, as was U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., last fall, before he entered the race.
But in recent weeks, most of the campaign stops in the Upper Valley have been in Lebanon or Claremont, with U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and former U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke, D-Texas, making appearances in the Sullivan County city.
It’s not that Hanover has lost its mojo among Democrats. Far from it, judging by the turnout in the 2018 midterms.
Deb Nelson, the chairwoman of Hanover Democrats, said candidates may have largely bypassed Dartmouth in recent weeks because of timing.
“I think it’s all about the Dartmouth calendar,” Nelson said. “The first week of March was exam week, and then they’ve been gone for two weeks and are just getting back.
“A lot of campaigns just didn’t bother to go to Dartmouth because the kids weren’t there,” she said.
That’s expected to change shortly. Nelson said Warren is planning to campaign in Hanover this spring, and other candidates are inquiring about house parties.
And state Rep. Garrett Muscatel, a Democrat and Dartmouth student, said he is hearing talk of visits in the “near future” from Warren, O’Rourke, former Housing Secretary Julian Castro, and others.
Meanwhile, Dartmouth lecturer Charlie Wheelan, who last year led a national group that made an unsuccessful effort to elect more independents to political office, said his Unite America organization is making some adjustments.
“On the centrist front, our strategy for 2020 will be on supporting moderate Rs and Ds, particularly in primaries, and less on supporting independents,” Wheelan said via email. “It’s just too hard in this climate. Also, we’ll be looking to support process changes, such as ranked choice voting and independent redistricting commissions.”
Republican Gov. Phil Scott has named three new members to the Vermont Fish & Wildlife Board, including Michael Bancroft from Orange County.
Bancroft, who grew up in Barre and lives in Corinth, works as a commercial insurance agent and hunts, fishes and hikes. Scott also announced that Windsor resident Tim Biebel will become the board chairman.
He replaces outgoing chairman Kevin Lawrence, an educator and farmer from the Bradford area who held the Orange County seat.
Biebel, a general contractor and hunter, was appointed in 2016 by then-Gov. Peter Shumlin. Members of the 14-person board serve six-year terms and set regulations for fishing, hunting and trapping.
Scott’s appointments, which also include hunters from Franklin County and Washington County, drew criticism this week from the Stowe, Vt.-based Protect Our Wildlife group, which asserted that they lacked “inclusion.”
“By appointing three lifelong hunters, the governor rejected concerns that the Board needs to better reflect the opinions and concerns of all Vermont citizens, not just the estimated 16 percent who hunt, trap, or fish,” the group said in a news release, saying it would like to see a bipartisan appointee, such as a wildlife biologist, fill a vacancy.
Fish & Wildlife Commissioner Louis Porter on Wednesday said it has been the “tradition” of governors from both parties to appoint people who hold licenses to hunt, fish or trap to the board.
“I think it makes sense that governors have appointed people who participate in these activities because they are the citizen voice of how these regulations affect participants in those activities,” Porter said.
Three of the 14 board members, one from each county in Vermont, are women.
Former state Rep. Steve Negron, the Nashua Republican who last year challenged U.S. Rep. Annie Kuster, D-N.H., said he will run again for Congress in 2020. “We’re getting the band back together, and we’re going to file our candidacy tomorrow with the (Federal Election Commission),” Negron told WMUR television.
Kuster rather handily won re-election in November with 55.6 percent of the vote, to 42.2 percent for Negron, but the Republican may be banking on higher GOP turnout in the 2020 presidential election year. He has been a supporter of President Donald Trump’s efforts to build a wall on the border with Mexico.
First-term Executive Councilor Mike Cryans, D-Hanover, will hit a big milestone on Saturday. The 68-year-old Cryans, who runs 10 miles a day, will have covered 100,000 miles since he turned 40 as of this weekend. “If it’s a snowy morning and the ice is out there, I just plod along,” said Cryans, who went for a run at 4:30 a.m. on Wednesday before he had to be in Concord for a 10 a.m. Council meeting.
He also has set a goal to visit all 109 towns and four cities in his sprawling district by June 1, and so far, has been to 62 towns and the four cities. “It’s such a big district. You can always find something to do,” said Cryans, a former Grafton County commissioner.
He said road conditions and water issues are the big constituent issues he’s encountered thus far.
John P. Gregg can be reached at jgregg@vnews.com.