Joan Hartwell admits she’s not a morning person, but Tuesday she made an exception.
Hartwell was up at dawn. After feeding her cat and making her bed, she headed for Kilton Public Library in West Lebanon. She spent a good part of the brisk, windy morning outside the back entrance to Kilton, which serves as the city’s Ward 1 polling place, with a Don Bolduc for U.S. Senate campaign sign.
“I feel I should give my opinion to my neighbors,” said Hartwell, a retiree who has lived in West Lebanon for 30 years.
Her only regret: “I forgot my gloves and hat.”
Hartwell had no regrets, however, about showing public support for Bolduc, the Republican’s far-right challenger to Democratic incumbent Maggie Hassan, in Tuesday’s general election.
Bolduc, a former Army brigadier general who led one of the first American special forces units into Afghanistan, is not as “polished as some politicians,” but “someone who has given as much to our country as he has” gets her vote, Hartwell told me.
Leading up to Election Day, national political pundits were saying the Bolduc-Hassan race could decide control of the Senate, currently split 50-50. As of late Tuesday, a winner hadn’t been decided.
On Sunday, the Boston Globe reported Bolduc was “polling neck-and-neck” with Hassan, who served three terms as governor before her successful 2016 Senate bid.
Marcia Knapp, a retired nurse who has lived in West Lebanon for more than 40 years, joined Hartwell outside the library. The women were aware they didn’t represent a majority of Lebanon voters.
In the heavily Democratic city, Hassan enjoyed a better than 2-to-1 advantage over Republican incumbent Kelly Ayotte in 2016.
“If Bolduc wins, it’s not going to be because of Lebanon and Hanover,” Knapp said.
On Tuesday morning, Nancy Graham, chairwoman of the Lebanon Democratic Committee, and Diane Root stood on the opposite side of the walkway with their party’s campaign signs.
While Hassan figures to win big in Lebanon and Hanover, her statewide edge is likely razor-thin. “That’s why we have to have a good turnout here,” Graham said.
Hassan is accustomed to close races. In 2016, Hassan defeated Ayotte in the statewide tally by 1,017 votes.
Hassan’s supporters are banking on her ability to work across the aisle as carrying her again. The nonpartisan Lugar Center ranked Hassan as the nation’s most bipartisan senator.
A recent Valley News editorial pointed out that all 48 bills she introduced last year attracted a Republican co-sponsor.
Hassan’s reputation as a moderate Democrat didn’t carry weight with Bolduc’s supporters outside Claremont Middle School, where the city’s Ward I and II voters cast ballots.
Joe Osgood, a former state legislator turned Sullivan County commissioner, attached an “I voted” sticker on his Bolduc for Senate camouflage baseball cap.
Osgood was joined by several other male GOP supporters at a pop-up canopy that he’d set up just off the entrance to the school’s parking lot.
When a garbage truck driver hit his horn as he drove past the school, Osgood waved back. “Any vehicle that burns a lot of diesel fuel is going to honk for Bolduc,” Osgood said.
President Joe Biden and other Democrats, who control both the House and Senate, are to blame for high fuel prices and inflation, in general, Osgood said. “My hope is the silent majority comes out today,” he said.
The Claremont vote didn’t quite go in Bolduc’s favor. Unofficial results had Hassan winning the city’s vote, 2,170-1,935.
Bolduc is a political novice, but he’s already mastered the art of tailoring his message to his audience.
Ahead of the GOP primary in September, Bolduc, an ardent Donald Trump fan, claimed the 2020 presidential election was stolen.
The day after defeating state Sen. President Chuck Morse, Bolduc pivoted. “I want to be definitive on this — the election was not stolen,” he said in a Fox News interview. “Elections have consequences, and, unfortunately, President Biden is the legitimate president of this country.”
A week later, however, Bolduc returned to election-denial mode, The New York Times reported on Sept. 26. “The narrative that the election was stolen, it does not fly up here in New Hampshire for whatever reason,” Bolduc said while appearing on The Mel K. Show, a podcast aligned with the QAnon conspiracy movement.
Like other Bolduc supporters I talked with, Osgood was willing to overlook his candidate’s inconsistent messaging. “He’s a strong conservative, and he’s going to stay that way,” Osgood said.
Rex Houdyshel was more bothered by the reaction that his Bolduc signs drew outside the polls at Plainfield’s elementary school Tuesday morning. “Someone called me fascist,” he said.
And that was before Houdyshel, a software engineer from Claremont, removed his jacket to show a Bolduc for Senate T-shirt that he’d decorated with campaign buttons and another that read, “Big Government Sucks.”
Farther down the sidewalk, Claremont Democrats set up camp, albeit without a canopy. Ja Jongraktanakit, a 16-year-old Stevens High School exchange student from Thailand, joined the group. She lives with state Rep. Gary Merchant and his wife, Joella. With school closed on Election Day, she campaigned for Hassan, partly on the candidate’s support for “women’s right to choose.”
By early afternoon, Jongraktanakit was wrapping up her time outside the polls to do her homework.
Let’s hope voters did the same.
Jim Kenyon can be reached at jkenyon@vnews.com.
