NH Republicans to celebrate Trump campaign launch with activist training sessions, watch parties
Party gearing up for reelection effort with 'week of action'
Party gearing up for reelection effort with 'week of action'
When President Donald Trump formally launches his reelection campaign with a rally in Florida on Tuesday, supporters in New Hampshire and throughout the country will be in the midst of a “week of training” for GOP volunteers.
New Hampshire Republicans began last Friday holding a weeklong series of 13 training sessions. For the Trump announcement, they are featuring a training session and “MAGA Watch Party” at Ryan’s Place restaurant, 114 Calef Highway, Epping, on Tuesday at 7 p.m. Trump’s speech is scheduled to begin in Orlando, Florida at 8 p.m.
In addition to the Epping event, GOP watch parties and training sessions focusing on “digital activism” are being held this week in Granite State cities and towns including Keene, Rye, Manchester, Concord, Dover and Laconia through Friday.
During the training week, volunteers who have been recruited as leadership fellows for the campaign have been conducting grassroots sessions to recruit more volunteers to work to reelect Trump and the GOP ticket at the state level.
The RNC says its fellowship program, the Trump Victory Leadership Initiative, has trained 30,000 fellows nationally since 2015 and nearly 1,200 in New Hampshire since 2016.
NHGOP Chair Steve Stepanek said the effort began Friday with a party and training session at his Amherst home celebrating Trump’s 73rd birthday. Speakers included Jim O’Connell, deputy political director of the Trump reelection campaign, and Massachusetts state Republican Chair Jim Lyons.
Stepanek said more than 120 Republicans attended, including potential 2020 U.S. Senate candidates former New Hampshire House Speaker Bill O’Brien and retired Brig. Gen. Donald Bolduc, as well as 2nd District U.S. House candidate Steve Negron.
Trump won the New Hampshire first-in-the-nation primary in 2016 by more than a two-to-one margin over second-place finisher former Ohio Gov. John Kasich. But Trump narrowly lost the Granite State’s four electoral votes, by a margin of about 2,700 votes out of about 750,000 votes cast, to Hillary Clinton in November of that year.
Democrats dominated the 2018 midterm election in New Hampshire with the exception of Republican Gov. Chris Sununu’s reelection. Stepanek was elected NHGOP chair in January of this year and has promised to rebuild the state party, focusing on grassroots activism as well as fundraising.
The state party and Trump Victory organization, which is a combination of the Trump campaign and Republican National committee, are optimistic about Trump and the GOP's chances in New Hampshire in 2020.
“This national training kickoff will help energize our volunteers and activists as we prepare to win the 2020 election,” Stepanek said. “Work being done will help Republicans get elected across the ballot, including Gov. Chris Sununu, the president and taking back state and federal offices.”
“New Hampshire is ready to win for President Trump,” said RNC spokesperson Nina McLaughlin. “We are already working to expand on our fellowship program, adding to the 1,185 already in the Granite State, and re-energizing them through Trump Victory Leadership Initiative trainings and ‘MAGA Meet-Up’ parties this week. New Hampshire Trump Victory is excited for our first week of training, growing and energizing our volunteer base in the Granite State.”
Democrats to attack
Democrats will criticize the president Tuesday with a rally of their own outside the site of the Trump event, the Amway Center in Orlando. The Democratic National Committee has launched digital ads attacking Trump.
New Hampshire Democratic Party Chair Raymond Buckley and Iowa Democratic Chair Troy Price are planning to hold a joint conference call with reporters to criticize the incumbent. Iowa and New Hampshire are not only early voting states, but they are also viewed as swing states in the general election.
The NHDP said the two chairs "will discuss Trump's broken campaign promises, what's happening on the ground in these two early states, and what issues are likely to dominate the 2020 election in these two battleground states."
New Hampshire Democrats are also planning their own “weekend of action” for the coming weekend.
"No matter what he says on Tuesday, the only way Donald Trump 'shook things up in Washington' was by rigging the system even worse,” said NHDP spokesperson Holly Shulman. “Trump, just like (Gov.) Chris Sununu, has helped corporations and the top 1 percent get richer at everyone else’s expense. He betrayed working Americans who trusted him. He broke campaign promise after campaign promise. And over the next 500-plus days, both Trump and Sununu will need to answer for it."