Are New Hampshire Democrats Already Surrendering FITN Primary?

By Michael Graham, NH Journal

It’s no secret the Democratic National Committee wants to throw New Hampshire’s First-in-the-Nation presidential primary under the identity-politics bus.

But is state party chair Ray Buckley quietly helping them do it?

Under the calendar passed by the DNC on Saturday, South Carolina would hold its primary on Jan. 22, 2028, followed by Nevada on Feb. 1 and New Hampshire on Feb. 8.

Now that the DNC calendar directly contradicts New Hampshire’s state law, veteran political insiders tell NHJournal it’s been extremely difficult to get a straight answer on how the state and national party organizations will proceed.

But one D.C. Democrat pointed NHJournal to Buckley’s statement and to the lack of reaction from the Granite State’s federal delegation.

Rather than committing to holding the FITN primary, Buckley merely pledged to “continue making the case to ensure that Granite Staters have a meaningful voice in choosing the next Democratic nominee for president.” (Emphasis added.)

Compare that to Gov. Kelly Ayotte’s response to Saturday’s vote.

“Disregarding New Hampshire’s First-in-the-Nation Primary is the complete wrong decision, and we will enforce our law that puts our state first regardless of what the DNC says. I look forward to welcoming presidential candidates to New Hampshire in 2028 for face-to-face conversations at VFWs, diners, and town halls across the state.”

The Democrats, this source said, are already working to create wiggle room.

“Buckley’s the dog that isn’t barking.”

The federal delegation is just as silent. Not one of the Democrats representing New Hampshire in Washington, D.C., released a statement in response to Saturday’s vote, and none of them responded to NHJournal’s requests for comment.

When the DNC’s Rules and Bylaws Committee passed the calendar last month, the delegation also avoided any language that would commit it to defending the FITN.

“The Democratic National Committee’s decision today is wrong for Democrats, wrong for New Hampshire and wrong for the country,” the statement said. What it pointedly did not say was that the delegation is committed to upholding the state’s law and holding the Democrats’ first 2028 primary.

The two Republicans running in the primary to face Pappas in November both called out his lack of influence in the fight to save the primary.

“The delegation has no juice within the Democratic Party,” said Scott Brown. “The party is run by radicals who are not only antisemitic, but do not support the old-school positions of former Democrats. This is a substantial economic hit on our state, and they don’t even try to protect it. Chris Pappas and our delegation should be ashamed.”

The John E. Sununu campaign released a statement pointing out that Pappas “has spent years voting with Nancy Pelosi and the party bosses. Yet when Granite Staters needed him to deliver, he was ignored, and now New Hampshire is paying the price. Chris Pappas is loyal to Washington Democrats, but powerless for New Hampshire.”

While Granite State Democrats remain largely silent, the DNC is even more outspoken about the motives behind moving New Hampshire to the back of the line. One issue is race, but perhaps even more important is the perception of New Hampshire as a state where progressive candidates can prosper.

“Democrats’ new calendar is designed to give more voice to traditionally Democratic voting blocs who’ve shifted right in recent years,” Lisa Kashinsky reported at Politico.

“I think our primary voters up north are probably a little different than primary voters in South Carolina,” Boyd Brown, a former DNC member from South Carolina, told NPR. “It’s not the woke ideologies that we just can’t get away from” in other places.

“A lot of Black voters don’t necessarily see themselves in the ideas and arguments that progressives put forward,” added Nina Smith, a former Buttigieg adviser who has worked with progressive groups like the Movement for Black Lives.

Granite State Democrats spent years denying that identity politics was endangering the FITN primary’s status, even as DNC officials like former chairs Howard Dean and Tom Perez explicitly and repeatedly declared the state “too White” to hold the first contest.

Rather than fight against the premise of identity politics, New Hampshire’s delegation to the DNC tried to compete. Former state Sen. Donna Soucy, who serves as DNC committeewoman, touted the Granite State’s stats on elected women and gay candidates in her speech to the committee.

“In November, we will elect the first openly gay man to the United States Senate,” Soucy said, a reference to Pappas.

“The Granite State was the first state, in 1999, with a female leadership trifecta in state government: a woman governor, Senate president and speaker of the House. In 2008, the New Hampshire presidential primary was the first time that a woman won a presidential nominating contest. We were the first state to have women as a majority in a legislative chamber, and in 2012, we were the first state to ever send an all-women congressional delegation to Washington.”

But Democratic women — in particular, the affluent, college-educated women found in New Hampshire suburbs — are also a key part of the progressive coalition that helped hand victories to candidates like Zohran Mamdani, Abdul El-Sayed, and Peggy Flanagan.

Soucy’s speech had no impact on Saturday’s vote.

“These states look more like the country” as a whole, Dean said of the new calendar. “Iowa and New Hampshire don’t.”

This story was originally published by the NH Journal, an online news publication dedicated to providing fair, unbiased reporting on, and analysis of, political news of interest to New Hampshire. For more stories from the NH Journal, visit NHJournal.com.