Graham: WMUR-TV Debate Debacles Give Republicans A Reason To Stay Away

By Michael Graham, NH Journal

I owe John E. Sununu an apology.

I thought it was a mistake when he declined to participate in the WMUR U.S. Senate GOP primary debate. But Monday night, WMUR proved him right.

The problem isn’t debating or the simmering anger of Scott Brown.

It’s WMUR.

The point of a Republican primary debate is to help New Hampshire’s Republican primary voters figure out which candidate will best represent them in November. Which one best reflects their views of GOP policies and ideas.

To hold such a debate, it helps to have moderators with a vague idea of what it means to be a New Hampshire Republican. Instead, GOP primary voters were exposed to this exchange between Republican candidate Victor Orlando and WMUR anchor Christa Delcamp:

“Mr. Orlando, you supported the president’s opponent, Nikki Haley, who advocated a very different strategy with Ukraine. How do you want America to handle this war?”

The puzzled candidate replied, “I never supported Nikki Haley. I’m not sure where that came from.”

Oof.

His one appearance on statewide TV, and the misinformed anchor mistakenly tells viewers Orlando didn’t support President Trump in 2024.

How does that happen?

Well, for one thing, it happens because of WMUR’s bizarre policy of having anchors who haven’t covered the Republican primaries ask the questions instead of the station’s political director, Adam Sexton.

It happens when a news outlet with few, if any, actual Republicans in the newsroom is in charge of the debate rather than having at least one center-right reporter on the panel.

And it would never happen when the late, great John DiStaso was asking the questions.

I was going to say it happens when the questions are generated by AI and read by vacuous anchors, except that if an intern had asked ChatGPT or Claude, “Give me 10 questions to ask New Hampshire Republicans running for Congress,” the results would have been far better than what WMUR gave Orlando and Lily Tang Williams on Monday night.

Take the Ukraine question. It’s OK, but it’s hardly a front-burner issue for Republicans at the moment. They also asked the candidates for federal office what they would do about local property taxes. They asked about increasing the number of members in the House of Representatives. They asked how the candidates felt about DOGE. Anyone remember DOGE?

There were some basic questions, too, about housing and energy costs. There were even a couple of GOP-specific questions: How can the party regain voters’ trust on the economy, and how can Republicans win the 2nd Congressional District? But those were very few and very far between.

Instead, it was, “Tell me a policy position of Rep. Maggie Goodlander that you agree with.”

When John E. Sununu announced he was skipping the WMUR faceoff, my first reaction was negative. Why not show up and talk to the voters?

But I confess my second reaction was to recall the debate WMUR engineered between Kelly Ayotte and Joyce Craig two years ago.

In that election, you’ll recall, there were two main issues: Craig accused Ayotte of being a pro-life extremist on abortion, and Ayotte hit Craig on her support for an income tax — specifically, her call to bring back the tax on interest and dividend income.

Go back and watch that debate. The first 10 minutes were about abortion, a gift to Craig’s campaign. How much time did they spend on the income tax? None.

How many questions did WMUR ask about the income tax? Zero.

In the end, it didn’t matter. Despite Kamala Harris and the Democrats sweeping New Hampshire’s federal races, Ayotte handily dispatched Craig by 10 points. The WMUR debate didn’t matter.

And that, my friends at Hearst TV, is bad news — not for Republicans, but for you.

What’s the upside for Republicans appearing in a debate moderated by people who, at best, are clueless and, at worst, are hoping to hurt their campaigns?

John E. Sununu is the first Republican to conclude there isn’t one. He won’t be the last.

Right now, the campaigns of JD Vance, possibly Marco Rubio and Sen. Ted Cruz are looking at what’s happening in New Hampshire. The RNC, which sets the presidential debate schedule, is watching, too. Why would they do a WMUR debate so some anchor can ask Vance about the time he voted for Kamala Harris? Or spend the entire debate asking questions designed to create attack ads for Democrats?

Yes, WMUR holds a special place in New Hampshire’s media culture. But like TV stations around the country, that place is shrinking, and its influence is declining.

It doesn’t have to be this way. The news may not have reached the editor’s desk at WMUR, but there are some actual Republicans in the state who could help the station craft a GOP debate that’s worthwhile for viewers and candidates.

Or it can keep doing what it has been doing so very badly for so long.

Michael Graham is Managing Editor of NHJournal.com.

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.