O'Malley Holds Backyard Town Hall in Concord

Former Gov. Martin O’Malley had a busy swing through the Granite State on July 8, speaking about higher education, meeting with the Greater Derry Londonderry Chamber of Commerce, talking with teachers in Concord, and then, holding a backyard town hall at the home of local attorney, Jay Surdukowski, in the city’s West End neighborhood.

The New Hampshire first-in-the-nation Democratic presidential candidate spoke about some of the problems facing the nation and what he would like to do about them, including a new debt free college plan for all American children, an immigration policy that brings “the best and the brightest” to the United States in order to create new businesses, and restoring the rule of law, specifically, keeping the Congress from shutting down the federal government every six months, he said to cheers from about 125 people in attendance.

O’Malley said while President Barack Obama had done a great job pulling the country out of its second Great Depression, there was more work to be done. He pointed to the heroin epidemic as a sign of the hopelessness among some Americans and called for rebuilding the American Dream for everyone.

“Our economy needs to work for all of us,” he said. “It requires three basic steps and the first one, is simply return to our true selves. To realize that it’s OK to care. In fact, it’s essential to care (and) to remember that our economy is not money … it is people.”

Those in attendance peppered him with questions about climate change, how he would work with the Congress to get policies approved, the minimum wage, and affordable housing.

Surdukowski, who works at Sulloway & Hollis, was recently named the campaign’s counsel in New Hampshire, a role he held for Gov. Maggie Hassan. He also sits on the Executive Committee of the New Hampshire Democratic Party.

Here’s a video clip from part of O’Malley’s talk.