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ROUNDUP: Sununu’s Anti-Choice Record Is Already A Major Liability With New Hampshire Voters

New reports from Bloomberg, The Hill, Axios, The Concord Monitor, and The Union Leader all make clear that Chris Sununu’s anti-choice record has emerged as a major liability with Granite Staters — and will be a major problem for him if he runs for US Senate. Sununu has come under sharp criticism after he signed an abortion ban and his Executive Council voted to defund Planned Parenthood, setting off alarms from pro-choice voters across the state who are deeply concerned by the Governor’s record of eroding reproductive rights and health care.

  • National Republicans are pressing the governor to launch a Senate bid in an effort to unseat Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.). The effort to oust Hassan will likely be a tough battle for any Republican in the race, which the Cook Political Report rates as “lean Democratic.” [...] Regardless of what office Sununu decides to run for, he is coming under fire from Democrats for his decision to include a 24-week abortion ban in the $13.5 billion two-year state budget. The ban only provides for exceptions when the life of the mother is at risk.

  • Democrats say abortion could be a decisive issue in Senate races in New Hampshire, Nevada, and beyond that will decide which party controls the chamber [...] “New Hampshire has seen unprecedented threats to reproductive health care over the past few months, with the governor signing a budget that includes an abortion ban and mandatory ultrasounds and the Executive Council defunding Planned Parenthood,” Hassan said in an email in which she pledged to fight for abortion rights.

  • The New Hampshire Democratic Party has a digital ad, released today, that attempts to blame the state’s Republican governor, Chris Sununu, for the New Hampshire Executive Council’s decision to defund Planned Parenthood. In the ad, titled "Laughing," the first text to appear on the screen references the Texas law.

  • The New Hampshire Democratic Party tried to escalate the assault on Sununu with a new digital ad that accuses the governor of laughing bout any political fallout from the family planning contracts controversy. “Chris Sununu laughed after his Executive Council voted to threaten reproductive health care for thousands of Granite Staters and dismissed women’s concerns about his attacks on Planned Parenthood as ‘drama’,” said NHDP Senior Advisor Senator Melanie Levesque.

  • Governor Sununu and the Republicans in the State House have clearly decided to tarnish our state’s “Live Free or Die” motto and the long, bipartisan tradition of defending reproductive rights in their quest to push for restrictive abortion legislation in New Hampshire. There has been a bipartisan backlash to Sununu’s abortion ban from people across New Hampshire, including former Republican legislators, who are rightfully shocked with the extreme direction their party is moving with regards to reproductive health care. Unfortunately, it has become increasingly clear that Governor Sununu and Republicans in the State House have no interest in listening to their constituents and are determined to continue waging attacks on our reproductive rights.

  • And why does New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu continue to say that New Hampshire’s new abortion law is basically the same as the laws in Massachusetts and New York? That is simply not true. Massachusetts and New York both allow for much more effective medical decision-making, and much better medical care. Both allow terminations when the fetus has anomalies incompatible with life after birth. New Hampshire’s law includes no such exception. New York allows terminations when “necessary to protect the patient’s life or health.” Massachusetts allows terminations “to preserve the patient’s physical or mental health.” New Hampshire’s much narrower law requires providers to determine that the mother faces a “medical emergency.” Both Massachusetts and New York specifically state that there will be no legal penalties for health care providers. Health care providers who violate New Hampshire’s new law face felony charges, prison time and fines up to $100,000. Gov. Sununu owes the people of New Hampshire an apology.

  • Since signing the first abortion ban in the modern history of the state in June, the last several weeks have seen [Sununu’s] anti-women’s health crusade hit rock bottom: every Republican member of his Executive Council voted to defund Planned Parenthood in New Hampshire.

  • Sununu probably wishes he could call that one back, as a flood of New Hampshire women and health care providers began voicing their outrage at his failure to fight for funding. They remembered that Sununu had voted against similar funding in the past. And it was just a few months ago that Sununu showed an equally milquetoast attitude over a “budget” bill that mandates any woman having an abortion for any reason to have a physically invasive ultrasound test to prove she is not 24 weeks pregnant.

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