Tulsi Gabbard will campaign for retired Army Brig. Gen. Don Bolduc in New Hampshire, according to an announcement made by his campaign Wednesday. Bolduc has the support of Trump, though not an official endorsement, which helped him win the GOP primary to become the candidate to challenge incumbent Democrat Senator Maggie Hassan.
At the beginning of this midterm election cycle, Hassan was considered one of the most vulnerable of the Senate incumbents running for re-election. When Bolduc won the primary, grumblings began that a Trump-supported candidate might not be the best one to take on Hassan. Plus, though Bolduc had a very distinguished military career, he has not held political office. He did run in 2019 to challenge Democrat Senator Jeanne Shaheen. There was criticism that he’s a Big Lie conspiracy theorist. Many Republicans in New Hampshire supported state Senate President Chuck Morse’s candidacy over Bolduc.
Bolduc has trailed in the polls but it hasn’t been the blowout that Democrats expected. Currently, the Real Clear Politics aggregated averaging has Hassan with a lead of 5.3 points. The last Trafalgar Group poll shows a 3 point lead for Hassan. That means that Bolduc is very competitive in this race.
I suspect that Hassan realizes that, because she has consistently refused to debate Bolduc. That’s a trend this cycle – incumbents refusing to debate their opponents. What are they afraid of? You and I both know what they are afraid of, especially Democrats like Hassan who vote 100% with Democrat leadership. She doesn’t want to get stuck with answering for the Biden administration’s record. I’m not ready to give up on Bolduc’s chances to win the race. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report rates Hassan’s seat as only “lean Democrat.”
Enter Tulsi Gabbard.
“We don’t agree on every issue, but I am honored to have the support of Tulsi Gabbard who shares my view that the status quo is broken, and we need a change of direction,” Bolduc said in a statement.
“Tulsi is a fellow change agent and independent-minded outsider willing to speak truth to power. I am going to spend every day between now and election day building a wide coalition of supporters that includes Republicans, independents and even disaffected Democrats who know that Senator Hassan is a career politician and must be retired.”
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Tulsi made a big splash in the news cycle on Tuesday as she announced her decision to leave the Democrat Party. She did so via video from her podcast. As usual, she sounded articulate and spoke exactly what was on her mind.
Let me give my hot take on the whole thing before I continue. Frankly, I’m surprised it took her so long to do it. She was a rising star in the Democrat Party when she was first elected to the House. All the right talking heads and anchors in the media sung her praises as the new face of the Democrat Party. The DNC made her a co-chair almost immediately, which is unheard of. Then, as the real Tulsi began to emerge, the Democrats began to suffer from buyer’s remorse. By the time she ran for the Democrat presidential nomination in the 2020 election, Democrats had no use for her and her brutal honesty. The wretched Hillary Clinton labeled Tulsi as a Russian asset, for heaven’s sake. It was all insane. She’s always acted more as an Independent than a Democrat, if you ask me, and that tracks with what she is doing now. Campaigning for candidates who are not Democrats is something I expect she will do. No, I don’t think she will register as a Republican. I think she’ll be an Independent, unless maybe she decides to organize a third party.
In the case of Bolduc, he’s a retired military man. Tulsi is an Army Reserve officer, an Iraq war veteran. The military connection probably led her to take a look at this candidacy.
Bolduc has nuanced his answer about whether or not Biden won the 2020 presidential election. During the primary his position was that the election was stolen from Trump. Then, last week, his answer changed. “I can’t say that it was stolen or not. I don’t have enough information,” Bolduc said in response to a voter’s question. “But what I can say is that we have irregularity.” Bolduc was one of 120 other generals and admirals who signed a letter saying that Trump won the election in 2020.
Bolduc, running against Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan in November, told a second voter who pressed him on the issue that he believes the election was marred by fraud. Then Bolduc suggested that the only way to hold Democrat Joe Biden responsible for what Bolduc considers impeachable offenses as president is to acknowledge his win.
“We have to be able to say, whether we agree with it or not, a constitutional process was followed to put him in the White House so we can then hold him accountable,” he said
It will be interesting to see who Tulsi campaigns with before the November elections. Early voting is already underway in many states. Ballots have been mailed out.
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