Granite State Democrats are learning a lesson their GOP counterparts had beaten into them long ago.
Politics, like life, isn’t fair.
U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) isn’t a New Hampshire Democrat. Neither is Gov. Maura Healey.
It wasn’t a local prosecutor who decided to treat New York City subway hero Daniel Penny like a criminal, and it’s not the Granite State Democrats who are refusing to deal with the flood of drones soaring over Northeastern states.
But local Democrats are paying a price for all of these national stories and the politicians driving them. Why? Because, unfortunately for them, they are reinforcing negative views New Hampshire voters already hold about the Democratic Party.
Take, for example, Warren’s comments on MSNBC about the execution of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson by a leftwing murderer. Sane people reacted to the story with horror: What’s happening when a father of two can’t walk safely down a public sidewalk?
Fringe progressives, however, are making headlines with a different reaction: Praising the psycho killer as a social-justice vigilante. Literally.
CNN’s Audie Cornish led a panel discussion of the Thompson murder and the acquittal of Daniel Penny in New York City with the question, “Tell me which vigilante action is okay?”
Warren followed up by telling fellow fringe leftist Joy Reid that, while murdering executives is bad, “but people can be pushed only so far.
“This is a warning that if you push people hard enough, they lose faith in the ability of their government to make change…and start to take matters into their own hands in ways that will ultimately be a threat to everyone.”
Warren, that’s a big “but.”
So big, Warren eventually “clarified” her comments, but the damage has been done. Americans already believe the Democratic Party is too extreme, and they have concerns about its stance on fighting crime. This story helped confirm the Democrats are bad on both.
The same with Daniel Penny. Elected Democrats, media pundits, and Black Lives Matter activists are loudly defending Jordan Neely, the deranged repeat offender who terrorized a subway train. Worse, they are smearing the military veteran who subdued him as a racist. Neely’s death was tragic, as was his life. But ask normal Americans who actually use mass transit or find themselves in neighborhoods where criminals like Neely are a threat, and this isn’t a close call.
And then there’s Joe Biden’s sweeping pardon of his son Hunter and the message that Democrats are the party of special treatment for politically-connected elites. If Republicans were paying the Biden family to help portray the Democratic Party as a bastion of corrupt, privileged hacks, what would he be doing differently?
(Just 22 percent of Americans approve of Biden’s decision to pardon Hunter while 51 percent disapprove, according to a poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.)
Even the bizarre “Drones Over New Jersey” story hurts, because it reminds people of the lousy job Biden has done as president, including the Chinese spy balloon fiasco.
Throw in illegal immigration and protecting girls-only sports and spaces, and New Hampshire Democrats are taking it in the neck on every headline news story.
Every cable news panel with a progressive decrying the “injustice” of Penny’s acquittal or suggesting murdered healthcare execs are ‘asking for it’ creates another Republican-leaning voter.
Not that the GOP needs the help.
According to exit polling analysis, more voters identified as Republicans (49 percent) in November than as Democrats (45 percent), the first time the GOP had a party registration advantage in a presidential year since FDR was president.
In New Hampshire, voter registration shifted from a narrow Democratic advantage in the fall of 2020 to a solid 40,000 vote GOP advantage in 2024.
So, what are New Hampshire Democrats doing to push back?
Well, they’re not doing what Pennsylvania Democrats are doing. Gov. Josh Shapiro overtly condemned those who, like Liz Warren, expressed sympathy for the murderer Mangione.
“I have no tolerance, nor should anyone, for one man using an illegal ghost gun to murder someone because he thinks his opinion matters most. In a civil society, we are all less safe when ideologues engages in vigilante justice.”
Where is a similar statement from Sens. Maggie Hassan or Jeanne Shaheen?
Speaking of senators, John Fetterman (D-Pa.) was even more blunt than Shapiro.
“He’s the a–hole that’s going to die in prison,” he said of Mangione. “Congratulations if you want to celebrate that. A sewer is going to sewer. That’s what social media is about.”
“Remember, he has two children that are going to grow up without their father,” Fetterman added. “It’s vile.”
National Review’s Charles C.W. Cooke wrote that Warren’s “revolting statement on the assassination of Brian Thompson is a reminder of why Democrats should abandon her, and look more to the example of John Fetterman.”
As of now, Granite State Democrats are choosing to do neither.
Good luck with that.
