Should Fergus Cullen Be Fired?

By Jim on November 5th, 2008

I’m inclined to agree with Senator Gregg.

The day after a second consecutive losing election for New Hampshire Republicans, Sen. Judd Gregg gave the chairman of the state GOP a vote of confidence.

Gregg also said today that he intends to run for a fourth term in the Senate in 2010.

“That’s my plan, yes,” he said.

Fergus Cullen “did a really excellent job with a heavy tide running against the party,” said Gregg, the lone remaining Republican in the state’s congressional delegation and the titular head of the state party.

I don’t really see what Fergus could have done differently given the nation’s financial crisis. When it hit it overwhelmed McCain’s campaign and swamped most republicans down the ticket (with some exceptions). This is two cycle’s in a row where national issues pretty much blew local and state issues right out the window.

What happened sucks but there’s no changing it now. The Republican party in NH needs to focus on the future and not get caught up in recriminations over what’s already in the past. If Fergus chooses to resign then so be it but I don’t think he should be removed nor should he become a scapegoat for national problems that swamped Republican candidates all over the country.

Speaking of Fergus, I got an email from the state party today and here’s what he had to say about the election:

FIRST THE GOOD NEWS:  Despite running into a national headwind and large Democratic wins at the top of the ticket in New Hampshire, we gained 17 seats in the state legislature and held all ten of our state senate seats. We have more elected NH Republicans today than we had going into yesterday’s election.

The Democrats failed to achieve their stated goals. Last April, the state Democratic chairman bragged that “there will not be a single Republican state senator north of Derry after November,” predicting a 20-4 Democratic majority.  Today we have six Republican state senators north of Derry. All eight of our incumbents were re-elected and we held our two open seats. Just two weeks ago Democratic Speaker Terri Norelli said the Democrats would expand their majority in the state house, but instead we increased our numbers by 17 seats.

I’m also pleased that, in contrast to 2006, our New Hampshire Republican candidates ran as a team and did so with a clear, consistent message focused on the Democrats’ 17% increase in state spending and 23 tax and fee hikes. In fact, one of our successful open seat state senate candidates, Bill Denley, and the Carroll County Republicans made up lots of signs educating voters about the 17% spending increase. Denley won a race the Democrats expected to win.

THE BAD NEWS: The national races went very badly due to national issues beyond our ability to influence or control. Barack Obama carried New Hampshire by ten points, 55-45%. John Sununu did a little better but lost to Jeanne Shaheen by seven points, 52-45%, in what is a great loss not just for New Hampshire but for the nation. Carol Shea-Porter defeated Jeb Bradley by seven points, 52-45%, and Paul Hodes defeated Jennifer Horn by sixteen points, 57-41%. We didn’t get back control of the Executive Council as we had hoped to.

WHAT HAPPENED? Some things in a campaign are within one’s ability to control or influence. Many things are not. I am confident that New Hampshire Republicans – our candidates, our campaign teams, our coordinated Victory effort, and the state party – did about as good a job at those things within our ability to control as we could have done. We had good candidates and, through an outstanding Victory program, did more to support them than has ever been done in New Hampshire before. More volunteers. More voter contacts. More phone calls. More doors. More direct mail. A top-notch turnout program far, far superior to what we were able to do in 2006.

But those things outside our ability to control mattered more. We couldn’t do anything about the president’s approval rating. We couldn’t do anything about the economic instability that blunted the real momentum the McCain campaign had coming out of the convention.

I don’t think there was anything more we could have done, collectively, that would have led to a different result.

WHAT NOW: And so we suffered some defeats and made some modest gains.  New Hampshire has clearly not become a blue state, but remains a competitive toss-up state where neither party has a built-in advantage. In the coming months there will be a vigorous discussion about the future of the Party, both at the state and the national level. So long as we keep the discussion constructively focused on what we need to do to continue the real progress we made in New Hampshire in this election cycle, I welcome the debate.

So that’s Fergus’ take on it. It looks like there were a few gains made and some seats held. Hey, things could be a lot, lot worse than they are right now. So Republicans should try to buck up and not let this last election get them down.

Edit: Some nasty messages about Fergus over in the PolitickerNH site.