For the first time in a decade, it’s an open primary on both sides of the ballot for New Hampshire’s 2nd Congressional District.
Leading up to the state primary on Sept. 10, NHPR is speaking with the top candidates running in that race to learn more about where they stand on some of the biggest concerns we’ve heard from voters.
Read on for NHPR Morning Edition host Rick Ganley’s interview with Democrat Colin Van Ostern. Van Ostern served on the New Hampshire Executive Council from 2013 to 2017.
What questions do you have for the candidates running for Congress and governor in the 2024 election? What issues do you want them to address while seeking your vote? Share your thoughts here.
Transcript
Editor’s note: This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity
What would you focus your attention on as a new member of Congress? What issue are you prioritizing?
So there's a lot that we need to fix. At a very high level, I think what's most important is that we have more people in Washington standing up for middle class, everyday families. But I'll give you two specific issues that I think we need to tackle.
One, look, I'm 45 years old and for 43 of those years, women had certain fundamental rights that the U.S. Supreme Court has taken away. We need to restore — we really need to protect the full range of reproductive rights, birth control, IVF and abortion access, no matter where you live.
Two, we've got to get serious about lowering household costs. That means housing particularly, which is an issue here in New Hampshire, but also health care, child care, student debt.
Now, that's an issue that we've heard from many voters that we've talked to: the concern about the high cost of living here in New Hampshire. So what kind of policies, specifically, would you propose or support to make the state a more affordable place?
Well, this is an area I've spent some time professionally. I helped start a new nonprofit college at Southern New Hampshire University that helped thousands of students get degrees without going into debt. And I also see right now both higher education costs, but also housing costs are a real big issue.
Some of the things Congress can do. We can let some of those Trump tax cuts for the very wealthiest, very biggest corporations sunset next year and use some of that money for two things. One, bring down our federal deficits. That lowers interest rates, and that means everyone with a new mortgage, new car, expanding a small business, or refinancing a house has lower costs. But two, have a new homebuyer tax credit. This is an idea I heard from the mayor of Lebanon, New Hampshire, who's helping me in this race. They have no more starter homes in the Upper Valley at all, and there's more that we need to do to help people access housing in our state.
Well, that's just about it. You need to entice people to build affordable housing, don't you? How do you do that?
I mean, we need more supply, for sure. We can incentivize local communities. They still need to be able to control their own destiny. But we need to have the federal government incentivize them to pursue policies that encourage more building, that make building easier. We also need a member of Congress who really understands our communities like I do.
I've been here for 25 years, and part of what a member of Congress does is fight for their local district, fight to make sure that if we're using Infrastructure Act dollars, for example, to build out town water and town sewer, that means that a construction of a new house might cost $50,000 or $60,000 less without a well or septic. You need someone who's been driving the backroads of New Hampshire for the last 25 years to be able to do that well.
You bring up infrastructure. You know, New Hampshire has seen increasingly dangerous flooding events in recent years, placing financial strain on towns and cities, as you know. How would you support those communities as these extreme weather events and flooding become more common?
So I saw this myself. I was an executive councilor representing 49 cities and towns. I saw the Ashuelot River — which is where I represented — 100-year flood stages four times in the 10 years before I represented that area. So part of the answer is: when we rebuild after disasters, we have to build resilient communities, recognizing the realities of climate change. That means a culvert that doesn't assume a 100-year flood is what it used to be in the last hundred years.
It also means we need to invest an equal amount of money into accelerating into the clean energy economy, so that we're starting to slow and reverse the climate change that is a real big problem for New Hampshire's economy.
Immigration and border policy is a top concern, as you know, with many voters in the upcoming election. What's one specific immigration policy that you could point to that you would want to support?
Well, I'll give you two. One is there was a bipartisan border security bill last spring that was tanked for political reasons by President Trump. I don't agree with everything in there, but it was a really important first step that had bipartisan support. It would have meant someone seeking asylum who comes over the southern border instead of waiting six years for a hearing, would see it in six weeks. That's good for everyone involved.
The second thing, I've been an employer here in New Hampshire. I've had three times I've lost employees to visa snafus, often by the federal government themselves. And we need comprehensive immigration reform. That includes updating our systems for making sure that we have a high quality workforce here in New Hampshire. We actually have pretty low unemployment in our state relative to other parts of the country. We need high quality workers here, and that requires comprehensive immigration reform.
But how do you do that politically? How do you do that in a very divided Congress?
Well, look, I've gotten things done here in New Hampshire in a bipartisan way. When I was on the Executive Council, one of those terms was with Democrats in control, the other was with Republicans. And there are projects I worked on with people like Ray Burton. He was an executive councilor who represented the northern part of the state for 35 years. There's a bridge that's literally being built in Hinsdale, New Hampshire right now that had been on and off the 10-year plan for 30 years. And I held a field hearing with Ray because I knew how much he cared about local communities. We talked about ambulance response times. We talked about building a new industrial park, and he supported getting that bridge back on the 10-year plan. And it's getting done this year. Getting things done for the people of New Hampshire is what we deserve from a member of Congress. But it takes someone who's done that before, too.
Yeah, we continue to hear from voters all the time about that, that they're tired of this political polarization that we're all seeing. Trust across party lines, you know, in Congress does continue to dwindle. So I want to ask you more about your background and what qualifies you to work with members of all parties to do what is, as you say, best for New Hampshire?
Yeah, you know, part of it is from the private sector. Part of it is just as community volunteer, like when you coach your kids basketball teams or you volunteer at the overnight winter shelter for the Coalition to End Homelessness, you're not asking about people's political parties. I've worked at Stonyfield and SNHU and other great employers here in New Hampshire. None of that's about politics. But when I did serve, I worked very hard, even with folks I disagreed with, even like Chris Sununu. The end of the day, the second time we had to get Planned Parenthood funding restored, it was with his vote, too. He flipped his vote and voted in favor. I will work with anybody to do the right thing for the people that I'm representing.
What are you hearing from people on the campaign trail? When you are talking to people, what are they telling you?
I'm hearing two things. One is a real excitement for a new chapter in our country right now. People are ready to turn the page. And the other is people think that we deserve a New Hampshire leader who understands our lives. We get used to having a great delegation here. People like Annie Kuster, who has endorsed me in this race, and people like Chris Pappas, Maggie Hassan and Jeanne Shaheen. They really understand our communities. They know what our lives are like. That's why they're good, effective leaders, and that's why they've been good advocates for us. And we can't afford to lose that in this race.
