Stefany Shaheen kicks off 1st Congressional District Democratic primary bid
Stefany Shaheen kicks off 1st C.D. Dem primary bid
Stefany Shaheen of Portsmouth, the eldest daughter of Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., launched her Democratic primary bid for the too-be-vacant, 1st Congressional District seat.
Health care advocate and businesswoman Stefany Shaheen, 51, launched her Democratic primary for the to-be-vacant, 1st Congressional District seat, vowing to push back against the Trump administration cuts to medical research and insurance for children.
The eldest daughter of retiring U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen instantly becomes a leading contender to try and replace four-term U.S. Rep. Chris Pappas, who is running for the Senate in 2026 to try and replace the elder Shaheen.
The announcement creates a competitive primary between two Portsmouth Democrats, Shaheen and Maura Sullivan, a Marine Iraq War veteran and former Obama administration official who finished second to Pappas in 2018.
Derry Republican businessman Chris Bright, who finished fourth in a 2024 primary in this district, is the only GOP figure to confirm that he'll be running next year.
The top three finishers in that 2024 GOP primary, former Executive Councilor Russ Prescott, Greenland businesswoman and veteran Hollie Noveletsky and Manchester Board of Aldermen President Joe Kelly Levasseur, are all considering their own campaigns.
Shaheen became a best-selling author of 'Elle & Coach' and an advocate when her eldest daughter, Elle, was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes at age 8.
She founded Good Measures, a small business that provides clinical and nutritional support to people living with chronic conditions and was a named inventor of some of the company's patents.
'For 15 years I've been a fierce fighter for medical research and innovation in health care to help people like my daughter, Elle, battling chronic, life-threatening diseases, like diabetes. So, when I see Donald Trump crushing medical research and slashing health care for kids, seniors and veterans to give tax breaks to billionaires and corporations, I have to fight back,' Shaheen said. That's why I'm running for Congress,' said Shaheen. 'No one fights harder than a mom for her kids, and that's how I will fight for your family too. I'll never give up.'
Craig Welch and Shaheen have four children.
Stefany Shaheen kicks off 1st C.D. bid
Stefany Shaheen, third from left, kicked off her Democratic primary bid for the First Congressional District seat. At far right is her husband, Craig Welch.
Joined Kamen's ARMI team
Shaheen released a two-minute video entitled, 'No One Fights Harder' as part of her campaign kickoff and planned to visit several communities in the 1st District the rest of this week.
She is part of a biotech initiative in Manchester's historic millyard as the chief strategy officer for Dean Kamen's Advance Regenerative Manufacturing Institute.
'If you are as outraged as I am, get in this fight with me,' Stefany Shaheen said in the video. 'In New Hampshire, we stand up for each other. Let's do this.'
A spokeswoman for the Republican Congressional Campaign Committee said Shaheen has made a career of climbing the ladder thanks to her last name.
Stefany Shaheen kicks off 1st C.D. bid
Stefany Shaheen, third from left, kicked off her Democratic primary bid for the First Congressional District seat. At far right is her husband, Craig Welch.
"Nepo baby Stefany Shaheen is a DC elitist who is committed to the Democrats' radical agenda that makes life more expensive and less safe. Granite Staters will resoundingly reject her and her out of touch policies,' said Maureen O'Toole, the eastern regional press secretary for NRCC.
A 'nepo baby' is a slang term referring to someone who has achieved success or opportunities due to familial connections.
Shaheen's team created a website and released several testimonials to her candidacy.
Andrea Amico, founder of Testing for Pease, said Shaheen became a champion for treating PFAS contamination found in the drinking water at the Pease International Tradeport.
'You could feel how deeply she related to the parents at Pease, who were worried about their children and the possible health effects from drinking contaminated water,' Amico said.
'Our fight was her fight, and she helped get the PFAS blood testing program, create the city's Community Advisory Board, and advocate for the first national PFAS Health Study to include our families,'
Her elective office career began when she won election to a seat on the Portsmouth City Council where she worked to tackle a parking shortage and also served on the Portsmouth Police Commission.
klandrigan@unionleader.com
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'It was just said over and over again, that this was a way to build the base that would make it easier to win campaigns in the future,' said one DSA member. A Mamdani spokesperson, Mausser and Michael Whitesides, the DSA's current electoral working group co-chair, deny this. 'That was not how this was framed to me,' Whitesides said. 'I don't think DSA takes on races we feel like we can't win. We can appreciate it's a long shot and think about the consolation prizes — like grow capacity or learn new skills — but we as an organization are not in races to lose. The thrust of the pitch to run Zohran was to try and win.' Mamdani's campaign also directed POLITICO to previous statements from the candidate, including in late February when he said, 'We always were setting up a campaign that could win this race.' But the city's DSA chapter — which hasn't supported a mayoral candidate since David Dinkins' run in 1989 — is open about the fact that Mamdani's campaign is simultaneously serving as a vehicle for the future of the party. 'We're seeing a crazy amount more interest in voting for a socialist than I would have guessed eight months ago,' Mausser said. 'One thing we'll be looking at is: OK, what neighborhoods voted for Zohran number one? Are these places that we can and should be running in the future?' In recent weeks, Mamdani has stood out as the candidate willing to boost other candidates — who all trail Cuomo by even wider margins than Mamdani's. He's the only candidate who has promised to endorse someone else as a No. 2 ballot choice through the city's ranked choice voting system, and he encouraged his supporters to donate to City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams' mayoral campaign after he raised the maximum amount through the city's public campaign finance program. Despite these efforts, the DSA's local party leadership, who are fully behind Mamdani's bid, have stood in the way of supporting other candidates. Mausser confirmed the party passed a resolution calling for DSA-endorsed elected officials to announce their intentions to rank Mamdani first on their mayoral ballot — if they don't, it could count against them the next time the organization is doling out endorsements. Last month, Gustavo Gordillo, NYC-DSA's other co-chair, applauded Bronx state Sen. Gustavo Rivera for endorsing Mamdani — and cheered his decision to not endorse Lander, whose positions on the Israel-Hamas war and freezing rent put him at odds with the DSA. 'Credit to Gustavo Rivera for not being afraid to tell Brad no and buck the left-liberal orthodoxy,' Gordillo wrote in a since-deleted X post. Mausser stressed the DSA does not have a formal position on the other candidates and is only rooting against Cuomo, who polling shows is projected to capture 50 percent of both Black Democratic voters and Democratic voters from the Bronx. He's also projected to win the support of 41 percent of Latino voters. And while Mamdani places second in all recent polls, he has struggled to gain ground with groups representing a disproportionate share of low-income earners — the very demographic the DSA purports to be focused on persuading. An April Siena College poll found Mamdani captured just 10 percent of Black voters, who, along with Latinos, make up the largest share of the city's low-income residents. He won only 2 percent of the vote in the Bronx, where median income significantly trails other boroughs. 'You can't win a mayoral race as a progressive without the support of working and middle class, black and brown communities, and this campaign does not have those relationships,' one DSA member told POLITICO. 'They have not had that from the jump, and as the race has unfolded, that has continued to be the case.' Sunder, Mamdani's campaign spokesperson, said the campaign has knocked on about 12,000 doors in the Bronx and won endorsements from current and former Bronx elected officials like Rep. Jamaal Bowman, who left office in January. The campaign also touted Mamdani's support from Latino voters, which Marist clocked at 20 percent in its poll. Gordillo said in another social media post that the DSA is using Mamdani's campaign to, in part, increase awareness residents have of their own position in the city's socioeconomic strata. 'NYC DSA is the only org on the left trying to use the mayoral race to change the political terrain on our terms and to raise class consciousness,' he wrote. 'I think this experiment will have outsized effects like Bernie did in 2016.' The line between Mamdani's campaign and Gordillo and Mausser's DSA chapter has been hazy from the start. The party helped orchestrate Mamdani's launch, and Mamdani made it clear he would not run for mayor unless he had the DSA's support. There are weekly meetings between the campaign and the chapter, and DSA members are helping with strategy in addition to taking the lead on his canvassing operation, Mausser said. So far, with the DSA's help, Mamdani has knocked 545,000 doors, according to his campaign. While Mausser claimed the DSA and Mamdani are in it to win it, regardless of whether he wins or loses, the post-primary prospects for the party — and Mamdani — are already looking up. She pointed to the possibility of a failed mayoral bid cementing Mamdani's influence over the left flank of city politics, an outcome similar to the one experienced by Cynthia Nixon, Cuomo's 2018 gubernatorial primary challenger. Nixon hasn't run for office since, but she hosted a fundraiser for Mamdani in March. 'Even if he loses, we'll now have an assemblymember who's dedicated to working with us, who has a huge profile and who can use his political clout to fight for DSA's priorities in Albany,' Mausser said. 'Cynthia Nixon is still a much sought endorser, and Zohran can find himself in a similar position as being something of a power broker for the progressive left.'
