Gov. Chris Sununu has released a congressional redistricting map he says he would sign into law.
Sununu made his proposal public after a meeting with House Speaker Sherman Packard and Senate President Chuck Morse. Morse and Packard both backed the congressional map that Sununu promised to veto last week on the grounds it would lead to preordained outcomes: a Republican candidate winning the 1st District and a Democrat the 2nd,
In a letter to Packard and Morse released by his office Tuesday, Sununu said his proposal, “keeps our districts competitive, passes the smell test and holds our incumbents accountable so that no one elected official is immune from challenger or constituent services.”
Under Sununu’s proposed maps, Seacoast cities would remain in the 1st District. That’s a change from the maps adopted by lawmakers, which put the Democrat-heavy cities of Portsmouth, Dover, Rochester, and Somersworth, in the second district..
Sununu’s maps would also move some largely Republican 2nd District towns, including Salem, into the 1st District.
But it would also relocate other Republican towns now in the 1st District into the 2nd, including GOP strongholds like Merrimack and Hooksett.
Republican lawmakers had prioritized placing Republican voting towns in the southern tier of the state into the 1st District.
Selling this map to his fellow Republicans in the Legislature may be a tall order. In his letter, Sununu wrote that said he didn’t see his proposal as “the only solution but hoped it would be helpful.”