Stephen, Bradley managers examine primary results

Former U.S. Rep. Jeb Bradley's name recognition and last minute advertisements were too much for John Stephen to overcome in the 1st Congressional District Republican primary Tuesday, Stephen's campaign manager told PolitickerNH.com.

Bradley defeated Stephen by 1,793 votes. Bradley will now face Democratic U.S. Rep. Carol Shea-Porter in a rematch of their 2006 race.

"Jeb Bradley, as a former congressman, is well known and certainly familiar to the Republican base and in addition to that he really beat us up in the last couple of days," Stephen's Campaign Manager Greg Moore said. "He really ramped up his TV ads the last few days and he just cranked out a couple of harsh ads."

Moore added, "we had a rifle and he had an uzzi, he had more bullets than we did."

Moore said the more voters got to know Stephen the more likely they were to vote for him.

"I think John did very well in Carroll County and did well in Belknap County and on the Seacoast," Moore said. "The places where John had the ability to become well known he did very well or he won."

In Belknap County, Bradley received 1,908 votes and Stephen got 1,388 votes. Bradley won his home county of Carroll by 2,714 votes compared to Stephen's 2,051 votes.

Bradley's campaign manager, Periklis Karoutas, said the campaign focused on promoting Bradley's message and running a grassroots campaign.

"Jeb fought a really hard campaign has a real grassroots style campaign that was focused on the issues," Karoutas said in an interview. "Jeb's got the message that voters in New Hampshire, both primary voters and general election voters, connect with."

Karoutas said the campaign devoted resources to the entire district, but credited Bradley's work in keeping the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard open as a reason why Bradley did well in Strafford County.

"Which people over there were paying close attention to what happened at the shipyard and they know how hard Jeb worked to protect the facility and so I think that also played a role," Karoutas said.

In Strafford County Bradley defeated Stephen 2,876 votes to 1,325 votes, a margin of 1,551 votes. The margin was almost the same margin that Stephen beat Bradley in Manchester, which Stephen won by 1,645 votes.

Dante Scala, professor at UNH-Durham and PolitickerNH.com columnist, said that Bradley was able to win throughout the district.

"I think he proved on Tuesday night that he still had significant widespread support throughout the district," Scala said. "If you look at the map of the district, just like six years ago, he was winning in all different parts of the district."

Scala also said that Stephen was unable to his share of the vote into other parts of the 1st District.

"John Stephen was unable, when push came to shove, to expand his base of support beyond the Manchester area," Scala said. "He had some success in holding down Jeb Bradley's numbers in Carroll County and some on the Seacoast but not what he needed. If you look at where John Stephen did well six years ago it doesn't look a whole lot different."

Scala added that the turnout in Manchester was lower than Stephen needed to win and "maybe it was the case that for Seacoast Republicans in Strafford and Rockingham John Stephen was a little too conservative for them."

Looking towards November Scala said Rockingham County and Carroll County will be important areas for Bradley to do well in.

"The key will be to watch Carroll County, that area has been trending Democratic over the years so it'll be important to watch it," he said.