MANCHESTER, NEW HAMPSHIRE (The Daily Whatever Press)—The first openly gay man ever elected to the United States Senate grew up working in his family’s restaurant, a Manchester institution that opened in 1917 and claims to have invented the chicken tender.
I need everyone to understand what that means. The nugget’s more respectable older cousin, the food of every child’s menu and every 2 a.m. drunk, has a gay senator in its lineage now.
Chris Pappas, 46, beat Republican John E. Sununu on Tuesday to keep Jeanne Shaheen’s open seat in Democratic hands. The Advocate had him up 60% to 37% with votes still being counted, which in New Hampshire political terms is a beatdown with a side of ranch.
Sununu conceded about 10 minutes after the last polls closed. Ten minutes. I have spent longer deciding between Thai and pizza.
The wrong Sununu
Some background, because this part is delicious. John E. Sununu was a senator once, from 2003 to 2009, until Shaheen sent him home. His father was governor. His younger brother, Chris Sununu, was governor for 8 years and is the popular one.
So John ran a campaign with yard signs that said SUNUNU in big letters and left his first name off entirely. Critics said he was counting on voters thinking they were getting Chris. Only one Chris was on the ballot, John. Voters can read.
So the thing they were upset about in Alaska—voter confusion—was fine in New Hampshire, if it worked to their advantage. It did not.