A Republican Senate candidate endorsed early by President Trump has won the New Hampshire GOP primary Tuesday.
Bryant “Corky” Messner, 63, picked up 50.6% of the New Hampshire primary vote in a four-way race after 132,807 Republican voters cast their ballots. Messner’s closest competitor was Donald Bolduc, who finished with 43.25% of the vote.
The New Hampshire Republican now goes on to face Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, 73, a two-term incumbent who previously served as New Hampshire’s governor. The New Hampshire Republican attorney must now convince registered Democrats to vote for him, as the Democratic Party has slightly more registered voters in the state.
Trump lost New Hampshire to Hillary Clinton by the slimmest of margins in 2016 and hopes Messner can help be a messenger for him in the Granite State this cycle.
The political newcomer was raised in Pennsylvania prior to attending and later graduating from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Upon his graduation, Messner became an Army Ranger, serving abroad and guarding the Berlin Wall during the Cold War.
Following his military service, Messner attended law school at the University of Denver and founded the law firm Messner Reeves LLP while living in Colorado. By 2007, he bought a summer home in New Hampshire on Lake Wentworth and made routine upgrades, so the house became his family’s legal year-round residence.
“I grew up in a blue-collar family, and I relate to blue-collar workers and blue-collar people. That’s who I am. You know, I’ve taken the time to go out and meet with blue-collar people and union blue-collar people. And what I’ve heard from them is a lot of fear from where Jeanne Shaheen and the progressives are going, particularly in her case, her co-sponsorship of Medicare for All in 2017,” Messner told the Washington Examiner.
Although Messner is a wealthy self-funder with almost $2.5 million cash on hand with strong support from the president, Shaheen has a deep war chest of over $7 million cash on hand, according to Federal Election Commission records.
