This article is featured in the 2024 Green Key special issue.
For decades, presidential hopefuls have visited Hanover for a chance to win over the Dartmouth student body ahead of the first-in-the-nation New Hampshire presidential primary. However, the most recent primary cycle did not attract the typical big name politicians to Hanover.
Earlier this year, several candidates visited campus through the Path to the Presidency policy forum series — co-sponsored by the Rockefeller Center for Public Policy and the Dartmouth Political Union — in anticipation of the 2024 primary, according to past reporting by The Dartmouth.
Democratic candidates Dean Phillips and Marianne Williamson and Republican candidates Doug Burgum, Chris Christie, Will Hurd and Asa Hutchinson participated in the series, while Republican candidate Nikki Haley hosted a town hall on campus at the Adelphian Lodge in 2023. Notably, the Democratic and Republican frontrunners, President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, did not visit Hanover.
Dartmouth has been a frequent stop for political visitors since the New Hampshire primary gained national prominence in the second half of the twentieth century. Since its establishment in 1983, the Rockefeller Center has hosted several candidate town halls and presidential primary debates that have sometimes brought entire candidate lineups to Dartmouth.
According to past reporting by The Dartmouth, numerous eventual presidents — including John F. Kennedy, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and Barack Obama — and other notable frontrunners have campaigned at the College.
Rockefeller Center assistant director Robert Coates noted that the second floor of the Rockefeller Center displays pictures of past candidate events.
“When you look at that wall on the second floor … you’ll see some of those sort of epic events — that Dartmouth was the center of the universe for an evening with national presidential candidates,” Coates said.
Upper Valley resident Eric Sailer ’60 recalled that several big-name politicians have visited Hanover during the 50 years that he has lived in the area.
“I remember years ago, John McCain, Ronald Reagan [and] Gerald Ford came here [and] spoke to big crowds at Thompson Arena,” Sailer said. “It was like that. It was good. It was great.”
Sailer said when McCain participated in a Dartmouth town hall, he engaged candidly with student audience members.
“A lot of students tried to be wise guys and ask penetrating questions,” Sailer said. “I remember [when] John McCain [visited, a] student tried to put him on the spot, and he answered the question and said, ‘You little jerk.’”
However, Sailer said he has noticed that fewer big-name candidates have come to Hanover in recent years.
“I think it’s because they want to go to the population centers like Manchester, Nashua [and] Concord [N.H.],” Sailer said. “I’m not aware that any of the big people have been up here.”
Rockefeller Center assistant director for public programs Dvora Koelling said the dynamic of the 2024 primary was impacted because there are two “presumed nominees” — Biden and Trump.
Koelling added that the Rockefeller Center extended invites to candidates challenging Biden and Trump, whose campaigns wanted to “make the most of every moment they had prior to the primaries.”
“There’s an anomaly going on with this race that I think obviously affects where candidates are putting their attention and what they’re doing with their time and bandwidth in a way that has not been the norm in past election cycles,” Koelling said.
Coates characterized Trump’s visits to New Hampshire campaign events as “fly-ins” rather than a complete campaign tour, while Biden polled poorly in New Hampshire during the 2020 primary.
According to past reporting by The Dartmouth, Biden pushed to take away New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation primary status in 2024 and did not file to appear on the ballot after the state refused to comply. The Democratic National Convention also did not award delegates to the New Hampshire Democratic primary.
“[Biden] couldn’t justify coming here to campaign if … he wasn’t running in New Hampshire, basically,” Coates said.
Rockefeller Center director Jason Barabas said the tensions over New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation status may impact Democratic candidates in the general election and beyond.
“Is [this] going to diminish the likelihood of having candidates come through?” Barabas said. “Absolutely. [New Hampshire is] a battleground state. Will that have repercussions for the electoral votes in the presidential contest? We’ll see if the Democrats regret that decision.”
Barabas said Hanover is usually “one of the brightest blue dots on the New Hampshire map” even though New Hampshire will remain a swing state in the general election.
“Sometimes that’s very advantageous for Democrats to come through [to Hanover], but again, maybe they can already count on it, so they don’t have to come here,” Barabas said. “They can go to a more marginal district.”
However, Koelling said she still sees enthusiasm from both the student body and Republican candidates to engage with each other.
“I think everyone on campus would be very interested in engaging — regardless of who the candidate is — and having the opportunity to hear from them, listen to them, respond to them and ask questions,” Koelling said.
Koelling added that Republican candidate Vivek Ramaswamy’s team was “enthusiastically involved” with the planning of his Path to the Presidency event — which was canceled after Ramaswamy suspended his campaign — and Christie’s team was “surprised” that the student audience exceeded the room capacity.
“Regardless of [candidates’] perspectives, we’re going to have a room full of students who want to ask [them] important questions about [their] policies and about [their] perspectives on politics,” Koelling said.
Space limitations, however, pose a challenge to organizing political candidate events, according to Koelling.
Barabas said he proposed that Dartmouth host a Republican primary debate in 2024, but space was a limiting factor.
“Spaulding Auditorium was available [in 2016], so that’s no longer available,” Barabas said.
Spaulding Auditorium is in the Hopkins Center for the Arts, which is currently under construction.
“Where in the Upper Valley are you going to put several hundred people? I was really thinking the hockey arena might have to be employed, but of course there’s hockey season,” Barabas said. “The venue spaces are not to be underestimated here.”
Barabas pointed out that many debates take place at St. Anselm College or New England College, both of which have larger venue spaces.
Coates said the Rockefeller Center has facilitated ways for Dartmouth students to engage with candidates who have visited nearby towns during the 2024 primary season. According to Coates, the Rockefeller Center brought students to a town hall that Haley hosted at the New England College.
“We ended up taking Dartmouth students to [Haley],” Coates said. “There was a candidate forum down at New England College, and we had as many as 13 [or] 14 students there. We helped get them there, or they arrived on their own.”
Coates added that the Rockefeller Center is already anticipating the next primary season in 2028. According to Coates, the Rockefeller Center is building a relationship with the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at St. Anselm College to broaden the access that Dartmouth students have to the IOP’s candidate events and facilities.
“Regardless of what happens [this] November, in four years there should be two open primaries,” Coates said. “We have already started talking about our strategy of being able to leverage Hanover and Dartmouth and not giving up on this idea of being able to run a major media coverage event in Hanover. One way we may be able to do that is in conjunction with the IOP.”
Coates also emphasized that there are opportunities for students to engage with politics through the upcoming New Hampshire gubernatorial race and 2nd Congressional District race. According to Coates, Koelling is organizing a gubernatorial forum for Democratic candidates on May 22 and will do the same for Republican candidates in the future.
“We’re going to make every effort to make those in-person engagements for our students and for the candidates as appealing as possible,” Koelling said. “It might be me being incredibly hopeful — but also feeling really confident in our students and also in our capacity to host really phenomenal presidential and other forums and debates on campus.”
