Democracy in Action asked about NEA NH's involvement in and goals for the NH Primary:

McDonough:...to have as many candidates as possible stop by and visit, and go beyond just meeting me and the staff here but to get into meeting our members. 

We have our annual meeting the last week in March and we invited the candidates to come.  Unfortunately it turned out to be--that was just when the bombing in Iraq started so it was a horrible week, but Gov. Dean and Dennis Kucinich made it up and we appreciate especially Congressman Kucinich [who] was on the floor 'till 3 o'clock in the morning and then he flew up to New Hampshire for the event.

But...most of the candidates have stopped by and our goal is to get them out and to meet our members.  That's our goal, Terry Shumaker, the executive director, and mine, is to get the candidates here. 

We had Sen. Graham--a lot of times you get very short notice, like the Senator's going to be in town can you get some teachers together for them to meet?  And fortunately we had a meeting down in Manchester where about thirty of our members were coming to a meeting anyway... [Graham spoke to a NEA NH regional council meeting on April 17, 2003]

He also taught a class over at Oyster River with one of our members, Matt Pappas, and that was very exciting for one of our new, younger members.  I got a call: Can you find me a history teacher on the Seacoast?  I got a call saying Sen. Graham's going to be over in the Seacoast, can you find me a history teacher on the Seacoast?  ...Okay, I can do that.  So we're more than willing to--when the candidates call and they want something we try to accomodate them.