Retiring House Democrat wades into bitter fight for her seat

Driving the news: Kuster filmed an ad for Colin Van Ostern, a former Kuster operative and New Hampshire executive council member who was the Democratic nominee for governor in 2016 and ran for secretary of state in 2018.

• The spot goes after Maggie Goodlander, a former Biden administration Justice Department official and wife of National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan.
• "The truth is, Maggie Goodlander hasn't lived in our district for decades, and she gave thousands to pro-life Republicans," Kuster says in the ad.
• She adds: "Let's send New Hampshire candidates to Washington, not the other way around."
• It's not just ads – FEC filings show that New Democrat Majority, a PAC that supports the Kuster-chaired New Democrat Coalition, is also spending on direct mail in the race to support Van Ostern.

What they're saying: "Colin Van Ostern's attacks suggesting that Maggie Goodlander won't fight for reproductive freedom is false, shameful, and out of bounds," a Goodlander campaign spokesperson said in a statement.

• "He knows Maggie's professional record in this fight and he knows that Maggie and her husband have fought their own painful battles with reproductive health. To use this issue to try and score political points is about as low as it gets."

The other side: Kuster said in a statement that the ad was a response to a more than $400,000 ad buy from VoteVets, a Democratic veteran-supporting super PAC backing Goodlander, a Navy Reserve officer.

• The ad labels Van Ostern a "perennial candidate," seizes on fines against his venture capital firm in 2022 for misleading investors and accuses him of taking corporate PAC money.
• The corporate PAC money claim reportedly refers to Van Ostern's 2016 gubernatorial run, with End Citizens United saying neither Van Ostern nor Goodlander has taken corporate PAC donations.
• "The unprecedented flood of dark-money false attacks against Colin ... are counter to how we do elections in New Hampshire," Kuster said in the statement.
• "His roots here run deep, and his commitment to our people is unshakable. We know him, and he knows us—that's why I'm speaking out," she added.

Between the lines: Goodlander's candidacy has been dogged by residency questions over reports that she last voted in the district in 2008 and bought a home in a different part of the state in 2018.

• Born to a prominent New Hampshire family, Goodlander was raised in the district and rented a house there shortly before launching her bid for Kuster's seat in April.

• Goodlander has fought back with ads saying she is "New Hampshire born and raised" and that "this is where I learned to love freedom."
• The Van Ostern ad references donations Goodlander made in 2020 to Dan Driscoll, a Republican who ran for Congress in North Carolina, and former Rep. Justin Amash, who was an independent at the time — though the vast majority of her political donations have been to Democrats.

Zoom in: Goodlander has made abortion access a central issue of her candidacy, opening up about giving birth to a stillborn son in a bath tub last year.

• Kuster has helped run interference for Van Ostern on the abortion front, cutting another ad touting him as a "champion for choice."

State of play: Goodlander had raised over $1.5 million as of the end of June versus more than $1 million raised by Van Ostern in the same period, according to Federal Election Commission filings.

• More than a dozen Republicans are running for the seat, most prominent among them Lily Tang Williams, a former Colorado libertarian politician who ran for the seat in 2022, and business consultant Vikram Mansharamani, who ran for U.S. Senate in that year.
• The district went for President Biden by 9 percentage points in 2020 and is rated as likely Democratic by Cook Political Report.

Editor's note: This story has been updated to include additional reporting about PAC spending in the race.