Sununu to Seek Re-election as New Hampshire Governor, Rejecting Senate Bid

Republicans consider Ms. Hassan, who won her seat by about 1,000 votes in 2016, to be among the most vulnerable Democratic senators next year.

“Maggie dodged a bullet for sure,” said Irene Lin, a Democratic consultant who has worked in New Hampshire.

Mr. Sununu, 47, is a younger brother of a former U.S. senator, John E. Sununu, and a son of John H. Sununu, a former governor and a top White House aide to President George H.W. Bush.

Recent polls of New Hampshire showed that in a hypothetical matchup, Mr. Sununu’s lead over Ms. Hassan was diminishing. Mr. Sununu’s popularity soared last year over his handling of the Covid-19 pandemic, but it has been falling recently, to 56 percent in October from 64 percent in August, according to the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at St. Anselm College.

The governor is a moderate Republican who in 2018 vetoed a bill to fund paid family leave through a state payroll tax. He has called himself a “pro-choice” supporter of Roe v. Wade, but this year he signed a ban on abortions after 24 weeks, with no exceptions for rape, incest or the health of the mother.

Mr. Sununu was re-elected in 2020 with 65 percent of the statewide vote. That was 20 percentage points better than what former President Donald J. Trump received when he lost New Hampshire to Mr. Biden last year. Unlike other Republican governors of blue states, such as Maryland or Massachusetts, Mr. Sununu supported Mr. Trump’s re-election, declaring at one point, “I’m a Trump guy through and through.”

After Mr. Sununu’s announcement, Sabato’s Crystal Ball, a group that does political analysis at the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics, called the governor’s race a safe Republican seat. The two leading Democrats who pursued the seat in 2020 have taken themselves out of the running for next year.