The end of Peter Gair’s driveway is a trophy case of Democratic support. Signs, packed along a North Country road a skip away from Santa’s Village, peddle left-leaning candidates in races up and down the ballot, from gubernatorial nominee Molly Kelly to register of deeds candidate Nathan Morin.
Except one. You won’t see a show of support for state Senate incumbent Jeff Woodburn, the former Senate minority leader arrested in August on nine domestic assault-related charges.
And if you ask Gair about it, an avowed progressive whose car carries a worn Obama ’08 sticker, he’ll wince.
“It’s complicating everything,” said Gair, in his Jefferson home, speaking on the criminal charges. “I’m not sure he should be running, but it’s difficult to put myself in his shoes.”
Gair isn’t alone. When Woodburn was arrested on charges related to alleged abuse of an “intimate partner,” it invited a torrent of rebuke from state Democratic leaders, who nearly unanimously called on Woodburn to resign immediately. But up in his expansive district, covering all of Coos County and parts of Grafton, Woodburn is receiving a more nuanced reception.
For some North Country Democrats, like Gair, the allegations are serious, and the response to them is a key test for the party.
“It smacks of something that’s unpleasant, but it’s here now; we have to face it,” he said.
But other voters have brushed off the alleged behavior, full details of which aren’t likely to air until Woodburn’s Dec. 17 trial. To them, it doesn’t fit his image.
“I think right now people who know him and those that have supported him for so many years feel like it’s just way outside the norm,” said Rusty Scott of Lancaster, a Republican-leaning independent who supports Woodburn. “Jeff’s a pretty squeaky clean guy.”
In District 1, Woodburn is all but a household name. A three-term senator, a decades-long resident and former high school economics teacher, he’s kept an undeniable presence in his community and beyond. But on Aug. 2, he was accused by the Attorney General’s Office of a year’s worth of abusive behavior, including biting a woman, hitting and throwing objects at her, and breaking into her home.
Now, with a trial date around the corner, a complete lack of support from his state party, and a tight-knit network of voters weighing a serious set of charges, Woodburn is banking on his roots to pay off for his re-election Tuesday.
“I think people are very fair; they’re very open,” the senator said Wednesday. “Everybody knows everybody in the North Country. So there’s kind of a ‘we’ll wait and we’ll see.’ ”
His opponent, Republican David Starr of Franconia, says otherwise. The allegations may help stir up other doubts surrounding Woodburn’s service to the district, he says, and open voters to the idea of a new candidate.
“There are a lot of people that (Woodburn) rubbed the wrong way,” said Starr, who has touted a platform of lower taxes and eliminating regulations. “We really need jobs.”
Woodburn has done well in recent elections, claiming victory with 10 to 20 percent margins since 2012. But even as many privately think his odds this year remain high, evidence of disagreement is common. Road signs for Starr – a newcomer to electoral politics – line stretches of Route 3, met by smatterings of Jeff Woodburn postings.
Even in Woodburn’s hometown, divisions are set.
In Whitefield, 500 yards from Woodburn’s downtown home, a laundromat broadcasts an eye-catching sign: “Vote against domestic violence.” Mark Lufkin, co-owner of the business, doesn’t know who put it up.
Lufkin is no Woodburn fan, but he says the sign is a general statement not directed at the senator. His personal thoughts on the senator are complicated.
“If it was me in his position, I think I’d step down,” Lufkin said. Not because he’s guilty, he added quickly, but because of the toll the scrutiny had taken on his family.
A political action committee titled “Defeat Jeff” has plunged $674 into yard signs with Woodburn’s face reading “Send him to court NOT Concord.” Lufkin had taken some down around the school – out of consideration for Woodburn’s children, he said.
But on Woodburn as a politician, Lufkin was less generous.
“He has done nothing for the town that he lives in,” Lufkin said. “I’m not going to say that he hasn’t helped the North Country because I believe there are certain things that he’s helped out with, but in the town that he lives in, I can’t think of a single thing that he’s done.”
Others in the town paint a different picture.
“Jeff’s a good guy,” Steve Dynan said. “He’s helped us out a lot.”
Dynan, who works for a local power plant, said Woodburn had helped bring in money for road repairs and taken action to help local businesses.
And beyond Whitefield, some support is still evident.
“The big thing for me is Jeff is very tuned into our issues,” said Scott, in Lancaster. “He’s local. I think he knows what’s going on. And I think he just represents the North Country pretty well.”
On Wednesday, a slow stream of local residents milled through Whitefield’s gas stations and thrift stores. Some had barely been watching the election at all. But asked about Woodburn’s charges, many saw no reason for him to step down. And they dropped a phrase that’s proliferated the district: innocent until proven guilty.
“I don’t think it’s helpful to his career but if he’s not been convicted, I don’t see any reason to condemn the guy if it’s not proven,” said Cary D’Agnese, sitting outside a Cumberland Farms. Lufkin and others agreed.
It’s a sentiment opponents of Woodburn can’t stand. Weeks after the bruising nomination of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh – accused of sexual assault – the treatment of Woodburn feels to some like a free pass.
“The liberals got no brains,” said Wayne Derby, a conservative-leaning independent in Bethlehem. “The thing about the Democrats are they have a double standard. They can do anything they want, and whatever their party wants, whatever they do, that’s okay. Let the Republicans do something and ‘Oh my God, the world’s going to end.’ ”
Woodburn, who suspended his campaign during the primary but has since been a fixture at farmers markets and town events, maintains that the abuse charges are not sticking in voters’ minds. At a gas station in Whitefield, mid-way through a sign-posting push, he said no voter has confronted him about them.
“Elections are about people, not the politicians,” he said. “They want to talk about what’s on their mind.”
He was confident he would prevail in court, and dismissed calls for his resignation from down south, by now faint in the distance. The election choice was “ours,” he said. “Our North Country, our choice. It’s not anyone else’s choice.”
Across the street, Melissa Marcum firmly agreed. She should, she added: She’s Jeff Woodburn’s sister.
From the start, Marcum never doubted Woodburn’s innocence, and never asked him, she said. The nature of it runs against his central character, she argued.
“He’s my big brother for many years, and he’s never had a history in any relationship of domestic violence,” she said. “Even with me as a child. Those are things that come out.”
It’s an assurance Woodburn and his supporters are now relying on to carry him over the line Tuesday. But it rankles those on the right, who already have bristled at what they see as a “photo-op senator” who hasn’t done enough to better business conditions in the area and restore jobs. And it’s what drove Bruce Perlo of Sugar Hill to create the “Defeat Jeff” PAC and pay the $674 for 100 anti-Woodburn signs, he said Thursday.
“I thought that it would be a good idea to make people aware,” he said. “He is a very personable guy when he is in control of himself. I just think that he … shouldn’t be representing us.”
Perlo, who supports Starr for his anti-tax and anti-regulatory positions, said that this election, like any other, would come down to the moderate voters. That’s where keeping the assault charges in the public mind could be persuasive, he said.
“People in the middle are the people we are hoping to influence,” he said. “There are some people who I would call center-left who are really turned off by this thing of Jeff’s.”
That dynamic could put Gair and others like him, conscientious Democratic voters, in the driver’s seat. For now, he says, it’s making for excruciating circumstances.
“This is a big deal for a lot of reasons,” he said. “I think many people here are quite happy with Jeff for a lot of reasons. … You can’t take that away. So people, I think, are distressed, and they have to make the choice I think nobody wants to make in that setting.”
As for Gair? The answer on Tuesday is far from clear.
“I’ve not decided,” he said. “I’m not voting Republican.”