An occasional series of articles about immigrants to New Hampshire and the people and experiences that help them learn a new culture and find work, housing and community.
Luis surveys his surroundings with the tricycle cart his family uses to shop for groceries in nearby Keene. Photo/Julie Zimmer
In an industrial building on Vose Farm Road in Peterborough, dozens of shelves are piled high with stacks of coiled, colorful firehoses, destined for fire departments in the United States. This is the New England branch of Kuriyama Fire Products, a division of Kuriyama of America.
Before a single hose leaves Peterborough, it must be tested to make sure it won’t leak under the high pressure required to fight fires.
That’s where Luis, an asylum seeker from Mexico, comes in. His last name is omitted to protect his identity.
Since mid-2023, his job has been to test hoses and send back any that leak. While the pressure at most fire hydrants ranges from 120 to 150 pounds per square inch, Luis said, he tests them under 300 to 400 pounds per square inch.
“Firefighters have too much risk to have firehoses that don’t work,” he explained on a recent tour of the facility. He likes to orient new hires. He shares his work ethic by example, telling them to read the manuals because they can read English better than he can, but to watch him as he demonstrates what to do.
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Kevin Gage, the production manager who hired Luis, says he wishes he had more employees like him.
“He’s a hard-working man. He usually gets here early and works hard all day,” Gage said. “He walks in and shakes everyone’s hand. It’s a routine. He’s an asset to us.” Luis has a lot of good ideas, Gage adds, “like putting safety features on equipment.”
Problem-solving comes naturally to Luis, who raised cattle and horses on a ranch in Mexico until it became too dangerous to stay. Finally, one night, without turning on the headlights of their vehicle, he set out for the Texas border with his family, Maria and three children. Luis had a visa from earlier trips to the United States and Canada on cattle business. He and the family were admitted legally through a port of entry to seek asylum.
Volunteers Jumpstart Adjustment
At a shelter in El Paso, the Annunciation House, the family met representatives of what has becomeProject Home: the Keene-based not-for-profit that assists asylum seekers with housing, education, medical care, legal assistance and other needs as they await court consideration and before they are eligible to work. Through them, on a Zoom call at Christmas in 2019, the family met Hanah LaBarre and Nathan Lyczak, whose home in Keene they would share for more than 18 months.
“Covid arrived just after they did,” LaBarre recalls. “That presented a whole set of new challenges.”
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Besides setting ground rules about daily life – where digital devices could be used, when visitors could come, whether candles could be used, when common areas of the house could be shared – LaBarre and Lyczak found themselves making policies around Covid: “We needed to know if the guests went into any other homes and whose? Did everyone wear masks?”
Even though anxiety was high, LaBarre found the guests’ strong family bonds “lovely” and the kids, “delightful, especially Caleb, the little one, who was extroverted, always zipping around the house, playing with us.” Caleb is now in elementary school, his sister Luisa is in middle school and his brother Jonathan is graduating from high school with a scholarship to college.
Luis remembers those first months as difficult.
“Early days are hard because you won’t be able to work,” he said. His first two applications for a work permit were declined without explanation. Maria got hers on the second try. She now works as a housekeeper in a memory care unit at Langdon Place in Keene, an elder care facility.
“The people are kind, loving and friendly,” Maria said. She likes the job but dreams of opening a restaurant someday.
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“She’s the best cook I know,” Luis volunteers, and his assessment is echoed by LaBarre and Laura Williams, a Project Home volunteer who tutored Jonathan and enrolled Maria and Luis in the Keene Community Education program for English as a Second Language. When they got jobs, both Luis and Maria had to drop the ESL program because the morning classes conflicted with their work. But Williams has stayed close to the family, especially Maria.
“We’ve spent many hours together making tamales,” Williams said. Kuriyama Fire Products Production Manager Kevin Gage talks with Luis during his shift at the Peterborough warehouse. Luis works as an assembler at the facility. The rancher and his family immigrated from Mexico four years ago and came to the Monadnock region with the not-for-profit accompaniment program Project Home. Photo/Julie Zimmer
Work Permit Brings Independence
Until Luis was approved to work and got a Social Security card, he volunteered for three hours a day three days a week at Stonewall Farm near Keene. When it came time to find a place of their own, the volunteer work paid off. Luis had become a friend of the then-farm manager, and mentioned they were looking for a place to rent. One day his friend asked him to meet at an apartment. Luis thought he might need help repairing something.
After walking through the apartment, his friend asked, “Are you good here?”
“I said, ‘What?” Luis remembers. He couldn’t believe that the apartment was for rent to his family.
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One of Luis’ smaller projects in welding certification training at Phaze was this kitchen cart, a gift for Maria. Photo/Dan Gillou, Phaze
NH Training Center Offers New Skills and Certification
The apartment is now homey, bustling with family activities and visits from friends. In the kitchen is a token of Luis’ love and appreciation for Maria: a stainless-steel rolling cart that he designed to give her extra workspace in their kitchen.
He created it at Phaze Welding Technology Center, a welding shop and training school in Peterborough next door to Kuriyama. While Luis was waiting for a work permit, Project Home connected him with training at Phaze to become a certified welder.
Dan Guillou, founder and owner of Phaze, was impressed with Luis’ work ethic, determination and courage in the face of personal losses. Both Luis’ father and his oldest son died in Mexico after he left, and Luis was unable to return for their funerals. Guillou gave Luis a “scholarship” to help Project Home afford the tuition.
“We’re not here to make a buck but to train people,” Guillou said. He launched his business in 2019 and says hundreds have gone through training. There are more than 2 million job openings for welders in the country, he said. Phaze can train 80 to 100 a year. With welding skills and certification “There won’t be a day you don’t work unless you don’t want to work,” he said.
As he got to know Luis, he recognized a hard worker and fellow problem-solver.
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“Welders look at a concept and the things they can design to solve a problem. To be good, you have to have vision. It involves a lot of planning.”Luis tests a fire hose for the Kuriyama warehouse in Peterborough. Photo courtesy of Kuriyama Fire Products
Family Works to Rebuild in NH, with Grateful Hearts
Gillou learned that Luis had been such a planner on his ranch in Mexico, where he hired welders when he needed work done. A graduate of Mexico’s National School of Agronomy and Veterinary Medicine, Luis has an advanced degree in cattle production and systems engineering.
Luis’ dream is to be a rancher again, in the United States, Guillou said. “With the skills he learned here, he can be a much better rancher. He can do himself what he used to hire done.”
Guillou is committed to helping Luis realize his dream. He’s put him in touch with two brothers in Keene who will make farmland available to launch an organic farm and perhaps, in time, a cattle operation. Guillou located equipment to start with this year.
“I know exactly what to do with that,” Luis said.
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Even with all the things that happened, he said, “We’re very lucky to find this place, this city.” He said he’s never felt discriminated against.
“I don’t think anyone realizes what the true cost is to settle a family here in the state,” Guillou said. “It takes an immense amount of resources to get them through a year. There’s no government support for asylum-seekers.”
“One day, we can help, too,” Luis said, “when we have our stuff done — when we are accepted, legal and have our [permanent resident] status. We want to become citizens. It’s a huge goal.”
The hearing on their asylum case is later this year.
For information about volunteering with or donating to Project Home, visit their website
Advice from Luis and Maria
… for other immigrants:
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Have a positive attitude and be patient – very, very patient. “Everything goes slow, like molasses in the wintertime,” Luis said.
Be smart enough to make it work. Learn how to say, “We need this, not that.”
If you’re accepted for a job, do the work. Be proud of your job.
…. for hosts and other volunteers:
Keep going. People are different; they have different problems. Learn from people as they come.
Understand and ask about cultural differences, including food. Living with a family that ate a lot of vegetables, Luis said he had to tell them, “I’m not a rabbit. I’m a cattleman!”
Advice for hosts from Hanah LaBarre and Nathan Lyczak:
It takes a big heart. It’s a journey with a lot of uncertainty. “In our case, because of Covid there was no known end-date.”
Know as much about the person or family as you can before they arrive.
Step into it. Be open to another culture.
Know your limits. Know the help you’ll need from others. “It takes a community to make it work: a full team is crucial. “
Set house rules in the beginning.
Think through the transportation issues. Can guests walk to school? To resources they need?
Communication can be tricky. Sometimes you’re not talking in the same language.
Consider family roles: It was challenging for us that the heads of our guest family were elder to us. “That was different. In Mexico Luis had people working for him in his house.”
Advice for volunteers from Laura Williams, ESL teacher:
Know what you want to do, and follow your heart.
You have to be flexible. The core group of Project Home is aware of the difficulty of having volunteers as a support system.
There are opportunities on many different levels. You can be as involved or a peripheral as your time or patience allow.
The scenario is different for every person who comes. Each case has to be handled differently. You can’t impose a scenario that worked for one family on another.
Observations from Dan Guillou, Phaze Welding:
Money spent at the border is wasted. The border wall is mismanaged. The immigration process is mismanaged. There’s got to be a different way.
A huge workforce in Latin American countries is going to waste or relocating. America should incentivize Latin American governments to help their people.
Getting involved locally is the first step to solving what is going on in DC and at the border.
CONCORD — Out of Joe Biden’s shadow, Vice President Kamala Harris’s historic campaign to become the nation’s first woman president began well here this past week, though she didn’t lack for detractors.
“I think Granite Staters are really excited to have Kamala Harris at the top of the ticket,” said Craig Brown, who was state director of her 2020 presidential run.
“She is someone who has really been a fighter her entire career. … She has what it takes to be president,” Brown said.
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But to win New Hampshire this November, Harris will need a script vastly different from the one that received lousy reviews during her first presidential bid four years ago.
Harris never got to the 2020 presidential candidate filing gate in New Hampshire, dropping out in December 2019, weeks after her campaign said she would “mail” in her candidacy papers rather than show up in person.
“To call that campaign an epic failure is a gross understatement,” said Greg Moore, regional director for Americans for Prosperity, a fiscally conservative group that backed Nikki Haley’s 2024 White House run.
After a successful New Hampshire visit, Harris infamously said on the Daily Show with Trevor Noah that New Hampshire journalists acted surprised that a woman of color would spend so much time campaigning in mostly white New Hampshire.
“The first line of questioning I got was, ‘You’re in New Hampshire, and we heard you’re not going to come to New Hampshire. We thought you weren’t going to compete in New Hampshire,’” Harris said at the time.
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“And what no one said, but the inference was, well, the demographic of New Hampshire is not who you are in terms of your race and who you are.”
Since being elected with Biden in 2020, Harris has been in the state once, for an April 2021 visit that was well-received. Her husband has been here twice.
A wide open race
Pat Griffin, a Republican media strategist who worked on the ground here to help elect both Bush presidents, said, “She truly has been thus far a terrible candidate — the cackle, the prancing around, it’s difficult to watch.
“All that said, she has one important thing Joe Biden did not have. She behaves 24/7 like she’s truly alive, and against Donald Trump, with all the baggage he has, that counts for a lot.”
Academics and political insiders agree Harris has a brief window to cultivate an image that offers a contrast not just to Trump but to her current boss.
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Then-candidates Joe Biden and Kamala Harris spar during a 2020 Democratic presidential debate in Detroit in August 2019. Some observers say Harris’s performance then makes them look forward to a debate with Donald Trump.
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Lucas Jackson/Reuters File
“This race is now wide open both here and nationally,” said Neil Levesque, executive director of the New Hampshire Institute of Politics at Saint Anselm College.
“If she takes this moment to sort of change things, it could really have an impact. Whether she does it or not is the question. She is not brand-new, she’s a known commodity, but there is the potential to reshape her image as someone other than a West Coast left-wing liberal.”
As if on cue, a new University of New Hampshire Survey Center poll of New Hampshire voters has Harris leading Trump 49% to 43%, with a solid 45% to 33% edge among independent voters.
In a UNH poll in May, 84% of Democrats were solidly backing Biden. In the new poll, conducted Tuesday through Thursday, the party base support for Harris was up to 94%.
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Dante Scala, professor of politics at UNH, believes this quick sprint to Nov. 5 will work in Harris’s favor.
“They don’t have to worry about overthinking it,” Scala said. “So many times we see candidates and campaigns try way too hard. This is going to be all about impulse and instincts. If she has the right ones, this could go real well.”
Scala said her 14th-place showing in the New Hampshire primary after she quit the race won’t matter a whit.
“You remember all that, I remember all that, but most voters don’t even have a memory of her as a presidential candidate,” Scala said. “In that respect, she’s a clean slate.”
Appeal to youth
There’s no disputing that young Democratic-leaning voters are energized by the prospect of nominating Harris, 59, rather than Biden, 81.
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New Hampshire has 11 young delegates going to the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, one of the largest groups per capita of any state in the nation.
“Young people know what’s at stake this fall because our rights are on the ballot,” said K.R. Epstein of Manchester, one of those younger delegates. “We also know that young people have the power to sway presidential elections and Vice President Kamala Harris is focused on earning our votes. I know that VP Harris has the ability to take on Donald Trump and win.”
Another young delegate, Prescott Herzog of Claremont, said he’s confident Harris will reunite the Democratic Party.
“This will be my first time voting in a presidential election. and I couldn’t be prouder to cast my vote for Kamala Harris,” Herzog said.
“Her work with President Biden enacting legislation on the issues young voters care about, from climate to gun violence, shows that she will continue the Biden-Harris administration’s effectiveness.”
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After fiercely fighting to preserve the state’s first-in-the-nation primary, Democratic Party Chairman Ray Buckley said he was determined to put together a delegate slate that looked like America. He did it with many minority delegates and members of the LGBTQ+ community.
New Hampshire Democratic Party Chair Ray Buckley conducts a press briefing with fellow democrats including Sen. Becky Whitley (D-Hopkinton) at a party office in downtown Nashua on Wednesday.
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DAVID LANE/UNION LEADER
Concord lobbyist Jim Demers, who has been a pledged delegate to Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, said this may prove to be his most memorable convention.
“I’ve never been this stoked for a convention before. They are all fun, but this one is one for the history books,” said Demers. “I am really thrilled for the youngest members of the delegation, because this is a great story they’ll be able to tell their grandchildren.”
State Rep. Latha Mangipudi, D-Nashua, a superdelegate to the convention this time and a leader in the state’s growing Indian community, said “it’s long past time” for a woman to ascend to the nation’s highest office.
“We have even had Third World nations that have had women presidents. This is the time, this is the election, this is the candidate,” Mangipudi said.
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Delegate Sumathi Madhure, a physical therapist, said she had doubts there would be a South Asian on the presidential ticket in her lifetime. Now there’s an even shot one becomes president.
“Fairly or not, there was some apathy out there with President Biden at the top of the ticket,” Madhure said during a news conference this past week. “Now, all that is gone and wiped away.”
State Rep. Latha Mangipudi, D-Nashua, talks with then-U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris during Harris’s presidential campaign stop in Nashua in May 2019.
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Kimberly Houghton/Union Leader File
A surge of energy
Despite her stumbles as a candidate in 2020, Harris had her moments, including her comments at the first presidential debate about Biden’s past support for forced busing.
“I for one can’t wait for that debate or debates with Donald Trump,” said former state House Speaker Terie Norelli, D-Portsmouth, and the first female Democrat to lead the 400-person House.
“What’s most amazing to me was that this surge of energy came flooding in literally in an instant. You can’t manufacture that.”
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Scala believes the election here may be determined by the middle-class male vote, which Trump won decisively in 2016 but Biden securely captured in 2020.
“How they vote will determine if this is a nail-biter like it was for Hillary Clinton (who narrowly won here) in 2016 or a pretty easy ride like it was for Biden four years later,” Scala said.
“Yes, we’re a swing state, but a Democratic-presidential leaning state.”
Griffin, the Republican media strategist, said he just doesn’t know where the small but pivotal number of truly undecided voters will move here and in other swing states.
“I think she’s got a better shot at them because so many have looked at Trump and decided they aren’t eating that dog food,” Griffin said. But, he said, “She has to make a very strong sell.”
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Buckley, the state Democratic Party chair, thinks his party’s secret weapon is its ground game. Democrats have 16 field offices and counting. Trump has a single headquarters and only has started to bring on a few dedicated staffers.
The reality is the Trump team nationally views the Granite State and its four electoral votes as a luxury — one they don’t need to get to the 280 needed to clinch the victory.
“Trump’s not going to play here,” Buckley said.
Scala said the 2024 race is all about Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Arizona.
But New Hampshire still could be telling.
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“Come September, if New Hampshire is still a toss-up, very much in play for Trump, then that’s a very bad look for Harris,” Scala said.
Kamala Harris has a significant lead over Donald Trump in New Hampshire, according to new polling data.
In the first public survey of New Hampshire voters since Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race, Harris has a lead of 6 points over the former president.
The poll conducted by the University of New Hampshire between July 23 and 25, shows Harris with a 49 to 43 percent lead over Trump. The poll surveyed 3,016 people and had a margin of error of 1.8 percent.
In a Saint Anselm College Survey Center (SASC) poll of 2,083 New Hampshire registered voters conducted between July 24 and 25, Harris had a 50-44 percent margin over Trump. The poll had a 2.1 percent margin of error.
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Harris was not previously leading in the state. In a poll conducted by the New Hampshire Journal and Praecones Analytica after the Republican convention but before Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the 2024 campaign, when Harris was matched up against Trump in a head-to-head, her Republican rival was leading her by one point, on 40 percent to her 39 percent.
In the same poll, Trump and Biden were essentially tied, with Trump on 39.7 and Biden on 39.4 percent.
Vice President Kamala Harris speaks in Houston, Texas, on July 25, 2024. She is leading Donald Trump by 6 points in New Hampshire. Vice President Kamala Harris speaks in Houston, Texas, on July 25, 2024. She is leading Donald Trump by 6 points in New Hampshire. Montinique Monroe/Getty Images
New Hampshire has voted Democratic in all but one election since 1992, but it is considered a battleground state in most election cycles because control of its state legislature and congressional seats have switched back and forth between Republicans and Democrats.
In 2020, Biden won the state with 52 percent of the vote to Trump’s 45 percent, while in 2016, Hillary Clinton was able to carry the state by around 2,700 votes.
Neil Levesque, Executive Director of the New Hampshire Institute of Politics, noted: “With President Biden’s endorsement and the Democratic campaign’s shift to Harris, she has emerged with a consolidated party support, which enhances her standing against Trump among New Hampshire voters.”
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Levesque added: “Harris has achieved a level of partisan enthusiasm that Biden did not, especially among the liberal base: 94 percent of Democratic voters now support Harris, a noticeable increase from Biden’s 82 percent in June. As Harris takes the lead in the campaign, shifts in voter perceptions are expected to continue.”
Multiple polls have put Harris in the lead over Trump since she became the front runner for the Democratic nomination.
In a poll conducted by Morning Consult between July 22 and 24, Harris was leading Trump by one point, with 46 percent supporting Harris to Trump’s 45 percent.
And a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted on Monday and Tuesday showed Harris with a 2-point lead over Trump, with 44 percent of those polled supporting her in a head-to-head contest with the Republican, while 42 percent backed the former president. The poll had a margin of error of 3 percentage points.
However, not all the polls are favorable to Harris. In the latest poll conducted by the New York Times and Siena College, Trump was leading Harris by 2 points among registered voters and 1 point among likely voters.
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Another poll conducted by Morning Consult after Biden ended his reelection campaign showed Trump had a 2-point lead over Harris, with 47 percent supporting the former president compared to 45 percent backing Harris.
The poll also showed that Trump’s margin over the Democrats had decreased. The former president was now only 2 points ahead of Harris, after a previous survey by the same pollsters put Trump four points ahead of Biden—46 percent to the president’s 42 percent.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
NASHUA — Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said Vice President Kamala Harris “should be bold” when choosing her running mate.
While the two-term governor is one of at least seven Democrats being vetted by the Harris campaign, she has repeatedly said that she not interested in the position. She reiterated that to reporters on Thursday in New Hampshire, saying she’s “not going anywhere” and remains committed to her role as Michigan’s governor.
Whitmer said the current field of vice presidential candidates, which includes Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, and fellow Michigander Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg, are all “wonderful.”
“I am a little biased toward governors because, you know, I think executive experience would be a helpful thing in the White House. But Mark Kelly is fantastic, Josh Shapiro, there’s just a great list of people that I know that they’re talking to,” Whitmer said. “As a governor who handpicks my running mate in Michigan, I just know that having someone that you can trust who shares your values, and that you get along with, I think, is paramount and only she can make that decision.”
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While the current field is largely white men, Whitmer said she believes Harris “feels the same way” that they should be “bold” with their choice, adding two women or two people of color on the presidential ticket would be “exciting.”
Whitmer says Harris brings renewed sense of energy in 2024 election
Whitmer was in New Hampshire on behalf of Harris and in her capacity as a co-chair of Harris’ campaign, a similar role she had with President Joe Biden’s campaign prior to him dropping out of the race and endorsing Harris.
In front of a small crowd at Liquid Therapy in Nashua, she touched on topics ranging from reproductive freedom to Project 2025 in a discussion moderated by former House Speaker Terie Norelli, a Democrat from Portsmouth.
It was Whitmer’s first visit to the Granite State. She said she chose to visit now because “people in New Hampshire matter” and the Harris campaign is taking “no vote, no community for granted.” She emphasized the importance of connecting with those across the country who may find the political news cycle “overwhelming.”
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Like New Hampshire, Michigan is a swing state that will be critical for either party to secure victory in the presidential election. New Hampshire has four electoral votes while Michigan has 15 and is considered a key battleground state.
Both states have tended to vote Democratic, but former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, won Michigan in 2016, before losing the state to Biden in 2020. Trump led Biden in recent polling in New Hampshire, where Biden won in 2020 and Hillary Clinton won in 2016.
Biden’s exit was a surprise to her, Whitmer said, and she emphasized her gratitude for the “sacrifices he made on behalf of others.” But since he exited the race, Whitmer said she’s seen a renewed sense of energy and excitement, something that she doesn’t normally see this early in an election.
“It is going to be joyous, inclusive, future-forward-looking convention,” Whitmer said of the Democratic National Convention, scheduled to take place from Aug. 19-22 in Chicago. “November 5, then, after polls close, we can have a cocktail and cheers to Madam President.”