Ann McLane Kuster

Early life and education

Kuster was born in Concord in 1956. Both of her parents were politicians. Her father Malcolm McLane was Mayor of Concord, a member of the New Hampshire Executive Council, and an owner of Wildcat Mountain Ski Area. In 1972, he ran for Governor of New Hampshire as an independent. He got 20 percent of the vote, allowing Republican Mel Thomson to win the election with a plurality of 40 percent of the vote. In the 1976 presidential election, he endorsed Republican Gerald Ford. In the 1980 presidential election, he endorsed Republican turned independent John B. Anderson. Her mother, Susan McLane, was elected to the New Hampshire Senate as a Republican. In 1980, she ran for New Hampshire's 2nd congressional district, but got second place in the crowded Republican primary with 25 percent. Judd Gregg won with 34 percent of the vote, whilst Charles Bass (whom Kuster defeated in 2012) came third with 22%. Kuster's great grandfather, John McLane, was Governor of New Hampshire from 1905–1907. He was elected as a Republican in 1904 with 58 percent of the vote, defeating Democrat Henry Hollis.

Kuster graduated from Dartmouth College in 1978 with a degree in Environmental Policy and from Georgetown University Law Center in 1984.

Legal career

After college, Kuster became the director of Rath, Young and Pignatelli's education and nonprofit law practice group.

Kuster was a consultant and owner of Newfound Strategies LLC, "a consulting and training practice that works with nonprofit clients to maximize their effectiveness and sustainability through fundraising, outreach and strategic planning."

She has worked previously as an "of-counsel" partner in the Concord law firm of Rath, Young and Pignatelli. Kuster's legal practice at Rath, Young and Pignatelli focused on education, nonprofit and health care policy. Kuster has also worked as an adoption attorney, having been involved in more than 300 adoptions since 1984. She is a member of the American Academy of Adoption Attorneys.

Kuster has served as chair and board member of the Capitol Center for the Arts and as a founder and vice chair of the Women's Fund of New Hampshire. She has also served on the boards of the N.H. Charitable Foundation, New Hampshire Public Radio, Child and Family Services of NH, the Alumni Council and Tucker Foundation at Dartmouth College, and Womankind Counseling Center.

Lobbying career

From 1989 to 2009, Kuster worked as a lobbyist in the state of New Hampshire, earning more than $1.3 million in fees from various businesses and non-profits. $460,000 of that money came from ambulatory surgical centers, $150,000 from investment companies, and $145,000 from pharmaceutical manufacturers and their association. In an editorial, the Union Leader stated, “she’s also a career lobbyist, not in dreaded Washington, but in Concord. But she’s refused to use that word.” Rather, Kuster referred to herself as a "public policy advocate.

Kuster's career has also involved many years of lobbying on behalf of clients such as Merck Vaccines; Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) -- with whom she helped created the NH Medication Bridge program, a public-private partnership which provides free prescriptions to patients in need; Fidelity Investments - with whom she helped create the NH UNIQUE College Savings Plan to help families save money for college tax-free; Dartmouth College and Medical School; NARAL Pro-Choice New Hampshire; Bedford Ambulatory Surgical Center; and the New Hampshire College & University Council.

According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Kuster took $192,553 in contributions from lawyers and lobbyists during the 2010 election cycle.

Rohypnol

In 1998, while working on behalf of Hoffman-LaRoche, Inc., a pharmaceutical manufacturer, Kuster lobbied against HB 1553. The bill would have reclassified three drugs, including Rohypnol, linked to date rapes, assaults, robberies, and driving offenses, as Schedule 1 Controlled Substances, making them illegal to possess. The University of New Hampshire Sexual Harassment and Rape Prevention Program’s coordinator called the rescheduling of Rohypnol an “imperative,” as the drug “poses an imminent and serious threat to public health and safety.”

Early political career

Kuster served on the New Hampshire steering committees of the presidential campaigns for Barack Obama in 2007-08 and John Kerry in 2003-04. Kuster also served as Co-Chair with Peggo Hodes (the wife of Congressman Paul Hodes) of New Hampshire Women for Obama. Kuster was a 2008 delegate for Barack Obama at the Democratic National Convention in Denver and a member of the 2004 New Hampshire Delegation in Boston. In 2000, Kuster received the Eleanor Roosevelt Award for dedicated service to the Democratic Party at the local, state and national levels.

According to the Concord Monitor, "For 20 years before her campaign announcement, she worked the halls of the New Hampshire State House as a lobbyist representing a range of clients. Kuster's government-relations work accounted for perhaps half of the comprehensive legal services she offered, in addition to her practice arranging private adoptions." Kuster's longtime lobbying clients included Dartmouth Medical School, which receives monies from the State of New Hampshire to reserve places in Dartmouth Medical School for students from New Hampshire. Working on behalf of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, Kuster's most prominent project was helping to create the NH Medication Bridge program which provides free prescription medication to low-income patients earning under or near the poverty level. Kuster also fought proposed legislation that would prohibit drug makers from offering discounted drugs unless the discounts were offered to every buyer; the bill failed in subcommittee to strong bipartisan opposition. Kuster earned an average of $65,000 annually from 1989 to 2009 for this activity, according to reports she filed with the State of New Hampshire.

Kuster's long involvement in lobbying was a source of controversy during the Democratic primary for New Hampshire's 2nd congressional district. and her opponent in the general election, Congressman Charles Bass, also worked for the lobbying arm of a law firm Devine Millimet between his terms in Congress.

Libya

At a town hall meeting located at the New Hampshire Jewish Federation in Manchester, N.H. in November 2013, Kuster fielded questions relating to the Middle East. After reading a written question regarding establishing a select committee to investigate the terrorist attack in Benghazi, Kuster indicated that the questions "should stay focused on the Middle East." Audience members contended that Libya is located in the "Middle East". The video quickly went viral across the Internet, gaining more than 260,000 views in less than 48 hours.

Health care

Kuster supports the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA).

Elections

In 2010 Kuster ran for New Hampshire's 2nd congressional district against Republican nominee Charles Bass, Libertarian nominee Howard Wilson, and Independent candidate Tim vanBlommesteyn. It was an open seat as Democratic incumbent Paul Hodes was running for the U.S. Senate.

Kuster was defeated by Bass 48%-47%, a difference of just 3,550 votes.

Kuster ran for New Hampshire's Second District against Representative Charles Bass again in the 2012 general election. She received the endorsement of Democracy for America, and was selected as one of their Dean Dozen.

On November 6, 2012, Kuster defeated Bass 50%-45%. In doing so, she became a part of the nation's first all-female congressional delegation. This delegation included current Senior Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Junior Senator Kelly Ayotte, and Representative Carol Shea-Porter, who was defeated in the 2014 elections.

Kuster ran for re-election in 2014, defeating Republican opponent and State Representative Marilinda Garcia 55-45%. Kuster was a member of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Frontline Program, designed to help protect vulnerable Democratic incumbents heading into the 2014 election. The primary election took place on September 9, 2014, with the general election held on November 4, 2014. Republicans who ran in Kuster's district included State Representative Garcia and former State Senator Gary Lambert. Former U.N. ambassador John Bolton and his super PAC spent $30,000 on a two-week television ad buy opposing Kuster and her response to the 2012 attack in Benghazi, Libya.

Kuster ran for re-election in 2016, defeating her Republican opponent, former State Representative Jim Lawrence, 50-45%.

Legislation

Representative Kuster has sponsored 11 bills of her own, including:

Committee assignments

Personal life

Kuster is married to Brad Kuster, a fellow lawyer. They have two sons.

Kuster and her mother, State Senator Susan McLane, coauthored a book titled The Last Dance: Facing Alzheimer's with Love and Laughter. After her mother's death, Kuster and her father, Malcolm McLane, toured New Hampshire speaking publicly about aging and Alzheimer's disease and the burdens on families and caregivers that result.

Property taxes

In February 2013, WMUR-TV reported that Kuster had been late paying property taxes on a home in Hopkinton starting in 2010 and had failed to pay two tax bills for a property in Jackson in 2012. Following the report, Kuster stated that the bills were being paid. Kuster, whose assets have been estimated at $1.8 million, was reported to have been late on taxes six separate times since 2010, totaling $40,000 in back taxes. Kuster ultimately paid the taxes. When asked why she was consistently late, Kuster stated, “Life is expensive.”