New Hampshire governor calls out "soft on crime" Massachusetts while signing changes to bail law
New Hampshire Governor Kelly Ayotte signed a bill rolling back bail reform in the Granite State, drawing another distinction between how New Hampshire and Massachusetts do business.
"New Hampshire, we're focused on public safety. We don't want a revolving door," Ayotte told reporters at the bill signing. "We've seen some of the high-profile cases in Massachusetts that were even just reported on yesterday. We can't let dangerous people, rapists, people who have assaulted other people out on our streets. We also need to work cooperatively with immigration services."
The day before the bill signing, Governor Ayotte wrote on X, "While Massachusetts continues their soft-on-crime policies, we're keeping our communities safe," after retweeting a WBZ story which found that three accused child rapists who were wanted by ICE in Massachusetts were released on bails ranging from $7500 to zero.
Changes to New Hampshire bail law
The bill requires that a judge set bail for suspects charged with a list of serious crimes, instead of bail commissioners or magistrates who were used when judges were not available. It also allows law enforcement to hold an offender for up to 36 hours without bail before arraignment.
In 2018, New Hampshire passed a bail reform law meant to keep fewer defendants behind bars before trial simply because they could not afford bail. As a result, Belknap County Sheriff William Wright argues, law enforcement would encounter repeat offenders.
"We're arresting the same person on one charge six, seven, eight times before they're actually heard in the court for the actual case," Wright said.
Concerns about bail changes
The ACLU of New Hampshire does not buy that argument.
"If law enforcement disagrees with the bail commissioner's decision, there's nothing that prevents them from promptly going to court and saying, I disagree, and I think bail needs to be imposed," said Gilles Bissonnette, the legal director for the ACLU of New Hampshire.
Bissonnette worries that bail change will increase the number of defendants who will be unable to afford bail.
"We are going back to that time, unfortunately, where people are going to be detained simply because they can't pay money that really aren't a danger or aren't a flight risk," he said.
Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey did not respond to a request for comment on Governor Ayotte's comments on Massachusetts, but she did push back on claims by the Trump administration that the Commonwealth does not cooperate with federal authorities.
"We're not a sanctuary state. I'm a former prosecutor and attorney general. I led the New England strike force on fentanyl. So, I spent a good part of my career investigating, prosecuting, and putting bad guys away. I continue as governor to ensure that state and local law enforcement are working with federal agencies and federal law enforcement," Healey said.
New Hampshire's bail law goes into effect 180 days from its signing on September 21.
