MANCHESTER, N.H. (AP) — U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen emphasized her efforts to help small businesses while visiting a Manchester company on Wednesday, as her Republican challenger Scott Brown headed to a nuclear plant to highlight his energy plan.
Shaheen met privately with workers at Dyn Inc., which provides a range of services to help ensure Internet traffic is delivered quickly and reliably. She and the company’s chief operating officer told reporters afterward that legislation she helped craft helped the company expand from 20 workers to 400 in recent years. The company received funding under a provision of the 2010 Small Business Jobs Acts that created a public-private investment fund.
“Not every investment turns out, but this one really helped us grow,” said Dyn’s Graham Chynoweth, who also said Shaheen’s support for education initiatives that promote science, technology, engineering and math has helped the company recruit talented workers.
“We could hire all the engineers produced by UNH every year. We need more of them,” he said.
Shaheen has been arguing that Brown was beholden to big corporations when he represented Massachusetts in the Senate.
Brown, meanwhile, spent part of the day on a private tour of the Seabrook nuclear plant. In a campaign statement later, he said Shaheen tried to limit nuclear power while he favors a true “all of the above” energy approach to increase domestic energy supply. Republicans have pointed out that Shaheen managed a 1986 gubernatorial campaign for an anti-nuclear candidate, and are highlighting a 1987 video in which she called nuclear power dangerous.
“Energy prices in the Granite State are increasing and costs are estimated to rise as much as 50 percent this winter,” Brown said in a press release. “We simply can’t afford Senator Shaheen’s costly energy policies.”
Shaheen responded that she has voted in the Senate to support nuclear power and that anyone who is serious about addressing climate change knows that nuclear power is part of the answer.
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