Rarely has a political debate been as entertaining as Thursday night’s showdown between Democrat Maggie Goodlander, aka U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan’s wife, and her feisty Republican opponent, Lily Tang Williams. The two are vying for the open seat to represent New Hampshire’s Second Congressional District in Washington, D.C. The candidates could hardly be more different.
According to Tang Williams’s campaign website, she was “born to illiterate working-class parents in China’s western Sichuan province just before Mao’s Cultural Revolution.” She “grew up experiencing extremely poor living conditions, food rationing, social chaos, and Communist indoctrination.”
Tang Williams arrived in the U.S. in 1988 to attend university, and since then, her trajectory has been upward and onward. Her campaign’s slogan, Fighting for Liberty, and mission statement, “Lily is an American entrepreneur and educator who is fighting to prevent the country she loves from becoming the country she left,” tell us everything we need to know about this strong, dynamic, and impressive woman.
Memories of life under the tyranny and oppression of communist party rule have left her with a profound sense of gratitude for the freedom and the opportunity she discovered in America. A professional speaker and an activist, she shares her story about the horrors of her early years to inspire people to value their American heritage.
Goodlander, born and bred in New Hampshire, currently serves as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General at the Department of Justice. She has a stellar education and a glittering resume. Her campaign website boasts, “Driven by her belief that no politician is above the law, Maggie served as counsel in the first impeachment of former President Donald Trump.”
The NH Journal, a local media outlet, reported that Goodlander “hasn’t voted in the state’s Second Congressional District since 2008.”
The two women faced off against each other on Thursday night in Manchester. The NH Journal described the debate as a “political fistfight.” What transpired was a struggle between Goodlander’s elitism and Tang Williams’s common sense, and by all accounts, common sense won.
Attorney and editor Will Chamberlain posted the following exchange on X, with the caption, “You absolutely have to watch Jake Sullivan’s wife get roasted in broken English, it will make your day.”
Among other issues discussed in the clip below, Tang Williams hits Goodlander for pretending to be a “renter” in her first interview after entering the race. Goodlander told the Boston Globe “I am a renter, and there should be more renters in Congress.” But it was soon revealed that she and Sullivan had purchased a home in a separate district of the state in 2018 for $1.2 million.
Tang told Goodlander to go back to her $2 million mansion.
According to the NH Journal, when Goodlander was asked about the persistent inflation that is crushing family budgets, she “dismissed the question.” She said, “We could take an hour to debate and talk about these costs.”
In another fiery exchange, the powerhouse goes after Goodlander for not condemning Biden after he called Trump supporters “garbage.”
Journalist Jonathan Choe described the race as “wild” in a post on X. He wrote, “Democrat Maggie Goodlander had no idea what hit her after Republican challenger Lily Tang Williams went on a rampage.”
There’s no doubt that Tang Williams aggressive posture helped her prospects on Thursday night. Hopefully, it’s not a case of too little, too late. The NH Journal reported that her campaign has been massively outspent by the Goodlander campaign. The media outlet noted that Tang Williams “has yet to air a single television ad, so Thursday’s debate marked her best shot at selling herself and her candidacy to NH-02 district voters.”
This would explain why Goodlander is currently prevailing. That said, only three polls have been conducted so far in this race. The most recent, released by Saint Anselm College on Oct. 3, showed Goodlander with a 12-point lead.
The debate proved that Goodlander is as out of touch with the average American as her husband, the repellent Jake Sullivan. There’s every reason to believe that, after Tang Williams’s strong performance, some constituents will change their minds. Whether it’s enough to sway the outcome remains to be seen.
Elizabeth writes commentary for The Washington Examiner. She is an academy fellow at The Heritage Foundation and a member of the Editorial Board at The Sixteenth Council, a London think tank. Please follow Elizabeth on X or LinkedIn.
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