CONCORD, N.H. (AP) – A spokesman for Health and Human Services Commissioner John Stephen has been reprimanded for calling Democratic Gov. John Lynch a hypocrite.
Greg Moore, the agency’s legislative director and spokesman, took exception to Lynch’s singling out of the department during a budget request hearing last week. Lynch opened the hearing by noting that requests from state agencies exceed the current budget by $1.2 billion, an amount he called unacceptable, and that Health and Human Services alone is requesting $428 million more. Much of the additional spending comes from federal sources.
After Foster’s Daily Democrat published an editorial applauding Lynch for calling for fiscal constraint, Moore sent an e-mail to the newspaper pointing that the budget request submitted by the Executive Office increased by nearly 21 percent.
“If 13 percent is too big and worthy of being called out by your paper, what does that make 20.56 percent? I guess Governor Frugal is really Governor Hypocrite,” he wrote. “Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. What leadership!”
Stephen Moore will be “officially reprimanded,” and that another incident would warrant termination.
“The references he made about the governor are absolutely unacceptable. I am taking steps to ensure something like this does not happen again,” Stephen said Wednesday. “There will be an official reprimand. I have informed the staff this will not be tolerated again.”
Lynch spokeswoman Pamela Walsh said the governor used Stephen’s agency as an example but was speaking to all state agencies. As for the Executive Office budget request, she said that increase comes primarily from the Office of Information Technology. The request for the governor’s staff comes to just over the $1.5 million authorized for this year, she said.
Moore, who previously served as campaign spokesman for Stephen’s failed 2002 Republican congressional bid, apologized for the e-mail Wednesday.
“That was over the top. It was too much on my part,” Moore said. “I was totally out of line and I’m personally embarrassed by this. From my perspective, it was driven by an editorial that had inaccurate information.”
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