Trump’s former ambassador predicts a Senate return, potentially setting up a key rematch of the state’s campaign for change

RYE, NH – EXCLUSIVE – Scott Brown is on the move.

The former senator from neighboring Massachusetts and 2014 Republican Senate candidate from New Hampshire, who then served four years as US ambassador to New Zealand in 2014. President-elect Trump first administration, is seriously considering a 2026 bid to return to Congress.

If Brown goes ahead and launches a campaign in the coming months, it could set up a high-profile rematch with Democrats. his Jeanne Shaheen, in what would likely be a competitive and costly Senate showdown in a key swing state.

Brown, 65, who competed in nine triathlons this year and averages 40 to 50 concerts a year as singer and guitarist for the rock group Scott Brown and the Diplomats, is doing more than just thinking about running . to return to the Senate.

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In recent weeks he has met with different Republican and conservative groups in New Hampshire.

Brown, in a nationally exclusive interview with Fox News Digital, said she’s doing her “due diligence, meeting with everyone and everybody. So you’re going to see me around a lot, whether it’s parades, triathlons, my rock band , getting together and getting out and really learning.”

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And Brown is targeting New Hampshire’s Democratic congressional delegation.

“What really bothers me is how they’ve basically covered (President) Joe Biden for the last four years, what they’ve done or not done on the border, what they’ve done and not done on inflation, and they’re completely out of touch with what we want here in New Hampshire And the more I think about it, I think we can do better,” Brown argued.

Brown made headlines in 2010 when the state senator from the blue state of Massachusetts won a special US Senate elections to serve out the remainder of the late Democratic Senator Ted Kennedy’s term.

After losing re-election in 2012 to now-Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Brown eventually moved to New Hampshire, the state where she had spent the early years of her childhood and where her family had roots dating back to colonial times. He launched a Senate campaign months later and narrowly lost to Shaheen in the 2014 election.

After hosting almost every Republican presidential candidate in the 2016 cycle at conference events he called “No BS Backyard BBQs,” Brown finally endorsed Trump in the weeks leading up to New Hampshire’s early primary to the nation After Trump was elected president, he appointed Brown as the US ambassador to New Zealand, where the former senator served for four years.

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Returning to New Hampshire at the end of the first Trump administration, Brown supported his wife Gail, a former television news reporter and anchor, as she ran for Congress in 2022.

And the Browns also remained politically active in other ways, once again hosting many of the Republican presidential candidates, as well as Robert F. Kennedy Jr., at their “Backyard Barbecues” during the 2024 presidential cycle.

In May 2023, he was asked if he would consider another run for the Senate, Brown told Fox News Digital “of course”.

Now, as Brown considers another call to the Senate, the timing isn’t working for him.

Brown entered late in the 2014 campaign, just seven months before Election Day.

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This time, he stressed: “I have a long track. Obviously I didn’t have it the first time, and I’m going to do what I’ve been doing for almost a decade, go around, meet with the people involved. in the process “.

During his first bid for the Senate, which came months after he changed his residence to New Hampshire, he repeatedly faced accusations of carpetbagging.

Last week, a New Hampshire progressive group took aim at Brown.

Amplify NH said in a statement that “the gentleman from Massachusetts is looking for another shot at power and is once again running for Senate in New Hampshire.”

Brown says he’s not worried.

“We’ve had a home here for over three decades, and we’ve been engaged full-time here for over a decade. So now I think that’s old news.”

And he argued that New Hampshire’s congressional delegation “votes 100 percent with Massachusetts.”

While Shaheen ran for re-election in 2020, winning by roughly 16 points, and Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan won re-election in 2022 by nearly nine points, Senate Republicans are eyeing New Hampshire in 2026 as they seek to expand their 53-53. 47 majority in the chamber. New Hampshire, along with Georgia and Michigan, will likely be heavily targeted by Senate Republicans.

Trump lost New Hampshire last month, but cut his deficit to just three points in his showdown with Vice President Kamala Harris, from a seven-point loss to President Biden in the Granite State in 2020.

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And the GOP kept an open gubernatorial seat in the party’s hands — former Sen. Kelly Ayotte succeeded longtime Gov. Chris Sununu — while expanding its majorities in the New State House and Senate. Hampshire.

Asked if he would like Trump to join him on the campaign trail in the Granite State if he decides to run, Brown said “if he has time, of course.”

And pointing to Trump, Brown said he “not only helped, obviously, nationally, but he helped here in New Hampshire.”

Shaheen has not yet announced whether he will seek another term in the Senate. That decision is likely to come early in the new year.

But Shaheen, a former three-term governor of New Hampshire, will serve next month as the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the first woman to hold one of the top two positions on the powerful panel.

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Shaheen will also turn 78 next month.

When asked if age would be a factor in a possible Shaheen-Brown rematch, Brown said he liked Shaheen and greatly appreciated his support during his confirmation as ambassador to New Zealand, but added that “surely it depends on her.”

“I’m 65 years old. I can’t believe it. I feel like I’m 40. My wife says I look like I’m 12,” he added.