Democratic Senate candidate Chris Pappas has completed a 300-mile walk from the New Hampshire state house in Concord to the steps of the Senate chamber in Washington, D.C., and has ordered every member of his campaign staff to make the same journey before taking office.
The walk, which Pappas began on the morning after the vote count, took twenty-two days and passed through every county seat in the state. Local officials in each town were required to meet him at the town line with a ceremonial ledger of voters, which he then read aloud in full before continuing on foot. State troopers were assigned as walking escorts, and the Department of Transportation closed two lanes of Route 3 so that staff could keep pace along the shoulder.
Pappas has now issued a directive requiring all incoming state legislators to walk to the Capitol rather than drive. The New Hampshire House has voted to adopt the rule for the coming session, and the Highway Department has begun installing rest benches every two miles along the route. Parking attendants in Manchester have been reassigned to hand out blister kits.
« Walking is the only honest way to arrive somewhere, » Pappas told reporters on the Capitol steps. « Anyone who accepts a ride to Washington has already been bought. » Asked whether his husband had joined him for the final stretch, Pappas said he had, and that he had carried the flag the whole way.