I, Kelly Ayotte, of Nashua, New Hampshire.

Do solemnly swear.

Do solemnly swear.

That I will bear faith and true allegiance.

That I will bear faith and true allegiance to the United States of America.

To the United States of America.

In the state of New Hampshire and the state of New Hampshire.

And will support the Constitution.

And we will support the Constitution thereof.

Thereof.

So help me God.

So help me God.

I, I, Kelly Ayotte, do some solemnly and sincerely, solemnly and sincerely swear and affirm, swear and affirm that I will faithfully and impartially, that I will faithfully and impartially discharge and perform, discharge, and perform all the duties incumbent on me, all the duties incumbent upon me as as governor, according to the best of my abilities, according to the best of my abilities, agreeably to the rules and regulations, agreeably to the rules and regulations of this Constitution, of this Constitution and laws of the State of New Hampshire, and laws of the State of New Hampshire.

So help me God.

So help me God.

Congratulations.

Congratulations, governor.

Thank you.

Governor.

When I administer the oath of office to the Honorable Executive Council as.

Please raise your right hand and wear appropriate.

State your name and where you live.

I of.

I promise, even do solemnly swear that I will bear faith and true allegiance.

To the United States of America and the state of New Hampshire.

United States of America.

State and will support the constitutions thereof.

So help me God, the Constitution spare us.

I state your name.

Do solemnly and sincerely swear I is also pleased to hear and affirm that I will faithfully and impartially.

I will be.

Discharge and perform all the duties incumbent upon me as an executive counselor.

And on the Executive Council, according to the best of my abilities, agreeably to the rules and regulations, to the best of my abilities.

And for results and regulations of this Constitution and the laws of the State of New Hampshire and this Constitution.

So help me God.

Help me God.

Congratulations.

The Joint Convention will be attentive to the inaugural address by Governor Kelly.

I. Mr. speaker.

Madam president, Mr. Chief justice.

Honorable members of the House.

Senate.

Counselors, former governors, my fellow citizens.

It is humbling to stand before you today.

It is so wonderful for me to be able to see so many in my family who are here for this moment.

And I especially want to thank my parents for everything that they have done for me in this chamber.

I see friends, colleagues and dedicated public servants.

But what's more, I see the passion, energy and independence that makes our state different.

That drives a common sense approach to governing that has made this the best state in the nation.

We are number one for freedom, for number one for opportunity, for taxpayer return on investment, public safety and child well-being.

And we have the lowest tax burden in the nation and the lowest poverty rate in the nation.

And I'm going to give you another round of applause, because New Hampshire is moving in the right direction, because there's no one that deserves more credit for that than his four terms at the helm.

Thank Governor Chris Sununu.

Governor, thank you.

Governor, I want to thank you.

I want to thank Valerie.

I want to thank your children for your dedicated service to our state.

There's a lot of people I'm thankful for today.

I'm also thankful to have my former boss.

And also my close friend, Governor Craig Benson here.

He saw potential in me at a young age and provided me the opportunity to serve as attorney general.

But unfortunately, today, there's someone important who's not here.

We're missing our great friend, mentor, and the chairman of my first two campaigns, Governor Steve Merrill.

And I'm so proud that his wife, Heather Merrill, is here with us today.

Thank you so much, Heather, for being here.

Means a lot.

I think we both know that Steve is looking down and smiling right now.

Over the past year, we've lost some incredible public servants in our state.

Two women that I've always respected and looked up to, Ruth Griffin and Nancy Sununu.

I'm thinking of them both today.

But there's one person I can tell you.

I wouldn't be here if it weren't for him.

There is no way I would be here if it weren't for my wingman.

Joe.

And we all have Joe.

By the way, I have Joe to thank for all the great recipes suggestions I got on the campaign trail.

And I just it's my moment to set the record straight.

He snores way louder than me.

I'm just saying.

All kidding aside.

Our family's story, like many of yours, is a story of service.

Joe is a former Air Force A-10 pilot.

He's now a middle school math teacher.

Our daughter, Kate, is a cadet at the United States Air Force Academy.

And our son.

Our son, Jake, enjoys volunteering at our local food pantry.

I've spent my life in extreme.

I've spent my life in public service.

First was a murder prosecutor.

Later, as attorney general, US Senator.

But today.

Today is the honor of a life.

As your next governor.

Service can take on so many forms.

And all of us wouldn't be here today.

All of you wouldn't be here today if you weren't dedicated to serving our citizens.

Legislature is a model for the nation.

And I want to thank each and every one of you for your dedicated service to our state.

We cannot forget that service takes teaching.

It takes demonstrating.

And if we don't teach our kids, we they aren't going to learn it.

It is so important that we root our lives in something bigger than ourselves.

And it is critical for the health of our state and our communities that our next generation step up and contribute.

So one of the things I am looking forward to the most as governor is when those fourth graders, they come to the statehouse and I get to speak with them.

And I want to talk to them about how service feels, what it feels to help others, to be part of something larger than yourself.

I want them to know that there are as many ways to serve as you can imagine, and that the fulfillment that you can receive from giving all that you can to help others.

That's how Joe and I raised our kids.

And that is what I will have in my heart as your governor.

Speaker Packard, president Carson, I look forward to working with both of you.

I'm looking for both of you to marshal our strong Republican majorities.

To deliver on the promises that we made to keep our state moving in the right direction.

The results these past several years speak for themselves.

But we have more to do to deliver for everyone.

The corner office is the people's office.

It's not about me.

It's about our state.

And all of us together.

You have my word that each and every day, I will work on your behalf to do what's best for all of us.

For all of New Hampshire.

I'm going to be a governor for you.

Whether you're a Republican, a Democrat, an independent, you name it, because our state is so much bigger than a party or an ideology.

Minority leaders, Perkins and Simpson.

I want you to know that my door is always open.

Good government knows no party.

So let's show the folks that when Partizanship is at a fever pitch, we can set a different example.

I know you heard me talk a lot on the campaign trail about Massachusetts.

And the reason I did is because it's a cautionary tale.

Look at the out of control spending, tax hikes, illegal immigrant crisis, people and businesses leaving in droves.

But what's normal today in Massachusetts?

It wasn't always that way.

Year after year, their model of higher taxes and more government has made it harder for small businesses to make it.

And families to make ends meet.

On the other hand, over that same period, New Hampshire has gotten stronger, but only because of our leadership, our policies, and our commitment to taxpayers.

To the people of Massachusetts, our state neighbors.

I want you to know we love that you visit our communities, shop at our businesses, enjoy our great outdoors.

To the businesses of Massachusetts.

We'd love to have you bring your talents to the Granite State.

We're happy to show you why it's better here.

And to our friends over our northern border in Canada.

The same goes for you will welcome your business with open arms to the Granite State.

And especially to our North country.

And your bottom line will benefit if you come here as governor.

I will work tirelessly to recruit businesses to our state from near and far.

I will doggedly pursue opportunities for economic expansion, and I will bring businesses to the table to ensure that economic opportunity is available for everyone.

Because I think we can all agree that New Hampshire is truly a special place.

And I believe that our spirit of common sense cooperation is part of what makes that true.

We have extraordinary people, abilities, ideas and passions and an independence that no other state embodies like we do.

And we're tough.

Some say it's the weather.

Others say it's the granite.

I say it's our live free or die spirit.

I'm focused on tapping our deep well of talent, so that our government has the best, the best people and the best ideas.

I made it a point during this transition, to bring people from outside of government to sit with me and to give me perspective on how things are going.

I've been glad to have business leaders sit with me as we meet with commissioners, to see where things are, so that we can look for new ideas about where things should go next.

When you've got as many accolades as this state has it, it would be easy for us to rest on our successes and not strive forward with the same energy.

But nothing helps battle complacency more than bringing new people into the fold.

From my time in the private sector these past number of years, I saw firsthand the benefit of challenging the status quo of and bringing new blood to it.

So we're going to make sure that we have new people, new ideas, and new energy to get the job done for the people of New Hampshire.

And if we're going to keep our our state on the path of prosperity, if we are going to deliver for all of New Hampshire, we have to bring everyone to the table from the corner office to the legislature, to the executive council, to the private sector, to nonprofits.

And we've got to get to work immediately, because while things are great today, tomorrow holds real challenges for our state.

If we're going to remain the economic beacon of New England that we are, we need to start by tackling our housing crisis.

This is about now, and it's about our future.

Our state has so much opportunity to offer, but our lack of housing supply and sky high costs are making it increasingly difficult for individuals to tap into it.

It affects everyone from the young family looking to buy their first home, to the business that's trying to hire more workers, to the retiree who wants to stay in their home.

And selfishly, as the mom of a 20 year old and a teenager, you know, I want them to stay here.

But our young people aren't going to stay here if they can't afford to.

We need to get serious about housing production.

We need to streamline agency approvals, and we need to partner with our local communities.

The journey of 1000 steps begins with the first one.

And there isn't a simple solution to this crisis.

So we will pursue an all of the above strategy.

We have to bring everyone to the table.

The state, the local communities, the private sector so we can figure out where the opportunities are and how we can be clear to build and strengthen new and existing partnerships.

A great example of this is happening in Rochester under Mayor Paul Callahan.

This fall, I had the chance to join the mayor at a groundbreaking Breaking at Rapids at Quantico Project, a 52 unit workforce housing project.

That came together because the city stepped up.

HUD was there.

The private sector, New Hampshire housing and state government all working together.

Or look at Berlin, where the old Brown Elementary School, it was repurposed for new housing.

We need to look at state property like this and find opportunities to leverage underutilized assets on our books.

And make sure that they are using their in their highest and best use as a state.

We need to model good behavior.

If we're going to ask the same of our local communities who make the zoning decisions, that starts with overhauling the agency process to make sure that it takes no more than 60 days to get approval for a project.

The bottom line is we need to make the process as frictionless as possible.

So projects that are great for our communities are not getting halted by unnecessary red tape.

Working together, we can tackle this housing crisis head on and make sure that New Hampshire remains the best place to live.

Well, being governor is certainly a big job.

I can tell you the biggest job that I've had in my life, and I know Joe agrees, is that of being a parent, as a parent.

Our life's work is our children.

We pour into them in so many ways when they're under our roofs and when they leave, they're never far from our hearts.

As public servants, we must bring that spirit and focus to our education system.

We are in the top ten in total education funding per pupil in the country.

I think that's wonderful and we need to keep it up.

But it's not only about dollars and cents.

It's also about how best to our children learn and what kind of environment are we creating in our classrooms.

As a mother, I understand that every child learns differently and we should give each child the opportunity to be in the education setting that allows them to reach their full potential as an individual.

Public schools are critical.

I am the proud product of Nashua Public Schools, and so is Joe.

But it's not working for every child.

I applaud the work the legislature has done to expand opportunities for families through education freedom accounts.

And I look forward.

And we're going to work.

And I look forward to working with all of you on strengthening and expanding the program to ensure that more families have the freedom to put their children in the learning environment that is best for them to reach their full potential.

Joe and I talk all the time about what he sees in the classroom, with his students and he and the thousands of teachers in our state.

They're on the front lines of our education system.

Teachers know unique what's working for our students, and we need to listen to them.

That's why today, I'm announcing that we will be taking action to ban cell phones in our classrooms.

I'm sorry.

There is more.

When it comes to our kids.

One of the things that we need to make sure that we aren't doing, and unfortunately, it has happened, is that sometimes in our schools, we haven't had the hard conversations that we need to have when it comes to where our children are and how prepared they are for the next step.

These hard conversations are very, very important so that we aren't passing children along when they aren't prepared to go on to their career or on to their next studies.

This is critical.

We also need to expand in our state.

Career technical education.

This is so critical.

We need to expand, the existing public private partnerships that are already in place.

We need to make sure that we expand the pipeline at our community colleges that are in place, how important it is and what is happening.

We need that our young people to understand that there are so many amazing jobs that are open in our trades, and that those jobs need to be filled if we want to build all this housing, if we want to get things done in this state.

And these are great paying jobs, and we need to keep telling the amazing stories of the opportunities that exist in the trades, and the more and more pathways to create more pathways to a good paying career.

We need to work together on this.

This is an issue for all of us.

So one of the things I'm really proud of about New Hampshire is that our state stands as a model for the rest of the country when it comes to living within our means and balancing our budgets.

Can you imagine if Washington took a page out of our playbook?

Wow.

I'm even prouder that we do it with no income tax.

No sales tax.

With our New Hampshire advantage, and taxpayers now are keeping more money in their pockets due to the elimination of the interest and dividends tax.

And by the way, I'm I'm not going to surprise anyone when I say no income tax.

No sales tax.

Not now, not ever.

And I would also say to our local officials, don't forget the importance of keeping the tax burden as low as possible.

Property taxes are a burden in New Hampshire.

In spite of the fact that the state is sending more money than ever before down to the local level.

But while we have a lot to be proud of when it comes to financial restraint, challenges are ahead of us in the upcoming budget.

The large amount of federal funding from the American Rescue Plan is expiring.

Business revenues are coming in lower than the past several years.

And that means we have gotten to tight.

We've got to tighten our belt here in Concord.

And just like any family, what's going out has to match what's coming in.

So we are going to have to make reductions and recalibrate from the higher spending over the last several years.

We are going to have to look for better ways to do things with less money.

Now, whenever we talk about cuts, just like a family making hard decisions, there's things that we cannot skimp on protecting our most vulnerable and those in our state most in need.

Like this is non-negotiable.

Like groceries and gas for families.

This is important, but we do have to carefully look across our budgets of every agency and find savings to deal with the financial realities that we face.

I've instructed our commissioners to roll up their sleeves and find ways to rethink our approach and, where appropriate, do more with less.

We need to make sure that government is operating more like the lean process in manufacturing, where waste is eliminated each step in the process for a better result.

And to help us do this because I know there is nothing harder than politicians and asking them not to spend money.

So today I'm announcing the creation of the Commission on Government Efficiency, or as I like to call it.

I like to call it the Koch.

What can I say?

The Koch will make us smarter than ever before when it comes to saving taxpayer dollars and finding better ways to serve the people of this state.

And I can think of no better duo to lead this effort than two of the smartest business guys I know, Governor Craig Benson and Andy Cruz.

They're going to put proposals on my desk to streamline government cut spending and ensure that we're doing everything we can to create value for taxpayers.

As a former attorney general, it's not going to come any surprise to any of you that my top priority is going to be keeping our state safe, and that I will always have the backs of our law enforcement officers and our first responders.

I want to thank all of our law enforcement officers who are here today.

But if we're going to keep New Hampshire the safest state in the nation, we need to make critical investments in our Group two retirement system to make sure we retain and recruit.

If we do not make these critical investments, we will not be able to recruit and retain the people that work in our communities on nights, weekends and holidays to make sure that all of us can enjoy our quality of life.

We also need to ban sanctuary policies in our state and.

I'm counting on our legislature to do that.

This term, we've got Massachusetts illegal immigrant crisis right down the road.

And if you want to see what these dangerous policies do, not just to communities, but to a budget, they've spent $1 billion housing migrants rather than spending it, investing it on their law abiding citizens.

We cannot allow that to happen here in New Hampshire.

We're also not done on bail reform.

I firmly believe the legislature did more harm than good when they changed our bail law.

And the recent reforms just don't go far enough.

Listen, I think many of you heard me talk about this, but I did a ride along with the Manchester Police Department, and it really stuck with me.

This young officer I was with, he lost six months of work because he had his pinky nod to the bone by someone who was out on bail.

That should not have been.

I want to thank Mayor Ruai because he has worked really hard to turn the tide in Manchester.

But we need to get this law fixed so that we can keep all of our communities protected.

Thank.

And the other issue that we need to work on to improve our quality of life is our mental health system.

Our mental health system is so important to strengthening our communities and providing the families the assistance they need from loved ones.

I heard so much about these types of stories of people seeking help.

As I traveled around the state and throughout New Hampshire, I've heard about the urgent need that we need more mental health providers.

There are not enough providers, and we are going to look for ways working with our community college system and our university system to expand educational opportunities for our mental health providers.

A few months ago, I had the opportunity, along with Governor, Senator Sununu and Mayor Ruai, to visit Hope for New Hampshire Recovery in Manchester.

They're working hard to help those recovering from substance use disorder.

They share with me that many of their clients are battling addiction and mental health challenges.

At the same time, but licensing for new providers presented them a challenge when trying to grow their team.

All too often, substance use treatment and mental health care are siloed when it would be better for us to address these challenges today, to treat the whole individual.

In addition to strengthening the system itself, we also need to ensure that anyone who is facing a mental health challenge feels that they can reach out for help, and that they can come forward seeking help for your mental health is just as important as when we see a doctor.

When you're feeling sick or you have a physical injury.

We all need to work together and take care of each other.

Together, we can elevate the importance of mental health awareness and suicide prevention efforts throughout this state.

There are few groups near and dear to my heart.

You've heard about law enforcement, but there's another group that's even near and dear to my heart.

And that's those who have served in our armed forces.

Could I have all the veterans and those who have served stand up in the room today?

Please?

Thank you.

From the bottom of my heart.

I want each of you to know.

And I want every veteran in our state to know that they will have a friend in my administration.

We're going to fight for you.

We're going to help you if you need anything.

I want to hear from you.

Get in touch with us.

We will bolster the New Hampshire Department of Military and Veterans Services in their efforts to advocate for veterans.

I also know that incredibly important work also happens with our nonprofits nonprofits like swim with the mission, Easterseals veterans, Count, and so many others working together with our robust nonprofit community and with state and local leaders.

We will make sure that New Hampshire is the most veteran, friendly state in the country.

It's the greatest resource our state has besides its people is our beautiful landscape.

No other state boasts the natural beauty we do.

And there's a lot that comes with that.

From recreation to tourism to industry.

And a true gem of our state is our north country.

We need to make sure that it stays that way.

My administration is going to enforce the state's conservation easement on the Connecticut Headwaters tract.

There was negotiated on a bipartisan basis with then Governor Jeanne Shaheen and Senator Judd Gregg.

And we're going to ensure that that beautiful track of land remains open for recreation, and that it also remains open for logging and timber harvesting for the people of New Hampshire.

Similarly, there will be no landfill at Forest Lake in Dalton.

We will not allow that beautiful part of our state and that beautiful area to become a dumping ground for out-of-state trash.

It's just not going to happen.

Lastly, before I close.

And just in case you forgot, because I know it's been a few months since there haven't been all those ads on the on the TV.

But if you send me legislation that further restricts access to abortion beyond our current law, I will veto it.

New Hampshire is a beautiful, wonderful state.

You know, Joe and I were both born here.

We love this state.

And I just want to thank you for the privilege of a lifetime of serving as your next governor and protecting what makes us unique.

It's so much more important than one person or one party.

I want you to know that I will be a governor for everyone.

And please know this.

Even when we don't see eye to eye, I will always look to bring us together.

I could not be more optimistic about our future.

But at the same time, we have real challenges that we have to take head on if we want to keep our state moving in the right direction.

Voters are expecting us to find better ways to make sure that we strengthen this great state, that we grow our economy and we increase our quality of life.

We need to be proactive in securing new victories that will make our communities safer, our families more prosperous, and our daily lives more free.

I look forward to working with all of you who are here today, and everyone in the state of New Hampshire to deliver that for the greatest state in the nation.

Thank you so much.

May God bless you.