Here’s how Trump’s 2nd term has impacted the region | Local News

Now, a year out from Trump’s January 2025 inauguration, supporters say he’s followed through on campaign promises. Opponents argue affordability has fallen by the wayside.

For locals on both sides, federal moves in the past 12 months have had wide-ranging effects on everything from summer days at the lake to how often they have to fill out Medicaid paperwork and what it costs to run a small business.

From Trump’s first executive orders to what’s happened so far in 2026, here’s a look at the local impact.

U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., said that’s something her constituents remain concerned about.

“Since President Trump took office one year ago, I have spoken with Granite Staters across the state and across the political divide about how the administration’s actions have made life more difficult,” Shaheen said in an email last week. “Families and small businesses are worried about rising costs.”

This week, Trump threatened higher tariffs against several European countries if they don’t help him acquire Greenland — an autonomous territory of the Kingdom of Denmark, a U.S. ally. He later walked back that threat.

Speaking to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Wednesday, Trump credited his tariff policies with improving the U.S. economy.

He also maintains tariffs are taxes paid by foreign nations and businesses. In reality, Americans have thus far borne most of the cost of the tariffs, according to a new study by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy.

Congresswoman Maggie Goodlander, D-N.H., said she believes the tariffs are “really bottom line costs to working families in New Hampshire.”

She said one small business she’s been in touch with has already paid about $1 million in tariffs.

Republican state Reps. John Hunt, of Rindge, and Jennifer Rhodes, of Winchester, were not reachable for comment by Wednesday afternoon.

Rep. Sly Karasinski, a Republican from Swanzey, was not available for comment Wednesday but said he supports the president.

Cuts to federal programs and grants that fund services — coupled with threats of cuts — have left many Monadnock Region organizations in limbo.

The federal hiring freeze had a tangible impact on the normal summer activities of many locals.

Spanning from Jan. 20, 2025, to October, the freeze prevented recreation areas throughout the Monadnock Region from hiring their typical seasonal staffs, leading to limited access and reduced services at area mainstays like Otter Brook Park in Keene, Surry Mountain Dam and MacDowell Lake Park in Peterborough.

Cuts and pauses on federal funding also led to confusion and new challenges for area programs and projects.

An annual grant Cheshire County uses to buy bulletproof vests for sheriff’s deputies took six months longer than normal to process, according to County Administrator Chris Coates.

It eventually came through, like funding for some of the other local projects and grants put under review. Others remain in limbo.

For example, the county installed solar panels on a barn at the county-run Maplewood Nursing Home, a project for which it had been awarded $72,000 from the federal government under the Biden administration.

That money’s now “under review,” Coates said.

Funding changes continue to put pressure on services in the Monadnock Region.

Earlier this month, child care providers braced for a potential freeze in funds that help families of low income with day care tuition after the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services froze that money in five states in response to what the administration described as widespread fraud. The freeze has not yet applied to New Hampshire.

While not referring to a specific program or expense, Cheshire County Republican Committee Chair Anne Farrington, a Keene resident, told The Sentinel last week she feels reducing federal spending is a good thing for Granite Staters.

“The identification of long-standing financial corruption and abuse in federal aid programs has begun. This will reduce the waste of taxpayer dollars and help slow the growth of the national debt,” Farrington said in an email. “This directly helps everyone in New Hampshire who pays federal taxes, as well as those who are legitimately entitled to receive payments from the federal government.”

Escalating rhetoric about immigration began to turn into action once Trump took office.

The administration has repeatedly said its immigration enforcement efforts are aimed at removing violent criminals who are in the country illegally.

Farrington said that’s making the country safer.

“It also reduces the expense required to monitor, house, feed, and overall help support people who have entered the country illegally — which affects every community,” Farrington wrote.

Throughout the fall, Troy police, who partnered with ICE last year, made 12 immigration arrests in Troy and Keene, mostly stemming from traffic stops.

Many local residents vocally supported the department, while others expressed concerns, asking the town’s selectboard to provide more oversight.

The immigration crackdown also impacted Apple Hill, the Nelson chamber music center, which said in April it was seeing fewer applications from foreign students, and more difficulty in getting visas for those who did apply.

In July, a Peterborough man who is a legal resident of the U.S. was stopped at the border while trying to return home from visiting family in Canada. Border authorities told him a marijuana charge from the early 2000s barred him from entry to the U.S. He spent several weeks in Canada while an attorney worked to bring him home.

According to County Administrator Coates, the immigration situation has directly impacted staffing levels at Maplewood.

The county is partnered with Visa Solutions to bring in staff from outside the U.S., but Coates said being able to bring them on board has proven a challenge.

One Canadian was supposed to have their first day last week at Maplewood, where they’d committed to work for three years. They had been approved at the border but, despite applying through the proper channels, never got a social security card to allow them to work, according to Coates.

He said another person, who is Brazilian, was supposed to join the staff from Canada, but her visa is now on hold for 180 days due to an order from the Trump administration.

“We are trying to do everything to follow the process that’s been put in place, but we keep getting roadblocks put in our way,” he said.

Impact on city and county budgets

According to Coates, tariffs contributed to higher expenses expected for the county in 2026, including the costs of required services like the jail and nursing home.

Two Keene city councilors said changes made by the federal government in the past year have also contributed to the rising cost of the city’s long-planned downtown infrastructure project.

Tariffs and escalated immigration enforcement have led to “uncertainty and volatility” in the construction industry, said Councilor Randy Filiault, with a direct impact on the project.

Contractors are having trouble staffing projects, and have to charge more to offset the cost of tariffs, he said.

City Councilor Ed Haas said the downtown infrastructure project and other infrastructure projects have been affected by uncertainty stemming from changes to federal funding of grants.

In the case of the downtown infrastructure project, delays to the timeline have also contributed to increasing costs.

Meanwhile, the city is also being impacted by what Filiault described as “downshifting” — belt tightening at the state and federal levels that forces local governments to cover more costs.

That’s not new under the Trump administration, but the situation is becoming more dire, according to Filiault.

“At the city level and the school level and the county level … local governments can’t sustain these cuts anymore. There’s nowhere to go,” he said. “… We’re trying to do more with less, and it’s an impossible situation.”

The government shutdown in the fall affected thousands of federal workers in New Hampshire, and threatened a host of programs dependent on federal funding.

Community groups stepped up to fill gaps when SNAP funding lapsed, leaving some people without access to enough food.

U.S. Sens. Shaheen and Maggie Hassan, both of New Hampshire, were among the Democrats who ultimately broke ranks to end the shutdown.

In health care, local providers worked to counter confusion stemming from changes to national health and vaccine guidance.

Changes to Medicaid eligibility in the federal budget bill that passed in July and rising premiums due to the end of some Affordable Care Act subsidies are likely to cause significant problems for Cheshire County, according to Coates.

He said both the nursing home and Cheshire EMS could see more costs never being recouped.

Republican supporters of changes to Medicaid have said those changes are intended to make sure the program is sustainable so that people who need support from it can access it in the future.

N.H. Rep. Rita Mattson, R-Dublin, said the economy has been a bright spot for her constituents in the past year.

“Gas prices are coming down, everything’s coming down,” she said.

When Trump took office last year, average gas prices sat at about $3.01, according to data from the Federal Reserve. As of Jan. 12, prices were at $2.80.

The price of food is up about 3 percent from a year ago, according to the same data — a much slower rate of growth than in the past few years.

But Goodlander said she feels the pain that Granite Staters went to the polls in 2024 to seek relief from hasn’t been treated, noting that she continues to hear from constituents about high housing and energy costs, a shortage of affordable child care, and rising health care costs.

And she said Congress’ ability to work on issues like affordable health care and housing have been stymied by Trump’s broad interpretation of executive authority.

“In a Republican-controlled government across the board, the President has usurped often and persistently thwarted Congress from doing its most basic duties under the Constitution.”