The popular Republican reveals what’s next after ruling the key state for eight years

CONCORD, NH – After eight years in charge of the swing state of New Hampshire, Republican Chris Sununu left office a few days ago with some of the highest approval ratings among 50 American governors.

Sununu, who won elections and re-elections four times [New Hampshire and neighboring Vermont are the only states in the nation where governors serve two-year terms]he gave credit to his team.

“If you want to be good as a CEO, you have to surround yourself with great people,” Sununu said in a national digital exclusive interview with Fox News during his last full day in office on Wednesday.

Asked about his tenure in office, Sununu said, “As with anything in life, you want to make sure you leave it better than you found it. And I couldn’t be more proud of where we’ve come in the last eight years.”

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“The key is always to find a way to make it work for the citizens. That’s it. That’s the job. You have to be results-driven, regardless of the hand you’re dealt, the politics you’re dealt, the environment,” Sununu said.

“So I think in New Hampshire we’ve done it pretty well,” he said.

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His successor as governor, fellow Republican and former senator Kelly Ayotte, agreed.

Ayotte, who advocated the continuation of the Sununu program, praised her predecessor.

“New Hampshire is moving in the right direction and no one deserves more credit for that after four terms at the helm than Gov. Chris Sununu. Thank you, Governor,” Ayotte said.

Longtime New Hampshire Democratic Party Chairman Ray Buckely, a vocal critic of Sununu, disagreed as he pointed to “years of failed Republican politics” under the retiring governor.

Sununu, who announced last year that he would not seek an unprecedented fifth two-year term as governor, reiterated what he has said for months, that he is “very much looking forward to getting back into the private sector, maybe into private equity or boards of directors.”

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Sununu, 50, who was the nation’s youngest governor when he was first elected in 2016, has also repeatedly ruled out a 2026 New Hampshire Senate run for months.

“I’m not planning to run for anything now. Really not, at least for the next two, four, six years,” he emphasized.

But Sununu, who in 2023 seriously considered the 2024 Republican presidential nomination before deciding against it, hasn’t completely closed the door on another run for office in the future.

“Who knows what will happen later, but it will be very soon and nothing, nothing that I plan, nothing that my family would tolerate in the short term,” he said.

Sununu, who has been a regular guest on cable news networks and Sunday talk shows in recent years, is considering a formalized media role.

“I’m definitely talking to a few different networks that have come in and asked me to do certain things, and I’m going to continue to do things and help them out. Is there a long-term plan to do a little bit more with the network or the show or something? I’m definitely interested in that. “, he said.

Sununu, who comes from a prominent political family (his father John H. Sununu served three terms as governor and later as chief of staff to President George HW Bush, and his older brother John E. Sununu was a congressman and senator), emphasized, “I I’m definitely going to want to continue to scratch that political itch in some way, not necessarily running for office, but staying involved, having a voice, helping the party.”

But it is questionable whether the party, once again firmly under the control of President-elect Trump, will want Sununu’s help.

Sununu, a highly vocal critic of Trump following the then-president’s failed attempts to overturn his 2020 election loss to President Biden, ended up endorsing Trump’s rival Nikki Haley in the race for the GOP presidential nomination in 2024. Sununu became a top surrogate for Haley, former the two-term South Carolina governor who served as UN ambassador in Trump’s first administration.

But after Trump clinched the Republican presidential nomination, Sununu said he would vote for him.

“Donald Trump is the boss of the party and he’s the voice of the Republican Party, and I have to say I think he’s doing a pretty good job in the first few months,” Sununu told Fox News. “The people he’s nominated to those positions. They’re moving fast. They’re not slowing down. The efforts with DOGE (Trump’s planned Department of Government Efficiency), I think, have been phenomenal.”

And he praised the politician whom he had criticized for a long time.

“Give the president credit. He deserved it. He won the primary. He got the votes,” Sununu said. “He laid the groundwork for him to be successful, not only in the primaries, but he really galvanized a whole new working-class voter for the Republican Party as the general election went on. So he did a phenomenal job there.”

But he said the GOP is bigger than any politician, even Trump.

“It’s not just Republican Donald Trump or Republican Chris Sununu. The Republican Party is big. Man. It’s really, really, big, whether you have fiscal conservatives like me, social moderates, whatever it is, even some of the more extreme sides things, everyone has a place here and a voice.”

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And Sununu is very optimistic about the future of the GOP.

“It’s a really big party and it’s growing. I mean, it’s really growing, and November 5th was a big example of that. So I’m very optimistic about where the Republican Party is going with Donald Trump, with other leaders .JD Vance, everybody’s coming for table, put in their two cents and make sure it’s all about America.”