Jim Merrill

Here’s why you’ll enjoy working with him.

Jim is one of the Granite State’s most respected public affairs professionals. He serves as Managing Shareholder of Bernstein Shur’s New Hampshire office and is the New Hampshire State Director of The Bernstein Shur Group. In that role, he uses his extensive public affairs and communications experience as part of a bi-partisan public affairs firm to provide legislative, strategic, grassroots, and media solutions for corporate, non-profit, and political clients engaged in complex matters.

Over the past 20 years, Jim has also served as a senior advisor to the presidential campaigns of George W. Bush, Mitt Romney, and Marco Rubio, helping each candidate navigate New Hampshire’s historic and demanding First in the Nation presidential primary. Jim has significant State House experience as well, having served for over two years on the staff of former New Hampshire Governor Stephen E. Merrill.

Working with a wide array of local, regional, and national clients, Jim develops a plan unique to the circumstances, creates a persuasive message, and identifies targeted audiences. By leveraging his networks and years of campaign experience, Jim helps his clients reach and influence those targeted audiences through innovative legislative, communications, and grassroots strategies, while managing each element of the campaign to allow his clients to focus on their daily business. He regularly works with members of the media and is often sought out for comment and context on emerging political and policy issues.

In 2023-2024, Jim was named by Best Lawyers in America as one of New Hampshire’s top government relations attorneys.  In 2021, Jim was recognized by New Hampshire Business Review as one of New Hampshire’s 200 Most Influential Business Leaders. He was recognized in 2009 by Business NH Magazine as one of New Hampshire’s “25 Leaders for the Future”; in 2008 by New Hampshire Magazine as a “Rising Star”; and in 2004 by the New Hampshire Union Leader as one of the state’s emerging “Forty Under 40” business and community leaders.

Jim presently serves on the Bernstein Shur Board of Directors, the Business and Industry Association of NH Board of Directors, the Union Leader Corp. Board of Directors, the Greater Manchester Mental Health Center Board of Directors, the Advisory Board of the Warren B. Rudman Center for Justice, Leadership and Public Service at UNH Law, and the Advisory Board of the NH Institute of Politics at St. Anselm College. He is also a Trustee of the Nackey S. Loeb School of Communications, serving on the fundraising committee for the school’s annual “First Amendment Award” event for the past ten years. He previously served as a director of Easter Seals NH, where he chaired the annual fundraising campaign three times; the Daniel Webster Council-Boy Scouts of America, whose annual “Distinguished Citizen Award” fundraising event he has chaired three times; and the McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center.

In his former life, Jim was:

• A legislative aide and Liaison to the Executive Council for New Hampshire Governor Stephen E. Merrill.
• A staff member at the New Hampshire Departments of Health and Human Services, handling legislative and policy matters.
• A zoning and land-use attorney crafting legal and political solutions for a variety of real estate clients.

When Jim isn’t working, he is…

Spending time with his wife, Kristy, and their two children and two dogs, following all things Boston sports related, and working on yet another fixer upper project in their 100-year-old house in Manchester.