TRENTON, N.J. (AP) \u2014 New Jersey voters are electing their next governor Tuesday in a race that will reveal whether Democrats maintain their grip on a state that has been reliably blue but has shown signs of shifting toward Republicans in recent years.<\/p>\n
Jack Ciattarelli, a former state legislator endorsed by President Donald Trump<\/a>, is trying to become New Jersey\u2019s first Republican governor since 2018. He faces U.S. Rep. Mikie Sherrill, a Democrat in her fourth term in Congress who would become the state\u2019s second female governor if elected.<\/p>\n The outcome could gauge how the electorate is responding to Trump\u2019s policies and whether some groups of core Democratic Party voters still have faith in the party\u2019s leadership.<\/p>\n Ciattarelli, 63, is running for governor for the third time. He lost a Republican primary in 2017, then narrowly lost the general election in 2021 to Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy, who is term-limited.<\/p>\n This time, he has cast the election as an opportunity for voters to oust Democrats who have controlled both the governor\u2019s office and the state Legislature for nearly eight years. He\u2019s touted his background as a business owner with deep roots in the state and experience as a state and local elected official. He says his close relationship with Trump will help New Jersey.<\/p>\n \u201cMake no mistake. We cannot afford another four years of Phil Murphy\u2019s failed policies,\u201d Ciattarelli said during a rally earlier in the campaign.<\/p>\n Sherrill, 53, built her campaign around pushing back against Trump. She recently seized on the administration\u2019s decision to abruptly freeze funding<\/a> for a multibillion-dollar project to replace the aging rail tunnels that connect New Jersey to New York City beneath the Hudson River.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is what we\u2019re fighting for in this country \u2014 to make sure that we have a president who has to follow the law,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Sherrill also has leaned into her biography, which includes serving as a U.S. Navy officer and helicopter pilot and working as a prosecutor. She cast Ciattarelli as someone who would go along with Trump\u2019s actions no matter what. If elected, Sherrill would join Christine Todd Whitman, who served from 1994 to 2001, as the state\u2019s only female governors.<\/p>\n In last year\u2019s presidential election, former Vice President Kamala Harris won New Jersey, but Trump shaved his margin of loss significantly, shifting Hispanic voters toward him<\/a>. The Democrats\u2019 registration edge has eroded in recent years.<\/p>\n Ciattarelli has walked a fine line on Trump, praising him and giving the president an \u201cA\u201d grade, but he\u2019s also campaigned to attract Hispanic voters<\/a>.<\/p>\n While he has said he supports the president\u2019s effort to end birthright citizenship<\/a>, he\u2019s also talked about a \u201cpathway to recognition,\u201d and giving driver\u2019s licenses and Social Security numbers to immigrants who are in the country illegally but do not have a criminal record. That puts him at odds with the Trump administration\u2019s current policies. <\/p>\n Ciattarelli has not explained what he means by a \u201cpathway to recognition.\u201d New Jersey already issues driver\u2019s licenses to some immigrants in the country illegally and the federal government issues Social Security numbers.<\/p>\n With a close race possible, the U.S. Department of Justice announced it would monitor polling sites<\/a> in Passaic County, a former Democratic stronghold that Trump won in 2024. New Jersey Attorney General Matt Platkin, a Democrat, called the monitoring program \u201chighly inappropriate\u201d after it was requested by the state Republican Party.<\/p>\n Sherrill and Ciattarelli debated<\/a>two times<\/a> and have been crisscrossing the state, meeting voters at diners and leaning on surrogates to get their messages out. Democratic governors Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania and Wes Moore of Maryland, as well as former President Barack Obama,<\/a> all came to New Jersey to rally voters for Sherrill.<\/p>\n Trump campaigned for Ciattarelli in telephone rallies and has been urging voters to back the Republican, saying he would \u201crapidly\u201d bring energy and other costs down, without specifying how.<\/p>\n Also on the ballot are all 80 seats in the state Assembly, which Democrats control 52-28.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TRENTON, N.J. (AP) \u2014 New Jersey voters are electing their next governor Tuesday in a race that will…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":270694,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,8833,36046,12,1070,793,962,8633,790,144930,8629,5744,144932,90155,1997,144931,3,51493,111,8638,795,3438,21,19,22,20,25,24,800,8630],"class_list":["post-270693","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-barack-obama","tag-christine-todd-whitman","tag-donald-trump","tag-elections","tag-general-news","tag-government-policy","tag-gretchen-whitmer","tag-immigration","tag-jack-ciattarelli-new-jersey","tag-josh-shapiro","tag-kamala-harris","tag-matt-platkin","tag-mikie-sherrill","tag-new-jersey","tag-new-jersey-state-government","tag-news","tag-phil-murphy","tag-politics","tag-u-s-democratic-party","tag-u-s-news","tag-u-s-republican-party","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa","tag-washington-news","tag-wes-moore"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270693","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=270693"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270693\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/270694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=270693"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=270693"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=270693"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}