Pallotta wins in CD05. Sussex County’s Kelly Hart does it again!

By Rubashov

It’s hard to win when the establishment sets its face against you. After his upset victory in the 2020 primary and his narrow defeat to Democrat incumbent Josh Gottheimer in the November election, you would think the party grandees would rally around Frank Pallotta, clear a path for him, and start him on his way for a 2022 re-match. That would have made sense.

But that’s not what happened. Instead, some party leaders nursed the wounds they had received in the primary, when Pallotta beat the Bergen County “line” for his upset win. Others were unhappy that Pallotta hadn’t gone with an “insider” consultant and had Sussex County’s Kelly Hart run his campaign. Many thought Pallotta too conservative – too honest and open about it. And for others, the Jersey operatives at the NRCC included, Pallotta just wasn’t one of the boys.

So, the establishment went out and recruited a very plausible candidate in Nick DiGregorio and raised a lot of money – that they spent on internecine battle to defeat another Republican, namely Frank Pallotta. How this made sense to them, we cannot figure out, but it did serve as an emotional balm to some and an economic benefit to others. We don’t think it did the party any good.

Nick proved to be a formidable candidate and a strong campaigner. He had a wonderful back story, but his establishment handlers suppressed his policy positions, not allowing him to communicate with conservative voters. They believed they would prevail using the blunt force of money, the party “line” in Bergen County, the Jersey operatives at the NRCC, and establishment muscle in Trenton. Nick pulled away endorsements that Frank had previously enjoyed – with a final blow delivered by a legislator yesterday, the day of the election!

The establishment had failed to learn the lesson from last year’s result in LD03. It was there that Steve Kush pulled an upset win by fashioning a campaign that went around establishment filters and engaged directly with the electorate. Of course, this doesn’t always work. It doesn’t work when the electorate is asleep. But the electorate isn’t asleep, is it? It is very, very agitated.

Kelly Hart fashioned a similar win yesterday in CD05, using grassroots networks the Trenton establishment, and especially the Trenton blogs, continue to discount. Strong showings by outsider candidates across New Jersey are an indication of an electorate that is wide awake and open to hearing a conservative message. Even in the CD03 primary, Steve Kush was able to take a very wounded candidate to a respectable showing.

“It is very reassuring that the conservative base wields so much muscle,” said Steve Lonegan, the father of the modern conservative movement in New Jersey, “This should be a wake-up call for the NJGOP establishment.”

Hopefully, the establishment accepts Frank Pallotta’s win and rallies behind him. Nick DiGregorio already has. Let’s hope others follow his good example. We hope to be hearing more from him.

In contrast, Matt Rooney at Save Jersey penned a particularly dickish attack on the Republican nominee – the day after the election. Why is Rooney acting the sore loser when he wasn’t supposed to have a side? Didn’t he hold himself out as someone impartial enough to moderate a debate between Nick and Frank? Apparently not.

For all those Trenton bullies who got owned yesterday.

Why is Trump-hater Alan Steinberg backing Republican Nick DeGregorio?

By Rubashov

Be careful Republicans!

After pissing on every Republican in America for the last five years, Whitman Republican (or more precisely, former Republican) Alan Steinberg is now trying to anoint candidates for next year’s Republican congressional primaries. Steinberg has called Republicans every foul word he could muster – from “fascists” to “racists” – and followed up those insults by publicly excusing the worst excesses of the Democrat Party.

Steinberg’s sudden interest in directing support within the NJGOP to candidates for Congress in next year’s GOP congressional primaries is worrisome. Especially so when you remember that Steinberg’s mentor – former GOP Governor Christie Whitman – has already released a statement endorsing two Democrat incumbents (Josh Gottheimer in CD05 and Andy Kim in CD03) for re-election.

Writing in yesterday’s edition of InsiderNJ, Steinberg spent more than 1,000 words in a panegyric to a little-known, first-time candidate for Congress by the name of Nick DeGregorio. The photograph of DeGregorio that Steinberg chose to grace his sales pitch resembles that of a youngish monk from the 15th century.

Of course, Steinberg could not begin promoting his Republican offering without first offering up some praise before his Democrat masters – predicting the election of Democrat Terry McAuliffe in Virginia and an upturn in President Joe Biden’s polling numbers. This is something Democrat pollster (and Gottheimer pal) Mark Penn seems skeptical about, as this short interview makes clear…

Across America, Democrat poll numbers are crashing (especially over COVID). Why not New Jersey?

We were especially amused at these lines by Alan Steinberg: “Biden’s actions regarding Afghanistan will be a definite political popularity asset for him. Botched withdrawal or not, Biden will be recognized as the president who got us out of that quagmire, saving America thousands of lives, billions of dollars, and reversing the extraordinarily foolish Afghanistan policies of both his Republican and Democratic predecessors.”

Yes, this from a member of the administration that sold us the “Weapons of Mass Destruction” lie and expanded our military involvement throughout the Middle East. A NeoCon, Steinberg boisterously supported the expansion of the Security State – with its spying on American citizens and its use of the Espionage Act against whistleblowers. Too bad it took you two decades, trillions spent, and a million or so dead to change your mind.

Alan Steinberg proceeds to try to sell us on his protégé, Nick DeGregorio, calling DeGregorio a “growing formidable challenge” to Josh Gottheimer in CD05. Okay, but the latest information out of the Federal Elections Commission shows DeGregorio with zero dollars on-hand and Gottheimer with more than $11 million. Steinberg goes on to anoint DeGregorio “the current frontrunner for the 2022 Republican Congressional nomination in the Fifth District.” Based on?

Well, like Bob Hugin (who apparently DeGregorio models himself after), DeGregorio was an officer in the Marine Corps. If memory serves, Steinberg said that would be the clincher for Guy Gregg too. He also touts DeGregorio’s “academic credentials” and his Wall Street experience.

Hey, all of that is good, but what’s going on in DeGregorio’s brain is what matters. What is the young man thinking about? What are his policies (we certainly hope he doesn’t share in Alan Steinberg’s enthusiasms)? What does he really believe when he stops pretending, when he puts away the script and stops being a candidate? Is he the kind of man who can be on the level with those he wishes to impose himself on? In short, is he honest? Time will tell.

Alan Steinberg was well-cared for by the NJGOP. The party got him jobs in the administrations of Governor Whitman and President George W. Bush. Fat paying jobs. And he rewarded them by flipping out when conservatives took charge, calling them names like “racists” and “fascists” – eventually quitting the GOP.

Steinberg closed his promotional piece for DeGregorio with this bit of ridiculousness:

“I also have seen more enthusiasm for Nick De Gregorio among both rank-and-file Republicans and leaders than virtually any other Republican Congressional challenger over the past four decades. He is indeed a phenomenon.”

After all his years of hating Republicans and calling conservatives every filthy name he could come up with, we doubt if any self-respecting “rank-and-file Republican” would take the time to piss on him. Alan Steinberg is as welcome in conservative circles as a skunk on a wedding night.

Nick DeGregorio picked one hell of a spokesman for a Republican primary. Good luck.

Political Greatness
By Percy Bysshe Shelley

Nor happiness, nor majesty, nor fame,
Nor peace, nor strength, nor skill in arms or arts,
Shepherd those herds whom tyranny makes tame;
Verse echoes not one beating of their hearts,
History is but the shadow of their shame;
Art veils her glass, or from the pageant starts,
As to oblivion their blind millions fleet,
Staining that heaven with obscene imagery
Of their own likeness. What are numbers knit
By force or custom? Man, who man would be,
Must rule the empire of himself; in it
Must be supreme, establishing his throne
On vanquished will, quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears, being himself alone.

Does the NRCC have a one-seat pick-up strategy in New Jersey?

By Rubashov

New Jersey’s congressional candidates don’t even have districts yet. The challengers keep multiplying. At last count, there were at least three in CD03, two in CD05, two in CD07, and three in CD11.

And yet, it all seems to be about just one candidate in district whatever it might be… Tom Kean Jr.

After losing two congressional campaigns and one for the United States Senate, State Senator Kean appears to be leaving nothing to chance in securing a federal seat at the next opportunity. He controls the Republican side of the congressional reapportionment process. And he has promoted former staffers – with less than spectacular war records – to staff positions at the NRCC’s high command.

Perhaps this accounts for the remarkable attentiveness of the Republican Minority Leader, Kevin McCarthy, who joined Kean and Save Jersey’s Matt Rooney for a “diner booth chat” yesterday, the day Kean chose to announce his candidacy for Congress from a district whose boundaries do not yet exist. Next up for McCarthy is an interview with the “Mastermind” of Bridgegate. Perhaps Ken Kurson will join them and add luster to the proceedings? Does McCarthy even know any of this?

So, a district is being made to order in as much as that is possible. The trouble with this is getting the balance right. Too swing, and Kean risks a repeat of his last go-round with Tom Malinowski. Too Republican and he risks a challenge from those wild guys on the right. And they won’t wait. They’re like McCarthy. The moment they smell blood in the water, they’ll be there and everyone will know it.

One other thing…

Kevin McCarthy isn’t a household name in New Jersey. He is a very powerful and influential figure but remains ill-defined in the minds of most voters. But that is changing – and that change presents risk.

Have a look at this video. It is from an episode of Tucker Carlson, the most watched cable news host in America and someone who is wildly popular with the GOP base in however you carve a district. It is about the GOP, the NRCC, Kevin McCarthy, and messaging. It is also about opioids… and responsibility – and assigning blame. So, pay attention.

America's most popular cable news host lays the blame...

“This is the guy Republican leaders just went to this week for, quote, messaging guidance on hot topics. And you wonder why you no longer recognize the party that you vote for.”

Tucker Carlson

Did BCRO violate FEC rules?

By Rubashov

The Bergen County Republican Organization (BCRO) has sent out a number of potentially problematic election communications recently.  Several mass emails blasted out on behalf of the BCRO by members of its leadership failed to note who paid for them, in apparent violation of Federal Election Commission (FEC) rules.
 
The BCRO also sent out an expensive mass direct mail piece that appeared to suggest that the candidates on the BCRO “line” were part of a ticket sanctioned by President Donald Trump.  An operative with the President’s campaign denied this, stating that being on a local party ticket that is endorsing the President does not mean that the President is endorsing the other candidates on that ticket.  The endorsement goes up, not down, the ticket.
 
FEC rules on communications like this are very restrictive.  From the FEC website:
 
“A state or local party committee may prepare and distribute a slate card, sample ballot, palm card or other printed list naming candidates for any public office. The payments are not considered contributions or expenditures on behalf of any federal candidate listed, as long as the following conditions are met:
 
The list names at least three candidates running for election to any public office in the state in which the committee is organized.
 
The list is not distributed through broadcast stations, newspapers, magazines and similar types of public political advertising (for example billboards). Direct mail, however, is an acceptable method of distributing a slate card or sample ballot.
 
The content is limited to the identification of each candidate (pictures may be used), the office or position currently held, the office sought and party affiliation. Additional descriptions, designs, images and photographs must not provide supplemental biographical information, descriptions of candidates’ positions on the issues or statements of party philosophy. Certain voting information, however, may be given, such as time, place and instructions on voting a straight party ticket.”
 
Curiously, some of the BCRO email blasts contain appeals to Ronald Reagan’s so-called “11th Commandment” (“Thou shalt not speak ill of another Republican”) and accusations that the candidates opposing the BCRO-endorsed John McCann for Congress were running “negative” campaigns.  Hypocritically, the authors of these emails failed to mention the BCRO’s own negative campaign on behalf of John McCann in 2018.
 
That was the year that Steve Lonegan, the father of the conservative movement in New Jersey, was on the receiving end of a campaign unprecedented in its level of sustained hatefulness.    That campaign caused many conservative donors to simply give up on New Jersey Republicans, to this day sending their money to candidates elsewhere.  This drain of conservative money to campaigns outside New Jersey affects the ability of state Republicans to secure and hold elected offices.  Bergen County has particularly suffered.
 
The political consultant brought in to run the campaign against Lonegan was a brilliant tactician named Kelley Rogers.  He came up with a series of fiercely negative campaign advertisements.  It is worth noting that John McCann’s consultant was not around to direct his 2020 primary campaign.  Last year, Kelley Rogers pleaded guilty in federal court.  Politico covered the story (09/18/19):
 
In one of the first Justice Department cases of its kind, Maryland political consultant Kelley Rogers pled guilty to wire fraud on Tuesday for operating multiple fraudulent political action committees that raised money from donors for conservative causes but kept much of the funds for Rogers and his associates.

Rogers’ arrest and indictment took place shortly after Politico and ProPublica investigated one of Rogers’ PACs, Conservative Majority Fund, which since 2012 has raised close to $10 million — mostly from small-dollar donors, many of them elderly -- while giving out just $48,400 to politicians.
 
The BCRO appears to have a love affair with John McCann, despite his history of campaign losses – including the biggest defeat in the history of CD05.  For his part, McCann exudes a quirky charm and a combativeness that often gets him into trouble…
 

THERE ARE NO STUPID QUESTIONS, ONLY STUPID POLITICIANS- Congressional candidate John McCann to a woman asking a question- that's a stupid question.

Nevertheless, the BCRO leadership’s faith in John McCann appears unshakeable.  Despite his historic loss in 2018, BCRO boss Jack Zisa awarded McCann the party “line” without a vote of his membership.  That is, of course, an entirely different discussion for another day.
 

“History repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce.”
(Karl Marx, author and philosopher)

Was Lonegan’s defeat an inside job?

Well, at least Jay Webber won… and Seth Grossman.

Bob Hugin won’t totally have his way in wrapping the State’s Republican brand in a plain brown paper.  He’s going to have a Reagan conservative and an eccentric libertarian to provide some color to the package – not to mention the incumbents, starting with the staunchly Pro-Life Chris Smith. 

What Hugin won’t have is a genuine Trump-style populist bouncing around in the orchestra, stealing the stage of an election that he plainly believes he is paying for.  Like Grossman, Steve Lonegan is decidedly his own article, but enough in the Trump mold to easily wear the costume.

McCann you say?  The most baldly dishonest campaign in memory will now be set aside, and with it, all the Trumpian rhetoric.  No, John McCann was not endorsed by President Trump, even though his campaign communications led you to believe he was.  More on this later.

It is enough for now to compare the post-truth campaigning style of a certain southern political consultant to the rather insufficient counter-measures of the Lonegan team, whose messaging was done by a consultant shared with the Hugin team.  Although completely false, McCann’s consultant had the discipline to dominate his candidate, confine him to those tasks of which he was capable, and to run the kind of sharp, focused, MESSAGE-driven campaign that we don’t often see here in New Jersey. 

If McCann’s consultant survives the recent raid on his office by the FBI, the inquires by the United States Justice Department and such, he could become a formidable presence on the field in New Jersey.  It takes a certain toughness to come up with a message so at variance with a candidate, to bully the candidate into silence, and then to brazenly run with it to victory.

Unfortunately, now the candidate will think the victory his… he will start to talk again.  Like he did last week when, in an unguarded moment, he let slip his true feelings about abortion (he won’t vote for ANY Pro-Life legislation if elected to Congress) and guns (he opposes the NRA and supports universal background checks).  Did the New Jersey Family Policy Council know this when its (c)4 lobbying arm was induced into doing an openly political mailer that buttered the Pro-Choice candidate but trashed the Pro-Lifer?  Or did they know and did they not care?  More on this later.

Not to worry though.  John McCann has served his purpose.  The candidate with the money lost (and now that candidate is a wounded, angry animal, sitting on a million dollar war chest).  But John McCann is broke.  He has eaten his seed corn.  Don’t look for him to trouble Josh Gottheimer.  And there might even be a reward in it for him.  Another lucrative patronage job perhaps?  He might end up a judge.

So the money that would have been spent in the 5th fighting off the visceral attacks of a Lonegan candidacy will now be heading… where?  Which Democrat will be the beneficiary of yesterday… perhaps they will all share in a piece of it?

Among the other lessons learned…

The party potentates who opened the bottle  of a Tony Ghee candidacy did so before its time.  They gave the newcomer no time to breathe.  It’s a solid vintage that will hopefully be available again.

And speaking of which.  We learn from the former Wally Edge that Peter Murphy is about to assume the throne of the GOP in Passaic County – the place he occupied before a certain United States Attorney, named Chris Christie, sent him away.  It’s a bad business – especially for Bob Hugin, who has made political corruption his ONLY issue.  Lonegan’s polling showed Murphy’s support to be the strongest negative against McCann.  More than 80 percent of Republicans were less likely to vote for a candidate who had his support… that’s REPUBLICANS.  You would have hardly guessed it from Lonegan’s campaign communications, but there you have it.

Surprisingly enough, Lonegan did have coattails of a sort.  In Sussex County, Lonegan-backed challengers to two incumbent Freeholders annihilated the incumbents.  It is the first time in living memory that a ticket with two incumbents was defeated in Sussex County.

Dawn Fantasia is the principal at a charter school.  Josh Hertzberg is an administrator with the ILA union.  These are what Republican candidates look like in our populist era.  Fantasia supported Senator Steve Oroho’s negotiations over the refinancing of the Transportation Trust Fund.  She learned about it and patiently explained the details to others – and ended up cutting a radio spot to that end. People warned that it would hurt her politically, because the final deal raised the gas tax, while cutting or eliminating a host of taxes (including the estate tax) and providing property tax relief.  Another lesson learned?

John McCann injected himself into the Freeholder race, on behalf of the incumbents, who supported him.  He ran a radio spot that attacked Senator Oroho by name on the gas tax.  Former Congressman Scott Garrett came out in support of the incumbents and ran a robo-call on their behalf.  More lessons?

Lonegan won Sussex County, but by a much smaller margin – about 500 votes.  Why the difference?  Well, in Sussex, the Lonegan freeholder ticket had a strong message that they pursued relentlessly – and were quick and sharp with their counterattacks.  The Lonegan campaign itself lacked this, especially the quick counterpunches.  Fantasia and Hertzberg also had the full attentions of Kelly Hart, who had been “let go” by the Lonegan campaign in April.  She had been field director for Sussex County.

Curiously enough though, when the dust settles after the General Election, the only big changes to the line-up of elected officials in CD05 will be the election of Lonegan’s running mates in Sussex County.  Everyone else… McCann and all his running mates in Bergen and Passaic will have lost.

A few years ago, Ralph Nadar wrote a book called “Unstoppable” – in which he predicted the rise of populist movements on both the Left and the Right in response to the disconnect with the mainstream political parties.  He suggested that Left and Right reformers had much in common and therefore, the basis of a genuine “resistance” movement.

How will this translate with Dr. Murray Sabrin on the Libertarian Party ticket for U.S. Senate is anyone’s guess, but there are Libertarian candidates in Districts 5 and 11, and a Constitution party in District 3.  A Center-Left populist, Wendy Goetz, is also running in the 5th.

And finally, election night parties.  The people you meet at such things are not average Republican voters.  Many earn a living from politics – whether as a lobbyist or a vendor, a job holder or a consultant.  They are in the business of politics – even those that just secure from it a certain status, as a member of a local government perhaps, or a school board.

That is not the case with 99 percent of Republican voters.  All they get out of voting is the idea that they are checking the box for someone who thinks like they do.  Most have a general idea of what the Republican Party stands for and that they stand for that too.  That “general idea” is provided to them, largely, by the mainstream media.  And yes, it includes the points that Republicans are Pro-Life and pro-Second Amendment. 

New Jersey’s Republican political class needs to learn to live with this.  Bring to a close their 40 years war with Reagan and their contempt for our base.  Trying to pretend that you are something else or “a different kind of Republican” is not a message, it is a deflection.  For all his money spent on advertising, Bob Hugin was able to convince just 52 percent of Republicans in Sussex County to vote for him.  He will need to do a great deal better.

Let the political class make its money… but leave average GOP voters someone they can vote for.

Sadly, the party took a step back yesterday.  They took away someone who meant something to a great many average Republicans – and they did so by telling voters that McCann was just a newer Lonegan, only more conservative, and that Donald Trump endorsed him.  We all know that isn’t true. 

And on that note, we begin the General Election.

Candidate McCann faces accusations of bullying

The candidacy of John McCann is uncomfortable to watch.  Starting with the candidate.  McCann is obviously one of those politicians who thinks he is "good with people" -- a "people person" -- when his discomfort is all too apparent.  We'll let Mitchell and Webb take it from here... 

Apparently, when his overtures don't quite work out -- when a target doesn't swoon at his advances -- McCann can get a bit testy.  Well, that is what he is being accused of by two local Republican officials.  The officials -- Joseph Hakim and Mike Ghassali -- claim that John McCann threatened them with information he said he could obtain through the Democrat Sheriff of Bergen County.  The complaints appear below:

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Of course, we offer to candidate McCann and/or his campaign the opportunity to address this matter and we will be happy to publish his side of the story.

Who is this John McCann being pushed on us?

Another "star" is born.  Courtesy of a SaveJersey "poll" and indicating little more than that somebody's hand has been working overtime.  Sigh.

We doubt that 425 people could pick John McCann out of a line-up.  But that hasn't stopped a few insiders from pushing him for Congress in CD05 as the latest, tired NJGOP... wait for it... "game changer"! 

Oh, how we love that phrase.  Such a long list of losers have been touted as "game changers" -- so many lifeless, idealess, dead-end sales floor mannequins.

The Republican party bosses in Bergen County, fresh from their most recent loss (in a long string of losses), have abjectly surrendered to the point that they now believe that the only way forward is to formally turn their county organization over to the Democrats, and to rest comfortably under the wing of the Democrat Party.  So they accept the Democrats' terms and lawyer John McCann, who works for and is paid by the County's elected Democrat Sheriff, will be their candidate for Congress. 

With John McCann, Republicans will appear to have found a candidate to oppose incumbent Democrat Josh Gottheimer.  In reality, McCann's candidacy will be a hollow one, lacking financial resources or contrast with the Democrat.  It will serve the Democrats' will and cement Democrat Gottheimer into a district that no Democrat should hold.

John McCann is one of the NJGOP's "hollow men" -- having surfaced to run for the Assembly in 1995, he was crushed, fell to earth, and burrowed into the moist manure of crony politics.  Here he existed as a kind of chrysalis, without thought, ideology, or principles.  The money doesn't allow such things.  There are lots of "hollow men" about.  The NJGOP could not fill a room without them.

We are the hollow men
    We are the stuffed men
    Leaning together
    Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
    Our dried voices, when
    We whisper together
    Are quiet and meaningless
    As wind in dry grass
    Or rats' feet over broken glass
    In our dry cellar
    
    Shape without form, shade without colour,
    Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

    ...Behaving as the wind behaves

At the very beginning of conservative Scott Garrett's career in Congress, at the very beginning, John McCann attempted to go from pupa to butterfly.  But it was to oppose both Scott Garrett and Gerry Cardinale in the primary because, so John McCann said, they were "too conservative."

McCann, a self-described follower of the ideology of Democrat-turned Republican-turned Democrat Arlen Specter, assured anyone who cared to listen that the only way Republicans could hold on to CD05 was to nominate a "moderate".  McCann spelled that out as someone who was liberal on abortion, the social issues, and the Second Amendment.  Oh well, he was wrong, and in any case, his campaign collapsed because he couldn't raise the money or support to sustain it.  That was in 2002.  Does anyone really believe that the GOP has gone Left since then?

But McCann is, so they assure us, a GAME CHANGER.  And if you look at it from the other end, he is.  It's the end game.  John McCann's candidacy promises to end the game and to deliver New Jersey's 5th Congressional District into Democrat hands for what might as well be an eternity in politics.  And the Democrat Sheriff will keep writing his Democrat checks, and the Bergen bosses will accrue some considerations, and one more piece will be removed from the already almost blank board.  One less contention to squabble over. 

This is the way the world ends
    This is the way the world ends
    This is the way the world ends
    Not with a bang but a whimper.