{"id":40802236020,"date":"2012-06-06T01:34:00","date_gmt":"2012-06-06T05:34:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/2012\/06\/06\/nj-primary-takeaway\/"},"modified":"2021-01-25T11:22:05","modified_gmt":"2021-01-25T16:22:05","slug":"nj-primary-takeaway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/2012\/06\/06\/nj-primary-takeaway\/","title":{"rendered":"NJ Primary Takeaway"},"content":{"rendered":"

Well, not everything turned out\u00a0as I expected<\/a>, but I\u2019ll fall back on the fact that I called the winner in every raced involving someone who will actually serve in Congress next year. \u00a0(How\u2019s that for spin?)<\/p>\n

Turnout was a little higher than I expected.\u00a0 When all the votes are counted it looks like it might be about 11%.\u00a0 Specifically, GOP turnout was about 40,000 voters greater than in a typical primary, driven by the novelty of an already-decided Presidential nomination.\u00a0 But it was Democratic turnout in just two Congressional Districts that put the statewide turnout figure over the 10% mark.\u00a0 Approximately 110,000 Democrats voted in those two districts alone.\u00a0 That’s about 60-70,000 more than we would expect in a typical primary!<\/p>\n

On the headline event of the night, I was right on the winner, Bill Pascrell, but no one \u2013 including the victor\u2019s camp \u2013 ever dreamed of the numbers he would put up in Passaic County.\u00a0 Steve Rothman\u2019s negative campaign led to the expected low turnout in Bergen, but not in Passaic, where Pascrell\u2019s ground game \u2013 aided by Bill Clinton\u2019s endorsement \u2013 contributed to the stunner of the night.<\/p>\n

In the 10th\u00a0district, the race wasn\u2019t as close as I thought it would be \u2013 not anywhere close to where I thought it would be. Ron Rice, Jr. intended to challenge the incumbent Congressman, Donald Payne, Sr. before he died, and so had been preparing for a battle.\u00a0 The Essex County machine had a point to prove against this rabble rouser and turned out monster numbers in the Oranges and elsewhere. Moreover, they were able to produce the same margins in Union County.\u00a0 Rice may be a tenacious campaigner in Newark, but he go his hat handed to him, barely edging out Nia Gill for a dismal second place finish, 40 percentage points behind the winner, Donald Payne, Jr.<\/p>\n

I also, thought that the Monmouth County GOP organizational pick in CD6 would take the nomination over 2010 upstart, Anna Little.\u00a0 While Little had the Middlesex line, there seemed to be less overall enthusiasm for her grass-roots candidacy this time around.\u00a0 Moreover, I thought \u2013 foolish me \u2013 that the Monmouth GOP would make sure it did not suffer a repeat of their candidate\u2019s loss two years ago.<\/p>\n

I guess I gave them too much credit.\u00a0 In 2010, only 14,000 Republicans showed up to vote in the CD6 primary.\u00a0 In the newly expanded district, that number actually dropped to less than 11,000.\u00a0 Monmouth party pick, Ernesto Cullari claimed only 2,400 votes in the Monmouth portion of the district! District-wide, he got his clock cleaned, losing the nomination by 40 points.\u00a0 The Monmouth County GOP has a history of anemic GOTV operations and I know there was little real enthusiasm for Cullari.<\/p>\n

But really?! Only 2,400 votes? In some cultures, the Monmouth GOP would be compelled to light itself on fire in the village square from the shame of it all.<\/p>\n

Alright, that\u2019s enough ragging.\u00a0 So what\u2019s the big takeaway for New Jersey from yesterday\u2019s primary?<\/p>\n

Nothing.<\/p>\n

The few competitive races hinged on settling personal scores more than articulating differing visions of government or the future of the party.<\/p>\n

With that behind us, it\u2019s on to November.\u00a0 And to save us all some time, I\u2019ll just make most of my picks right now, thanks to the New Jersey redistricting commission:<\/p>\n

President<\/strong>: Obama wins the state\u2019s 14 electoral votes<\/p>\n

US Senate<\/strong>: Too early to call<\/p>\n

CD1<\/strong>: Andrews
\nCD2<\/strong>: LoBiondo
\nCD3<\/strong>: Too early too call
\nCD4<\/strong>: Smith
\nCD5<\/strong>: Garrett
\nCD6<\/strong>: Pallone
\nCD7<\/strong>: Lance
\nCD8<\/strong>: Sires
\nCD9<\/strong>: Pascrell
\nCD10<\/strong>: Payne
\nCD11<\/strong>: Frelinghuysen
\nCD12<\/strong>: Holt<\/p>\n

LD4<\/strong>: Mosquera
\nLD16<\/strong>: Too early to call
\nLD26<\/strong>: DeCroce<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Well, not everything turned out\u00a0as I expected, but I\u2019ll fall back on the fact that I called the winner in every raced involving someone who will actually serve in Congress next year. \u00a0(How\u2019s that for spin?) Turnout was a little higher than I expected.\u00a0 When all the votes are counted it looks like it might […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":939,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40802236020","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40802236020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/939"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40802236020"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40802236020\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40802237304,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40802236020\/revisions\/40802237304"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40802236020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40802236020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40802236020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}