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The race for New Jersey’s next governor had a sleepy summer. Now, with less than eight weeks to go before Election Day, it’s about to get real.
Democratic nominee Mikie Sherrill and Republican nominee Jack Ciattarelli will take the stage Sunday night at Rider University in the first of two gubernatorial debates before November. It’s the first time voters will see the candidates go face to face. It’s a town hall format. Questions from voters in the audience will drive the debate.
While polls give Sherrill a 5- or 6-point lead, political observers expect a close election. Ciattarelli came within about 3 points of upsetting Gov. Phil Murphy in 2021. His party also performed significantly better in last year’s presidential election – with Donald Trump losing New Jersey by about 5 points, cutting the margin in half from four years prior.
Ciattarelli is up against the fact that New Jerseyans typically hand the governor’s seat to the party that does not occupy the White House. Sherrill is trying to buck a Garden State trend and win three consecutive governor’s terms for her party, which hasn’t happened since the 1960s.
Along with Virginia’s gubernatorial election, New Jersey’s is one of only two statewide elections this year. The whole country is watching how the candidates perform heading into next year’s congressional midterms.
Ciattarelli and Sherrill won their party nominations in June. But Ashley Koning, director of the Rutgers University Eagleton Center for Public Interest Polling, said Sunday’s debate is the first opportunity for voters who haven’t been paying attention yet to get to know the two candidates.
“The political world in New Jersey has been talking about this race probably for at least a year now. But this will be a chance for them to introduce themselves to the general public and to talk about who they are, and then talk about what issues should be most salient going into this final stretch,” she said.
Here’s what else you need to know heading into the debate on Sunday night.
Attack of the attack ads
The race has grown testy in recent weeks. Both campaigns accuse the other of taking their candidate’s remarks out of context and running misleading attack ads on television.
A Sherrill campaign ad, for example, claims that Ciattarelli supports a 10% sales tax in the state on items like groceries, based on remarks he made during a June campaign rally in Bergen County. A tax hike would not be welcome news to consumers who are already contending with high grocery prices due to persistent inflation and President Donald Trump’s tariffs on imported goods.
Ciattarelli’s campaign said he only mentioned a 10% tax in reference to what other states like Tennessee have done. Ciattarelli called Sherrill a “liar” and sent her campaign a cease-and-desist letter, which it rejected.
At the same time, Sherrill has accused Ciattarelli of falsely portraying her in a TV ad saying she supports a transition to predominantly clean energy in the state even though it will cost consumers — in her own words — “an arm and a leg.” Sherrill’s campaign said she had actually been criticizing her own party’s messaging on the issue and calling for politicians to change how they talk to the public about clean energy.
Political experts expect the ads to come up during the debate, and that the conversation could become heated.
“ There’s a lot riding on this. So I would assume that we are going to see a knockdown, drag out kind of debate,” Koning said.
The Trump and Murphy factors
Two politicians who won’t be on stage Sunday night could nonetheless become key characters in the debate: Trump and Murphy.
The Sherrill campaign has worked hard to link Ciattarelli to Trump in the minds of voters. Despite his electoral gains in New Jersey last year, Trump is currently not very popular in the state. A Rutgers-Eagleton poll from July found that just 30% of New Jerseyans had a favorable view of the president, compared to 59% who viewed him unfavorably.
“Sherrill’s going to say to him ‘You can’t name one thing you disagree with Donald Trump on!’ and challenge him to differentiate himself,” said Dan Cassino, professor of government and politics at Fairleigh Dickinson University.
But Ciattarelli has openly aligned himself with Trump, receiving the president’s endorsement in the spring primary. And he’s using Trump lingo in his own campaign slogan: Make New Jersey Affordable Again.
Ciattarelli has also done his own work to link Sherrill to another politician who’s unpopular in New Jersey at the moment: Murphy, the current governor. Skyrocketing electric bills and high housing costs during his second term have left the voting public questioning Murphy’s leadership.
The July Rutgers-Eagleton poll found that 43% of respondents gave the governor a favorable rating. Murphy’s favorability was polling at 50% a year ago. Ciattarelli has disparaged Sherrill as “Murphy 2.0” in interviews and the tagline in his attack ad on rising energy costs calls her “like Phil Murphy, but worse.”
Sherrill has pushed back on being tied to Murphy. Earlier this year she told reporters that her record and experience are “completely different” and said she has a “distinct vision” for New Jersey, according to Politico.
Political experts say both candidates will surely see the Murphy and Trump angles coming on Sunday night and be ready to respond to the attacks.
“When they start to go down that road, the opponent is going to be ready for that and probably have some sort of line ready, some sort of ‘I’m my own person-type’ argument,” said Kristoffer Shields, director of the Rutgers University Eagleton Center on the American Governor.
Alas, the ratings are probably going to stink
Let’s be real: Many New Jerseyans are not going to watch the debate on Sunday night. Ben Dworkin, director of the Rowan Institute for Public Policy and Citizenship, said the candidates will instead be looking to land resounding blows that can live on in social media and news coverage, and provide fodder for the next round of TV ads.
“It is the clips that live on. That’s where you expand your audience. Die-hard partisans and ultimate political nerds will be watching, but the general public will probably be glued to some football game,” Dworkin said.
That said, if you want to tune in Sunday from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., here’s how you can watch.
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Mike Hayes
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