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Tag: Jack Ciattarelli

  • Legal threats hang over NJ governor’s race after CBS News report on Mikie Sherrill’s military records

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    Washington — With roughly a month left before New Jersey chooses its next governor, the gloves have come off following a CBS News investigation that ignited a political firestorm, whipping the campaigns of Republican Jack Ciattarelli and Democratic Rep. Mikie Sherrill into a frenzy. 

    It was last week when CBS News reported that a branch of the National Archives admitted it had released a mostly unredacted version of Sherrill’s military records to Nicholas De Gregorio, an ally of Ciattarelli. The documents included her Social Security number and other personal information.

    Jack Ciattarelli, the Republican nominee in the New Jersey governor’s race, and U.S. Rep. Mikie Sherrill, the Democratic nominee in the race.

    Ciattarrelli: Spencer Platt/Getty Images; Sherrill: Daniel Heuer/Bloomberg via Getty Images


    Now, the threat of lawsuits hangs over the race as a barrage of new media attacks are launched in the high-stakes gubernatorial contest. Sherrill and Democrats have alleged her unredacted records were released intentionally, which Ciattarelli’s campaign strongly denies, blaming it on “laziness” by the National Archives. 

    Sherrill’s attorneys with the Elias Law Group, a law firm targeted earlier this year by President Trump, issued multiple cease-and-desist letters to Ciattarelli and his allies following CBS News’ report. Ciattarelli has been endorsed by Mr. Trump.

    In letters addressed to Ciattarelli and his campaign, De Gregorio and campaign consultant Chris Russell, attorneys for Sherrill demanded no further dissemination of the congresswoman’s military file and that all copies of her service records be destroyed while also preserving documents such as emails and text messages that might be relevant in future legal proceedings. 

    In response to the cease-and-desist letters, Mark Sheridan of the law firm Squire Patton Boggs, who represents Ciattarelli’s campaign, wrote that the campaign will not destroy the records because “they are all exculpatory in nature.” He said the campaign will preserve copies of Sherrill’s military file, citing “the absurd and baseless demands by Congressional Democrats for investigations.”

    CBS News discovered the Archives’ blunder while investigating whether Sherrill was involved in the 1994 Naval Academy scandal, where more than 100 midshipmen were implicated in cheating on an exam. Sherrill was not accused of cheating but admitted to CBS News that she was barred from the processional at her Naval Academy graduation for not informing on her fellow classmates. 

    De Gregorio, a Marine veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan who unsuccessfully ran as a Republican for Congress in New Jersey, told CBS News that Russell asked him to see what he could find on Sherrill. On his own, De Gregorio submitted a request under the Freedom of Information Act to the National Personnel Records Center seeking Sherrill’s military records, and eventually received them. 

    The documents, which were also obtained by CBS News, included Sherrill’s Social Security number, which appears on almost every page, home addresses for her and her parents, life insurance information, Sherrill’s performance evaluations and the nondisclosure agreement between her and the U.S. government to safeguard classified information. The only details redacted in the document are the Social Security numbers of her former superiors. According to a signature verification page in the documents, the files appear to be the same ones Sherrill requested in August 2017 from the National Personnel Records Center, or NPRC, a division of the Archives that houses military records.

    CBS News reviewed De Gregorio’s request to the Archives and found it properly acknowledged that personal information and medical details would be redacted. The Archives told CBS News, “We do not believe that there was any attempt to deceive NPRC staff in this case.” 

    Democrats demand investigation

    Despite the National Archives admitting fault, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries told reporters on Thursday that he supports a “criminal investigation into the unauthorized and illegal release of Sherrill’s records. 

    “It’s outrageous that Donald Trump and his administration and political hacks connected to them continue to violate the law,” said Jeffries, a New York Democrat. “And they will be held accountable.” 

    In a new campaign ad released Monday, Sherrill’s campaign alleged that the Trump administration released her military records to the Ciattarelli campaign. The Democrat accuses the former New Jersey state representative of “breaking the law” by distributing her records, and alleges Ciattarelli’s campaign refused to return the records. 

    Sheridan, the attorney for the Ciattarelli for Governor campaign, wrote in his response letter that neither the campaign nor Russell were aware that they were in possession of records from the National Archives and Records Administration, or NARA, until a CBS News reporter informed them that they had received Sherrill’s mostly unredacted records because of the Archives’ mistake. 

    “Once the campaign learned from the reporter that it was in possession of information that NARA released erroneously, those individuals in possession of the material were advised not to disseminate it and did not disseminate it anywhere since that time,” wrote Sheridan. 

    He later added: “NARA admitted its technician made an error in releasing the information provided to Mr. DeGregorio. In fact, it appears that the technician simply copied information that was provided to Representative Sherrill in 2017 when she made a similar FOIA request for her own records. This is not some nefarious plot, but rather laziness on the part of a technician at NARA.”

    The National Personnel Records Center told CBS News it alerted the agency’s inspector general to the breach last week. On Tuesday, Politico reported the Archive’s inspector general has launched an investigation into the release of Sherrill’s military records. 

    The Archives apologized to both De Gregorio and Sherill in letters for their “serious error” while asking De Gregorio to not disseminate the record further.

    The White House referred CBS News’ request for comment to the National Archives.

    Ciattarelli focuses on Naval Academy scandal

    Since CBS News’ report, the Ciattarelli campaign and other Republicans have been grilling Sherrill, attempting to implicate her in the 1994 Naval Academy cheating scandal, but she has denied any involvement. The Ciattarelli campaign has called on her to release records related to the issue, since neither the documents released by the Archives to De Gregorio nor the documents released to CBS News under the Freedom of Information Act speak to any role in the scandal.

    A document obtained by CBS News — which is not in the files released by the Archives — shows that Sherrill’s name was omitted from a commencement program on May 25, 1994, the date of the Naval Academy graduation. The program was confirmed to be authentic by the U.S. Naval Academy.

    When asked by CBS News why her name does not appear in the commencement program, Sherrill said in a statement: “When I was an undergraduate at the Naval Academy[,] I didn’t turn in some of my classmates, so I didn’t walk, but graduated and was commissioned as an officer in the U.S. Navy, serving for nearly ten years with the highest level of distinction and honor.”

    She added: “That Jack Ciattarelli and the Trump administration are illegally weaponizing my records for political gain is a violation of anyone who has ever served our country. No veteran’s record is safe.”

    Critics of the congresswoman have pointed out that Sherill’s husband, Jason Hedberg, was also linked to the Naval Academy scandal. In Feb. 1994, some three months before the May graduation, he and about four dozen other midshipmen asked a federal judge in the District of Columbia to block any disciplinary action by the Academy. While it’s unclear to what extent Hedberg was involved, if any, his name is included in the 1994 commencement program. 

    CBS News did not report on Hedberg in its original report on Sherrill because he’s not seeking office and because his name was included in the commencement program. Separately, Sherrill is now under scrutiny after her two children were accepted into the Naval Academy. 

    In June, her congressional office announced that her children —Lincoln and Margaret Hegberg—were among the 22 students from New Jersey’s 11th Congressional District set to attend military service academies. 

    The New York Post reported Monday that Democratic Sen. Cory Booker and former interim Sen. George Helmy, both of New Jersey, each nominated one of the two children to the Naval Academy. Sherrill told the newspaper her children did not compete in her congressional office’s service academy nomination process but instead applied separately to the New Jersey senators’ offices. 

    “There really is no doubt in my mind that this was fully intentional from the Trump administration to the Ciattarelli campaign to do this. They have continued now to go after my family, my husband’s service, my kids in a completely inappropriate way,” Sherrill told Rachel Maddow of MSNBC on Monday.

    James LaPorta

    James LaPorta is a national security coordinating producer in CBS News’ Washington bureau. He is a former U.S. Marine infantryman and veteran of the Afghanistan war.

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  • The explosive exchanges from the N.J. governor debate that show just how bitter this race has become

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    Yes, the first debate between Republican Jack Ciattarelli and Democrat Mikie Sherrill in New Jersey’s getting-more-bitter-by-the-day governor’s race was tense. Combative even.

    There were sharp disagreements over President Donald Trump, taxes and energy rates, free speech, immigration, and education as the candidates faced off Sunday night in a town hall-style event before hundreds of spectators in the basketball arena at Rider University in Lawrenceville.

    Read the original article on NJ.com. Add NJ.com as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

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  • NJ governor hopefuls duke it out at first of two debates

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    Jack Ciattarelli (R) and Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D) met at Rider University on Sept. 21, 2025, for the first of two scheduled debates between the two gubernatorial hopefuls. (Photos by Dana DiFilippo and Amanda Brown)

    Jack Ciattarelli (R) and Rep. Mikie Sherill (D) met on Sunday night for the first gubernatorial debate of the general election campaign, a 90-minute session that occasionally veered into testy but never devolved into an outright slugfest.

    The event was a town hall-style debate, with questions from three moderators — including our own Sophie Nieto-Muñoz — and from audience members gathered at Rider University in Lawrenceville. Here are my takeaways, in no particular order:

    Joke of the night

    Usually, candidates in a debate try to land jokes, but on Sunday, the debate’s host, Laura Jones with On New Jersey, easily had the best barb of the night when she said David Wildstein was not responsible for the bumper-to-bumper traffic headed onto the Rider campus before the event. Wildstein, editor of debate sponsor New Jersey Globe, was an architect of the 2013 George Washington Bridge lane closures that caused days of traffic jams in Fort Lee and led to state and federal investigations (Jones noted that Wildstein gave his OK for the joke).

    Did you know that Sherrill was a U.S. Navy helicopter pilot?

    Sherrill had the microphone for all of nine seconds before she noted that she was once a Navy helicopter pilot, in case you missed that bit of biographical info from her campaign ads and her campaign logo and her million tweets about it.

    Political violence

    In addition to being the day of this year’s first one-on-one gubernatorial debate, Sunday also saw the funeral for conservative activist Charlie Kirk, whose Sept. 10 killing sparked widespread condemnation and renewed calls to investigate and punish political violence. Asked whether they’d sign onto new GOP-led state legislation to label political violence a hate crime, Sherrill declined to answer, while Ciattarelli said he would and noted Sherrill’s evasive response.

    Ciattarelli also used the moment to attack Sherrill for voting in favor of a House resolution honoring Kirk on Friday and later posting a message to social media condemning Kirk.

    “I think that was wrong,” Ciattarelli said.

    “That’s a neat trick to say you don’t want to divide people, and then in your answer, bring up something that’s very divisive,” Sherrill responded.

    Jersey roots

    Ciattarelli likes to remind voters that he’s a Jersey native and Sherrill is not (she’s from Virginia). He made a pointed reference to this on Sunday in a dramatic moment that saw him stare directly at her while he tied incumbent Gov. Phil Murphy’s support of offshore wind energy to the Democratic governor’s status as a Jersey transplant.

    “Now if he was from New Jersey, and anybody who was from New Jersey would know, that the Jersey Shore is sacrosanct here in this state. Nobody wants wind farms off our Jersey Shore, male, female, young and old, Republican, liberal, conservative, liberal, for different reasons,” he said.

    Taxes

    Wildstein asked both candidates a yes or no question: Would you commit to not raising the state’s 6.625% sales tax as governor?

    Ciattarelli answered, “We are not raising the sales tax here in New Jersey.”

    Sherrill (eventually) answered, “I’m not going to commit to anything right now, because I’m not just going to tell you what you want to hear.”

    Her answer was notable because Sherrill spent a lot of the debate hammering Ciattarelli over some votes he made in support of raising taxes as an elected official. Her campaign has also circulated a misleading audio clip of Ciattarelli to claim he’d support raising the state’s sales tax to 10% and slapping it on food and clothing.

    Unanswered questions

    Despite valiant efforts by the debate’s moderators and members of the audience to ask basic questions, the candidates skillfully avoided answering them when they didn’t feel like it, though it felt like Sherrill did this more than Ciattarelli.

    The most obvious example came when the candidates were asked whether they would continue the Immigrant Trust Directive, an order from our attorney general that restricts when state and local law enforcement can cooperate with federal immigration agents.

    Sherrill answered by saying she would not allow U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to walk around masked and accused Ciattarelli of supporting policies that allow people in the United States legally to be detained. When pressed about whether she would continue the directive, Sherrill again declined to answer.

    “What I’m going to do is make sure we’re following the law and the Constitution, so that’ll include due process rights and the Constitution,” she said.

    Ciattarelli, who liked to remind the audience when Sherrill evaded a question, said, “I don’t think she answered your question. Executive Order No. 1 on day one, we’re getting rid of the Immigrant Trust Directive.”

    Segregated schools

    The Sherrill campaign and her allies are making a lot of Ciattarelli’s answer to a question about segregated schools, one they claim reveals something far more sinister than I think it does.

    The question was, would you as governor continue to fight a lawsuit filed by a group of parents and activists who allege the state’s school districts are unconstitutionally segregated and what do you think the state can do to achieve less segregated schools?

    Neither of them initially answered the first part. Ciattarelli said he would focus on improving schools with “high-impact curriculum.” Sherrill said county-based school systems would help, as would high-intensity tutoring and phonics-based reading lessons in third grade. I’m not convinced these answers include a legitimate solution, though county-based schools might help if a Gov. Sherrill could get buy-in from towns (a gigantic if).

    It was the initial part of Ciattarelli’s answer that won quick condemnation from Democrats.

    “We do have the most segregated schools, but I wonder if we would be having this discussion if the performance of schools with predominantly Black student populations were outperforming schools with predominantly white populations. We need to get back on day one to improving all of our schools, and I intend to do that with a high-impact curriculum,” Ciattarelli said.

    When I heard that, I heard him arguing that the problem is not segregation but terrible schools in districts that serve Black students. But a Democratic super PAC posted a clip of his comments — sans the bit about improving curriculum — and said, “Jack Ciattarelli defends racial segregation in schools,” a sentiment that appeared to be shared by some of Sherrill’s allies. Sen. Andy Kim (D) called the comments “shameful,” while Sherrill said Ciattarelli “doesn’t care about” segregated schools.

    Boos

    No one asked about the issue of trans students in sports, but that didn’t stop Ciattarelli from shoehorning the issue in.

    Ciattarelli, who has told voters on the campaign trail that he would ax a state policy that allows school officials to keep students’ gender identity changes from their parents, interjected his thoughts on this when answering a question about vaccines.

    Sherrill said she’s worried that declining vaccination rates will lead to the spread of serious illnesses. Ciattarelli said he also finds the rise in measles and mumps cases concerning.

    “The obligation of any governor on day one after they take their oath of office is the public health and safety, and we’ll do that under Governor Ciattarelli,” he said, then added, “I just wish my opponent showed the same concern when it came to biological males participating in female sports. We should be protecting all students.”

    To my ears, the comment elicited the loudest set of boos of the night.

    If the idea was to bait Sherrill into a response, it did not work. In her response, she attacked Ciattarelli for not criticizing Trump health appointees.

    The two candidates will meet for one more debate in about two weeks.

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  • Republican in New Jersey’s governor’s race releases tax returns

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    Jack Ciattarelli speaks at a town hall in Pitman on Sept. 16, 2025. (Dana DiFilippo | New Jersey Monitor)

    Republican Jack Ciattarelli, who’s running to become New Jersey’s next governor, gave the press a peek at 13 years of his federal tax returns Friday after escalating calls for financial disclosure from his Democratic opponent in the race, Rep. Mikie Sherrill.

    The returns show that Ciattarelli, 63, a former state assemblyman who started and sold two medical publishing businesses, has made almost $14.9 million in income and paid almost $4 million in federal, state and local taxes since 2012.

    His most profitable year came in 2017, when he retired and sold his second medical publishing business. That year, he reported almost $7.1 million in total income, the returns show. Otherwise, his total reported annual income fluctuated between $600,946 (in 2014) and more than $1.3 million (in 2016) before he retired, and $168,433 (in 2022) and $854,966 (in 2018) after he retired, the returns show.

    The returns were joint returns, filed with his ex-wife Melinda. The couple’s divorce was finalized this year. She reported little income most years, with $22,138 of total income reported in 2024, the returns show.

    Ciattarelli paid an average effective tax rate of 28% per year when he was working full-time, with a high of 38% in 2016, his campaign spokespeople said.

    The campaign gave reporters two hours to view but not copy a towering stack of returns at Ciattarelli’s accountant’s office in Clinton. In an accompanying press release, Ciattarelli called the disclosure “an unprecedented level of transparency for any gubernatorial candidate ever.”

    “Now, it’s Mikie Sherrill’s turn,” he said in a statement, urging her to release her returns back to 2018 when she was first elected to Congress.

    Micah Rasmussen, director of the Rebovich Institute for New Jersey Politics at Rider University, found the timing of the disclosures noteworthy — two days before the first gubernatorial debate of the general election, with Ciattarelli and Sherrill scheduled to square off at 7 p.m. Sunday at Rider in Lawrenceville.

    “It’s definitely something that I would have liked to have seen earlier in the campaign, because we have a limited amount of time to weigh this stuff out, but we got it on the eve of the first debate,” he said. “It’s pretty obvious that the goal here is to not fall under the criticism on Sunday night that he hadn’t disclosed his taxes.”

    But he applauded Ciattarelli for disclosing returns back to 2012, his first full year in the New Jersey Legislature. He served in the Assembly from December 2011 until January 2018, making an annual salary in that post of $49,000.

    “I think that’s a good standard, is to say: ‘You saw my finances while I was in office,’” Rasmussen said.

    Ciattarelli did not release his returns when he ran for governor in 2021. Then, he ran against incumbent Gov. Phil Murphy and came close to unseating him. He also ran for the post in 2017 but lost to then-Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno in the Republican primary.

    Financial disclosures are important so voters can learn the sources of candidates’ income and any conflicts of interest and go to the ballot box armed with more information about the candidates, Rasmussen said.

    The details of Ciattarelli’s finances could deflate his criticism of Sherrill as a wealthy politician who cashed in on her time in Congress, Rasmussen said.

    “I think it sort of levels the playing field from the public perception,” Rasmussen said. “You can’t really say that Mikie’s the millionaire here, because they both are candidates who have significant assets and significant income and significant means. I’m not going to compare income brackets, but it puts them more or less at parity. They both are candidates with significant incomes.”

    Sherrill and her husband, a broker at UBS Securities, reported roughly $3.2 million in income for 2024, their tax returns say. They were billed $1.08 million in federal income tax; $279,010 in New York state income tax (UBS Securities is based in New York City); and $29,002 in New Jersey state income tax in 2024.

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  • Democrats face high stakes in New Jersey and Virginia

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    The two premier statewide elections this fall are Democrats’ to lose, but they have a lot to prove.

    Many Democrats won’t be satisfied with simply eking out a win — they are banking on resounding victories from Rep. Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey and former Rep. Abigail Spanberger of Virginia. The gubernatorial nominees, who are leaning into their national security pedigrees, are carrying the weight of a party’s expectations.

    The party is looking to them to springboard Democrats into next year’s midterms, with control of Congress up for grabs. They’re eager to show that 2024’s drubbing was an anomaly.

    “Democrats should be optimistic about these two races, but you know, the lesson from 2024 is we can’t take anything for granted,” said veteran Democratic strategist Simon Rosenberg, who added that President Donald Trump’s mastery of dominating news coverage runs the risk of drowning out his rivals’ economic messaging.

    After Democratic overperformances in local elections across the country this year, the party is bullish on their prospects. Recent polling has Sherrill and Spanberger leading their Republican opponents, Jack Ciattarelli and Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, respectively.

    When pushed, operatives express more confidence about Virginia, and acknowledge maintaining their grip on the governor’s mansion in New Jersey for the third consecutive cycle presents a tougher challenge.

    National Democrats have committed what they called some of their largest initial investments in these states — $1.5 million each in New Jersey and Virginia — to boost Sherrill and Spanberger. A group backed by the Democratic Governors Association also placed $20 million in advertisements in New Jersey, around twice as much as the DGA-backed group did in 2021.

    The political climate in Virginia and New Jersey is far better than what they’re facing in some battleground races next November. But the fear of being toppled by Republican nominees in states where Trump gained ground is adding pressure to the Sherrill and Spanberger campaigns, as are looming questions of whether they can unify their fractured coalition that cost Kamala Harris the election.

    With two months before voters head to the polls in New Jersey and Virginia — and just weeks before early voting starts — here are some issues to watch.

    Economy

    Democrats are blaming Trump for rising costs as they emphasize affordability — an issue that catapulted him to the White House last year. If successful, that messaging is likely to serve as a blueprint for next year’s midterms.

    Rep. Rob Menendez (D-N.J.) argued that Sherrill’s focus on affordability will appeal to those who backed the president because he has “lied about every major campaign promise” regarding cutting costs.

    Democrats see this as a way to recapture Black and Hispanic voters, who drifted toward Trump in part because they viewed him as stronger than Harris on the economy.

    “Many of the voters, the Latino and Black community, were looking for possible change. They thought Trump would be that change,” said Rep. Nellie Pou (D-N.J.), who represents a diverse district that Trump won last year. “Sadly, he has not delivered on any of the promises he has made. He has not changed the economy, he has not lowered the costs. … I think the Latino and Black community will see him for what he is.”

    Democrats are hoping the Trump administration’s recent moves on tariffs and the One Big Beautiful Bill Act will sway voters in November. Republicans, meanwhile, are toying with how to market the megabill to voters ahead of next year’s elections.

    This election will put Democrats’ Trump messaging to the test. But while they try to convince voters higher costs are the president’s fault, Ciattarelli and his fellow Republicans say outgoing Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy and Trenton Democrats are to blame.

    In Virginia, Democrats are leaning into similar messages on affordability, arguing Trump has broken campaign promises on lowering costs since his return to the White House. The DOGE cuts, which are acutely felt in Northern Virginia suburbs outside of Washington, D.C., are paramount in the campaign as Democrats look to cast Earle-Sears as a cheerleader for Trump’s gutting of the federal workforce.

    The Trump Factor

    The GOP is hoping they can replicate the party’s success when Trump is not on the ballot — something that helped lift Virginia Republican Glenn Youngkin to the governor’s mansion four years ago. That red wave, however, was short-lived as Democrats successfully flipped control of the lower chamber of the Virginia legislature in 2023. Now Democrats are looking to expand their control of both chambers as well as usher in a clean sweep of all three statewide offices this year by leaning into anti-Trump sentiments.

    But the president’s impact is an unknown factor in Virginia. Earle-Sears has yet to receive Trump’s endorsement, which some Republicans are bullish would help her make up ground.

    An endorsement “would be a plus,” said Fairfax County GOP chair Katie Gorka. “I know that there are people, especially in Northern Virginia, who are not Trump fans. … But the bottom line is, Trump did really well for a Republican in Northern Virginia.”

    In the meantime, Earle-Sears is borrowing from his 2024 culture-war playbook. In a campaign ad released Wednesday, she labeled her Democratic opponent a “woke Washington radical” who “wants boys to play sports and share locker rooms with little girls” and will allow kids to change genders “without telling their parents.”

    The Spanberger campaign wants to remind Virginia voters that the Republican nominee, who advocated the Republican Party “move on” from the president just a few years ago, is now fully embracing Trumpism.

    In New Jersey, Trump endorsed Ciattarelli in the Republican primary. But it’s unclear if the president’s support will provide a boost among the general electorate, in which Ciattarelli needs to earn the backing of unaffiliated and Democratic voters to chip away at Democrats’ large voter registration advantage. Recent surveys show Trump unpopular with New Jerseyans, and Democrats are confident he will drag Ciattarelli at the polls.

    Ciattarelli recently told reporters he appreciates “that the White House isn’t taking a heavy-handed approach” with his race, but offered to “do anything” that Ciattarelli thinks “can help the campaign.”

    Ciattarelli criticized the president years ago, and Trump did not endorse the New Jersey Republican in 2021. But Trump now proclaims Ciattarelli as “100 percent MAGA” — something Democrats are eager to remind voters of. Ciattarelli argues that Democrats are more focused on talking about Trump than New Jersey.

    Who will boost Democratic enthusiasm?

    While Republicans can rally the base around Trump this November, Democrats lack that clear leader.

    When asked about whether a campaign appearance from Harris would benefit Sherrill, New Jersey Democratic Party Chair LeRoy Jones said he is focused on “utilizing the celebrity base in New Jersey that we have,” and cited Sen. Cory Booker and Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, the latter of whom came in second place during the June Democratic primary for governor.

    “We have a number of individuals that give that turnout prowess,” he said.

    Former President Barack Obama held rallies for Murphy and former New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine, as well as Virginia nominees Ralph Northam and Terry McAuliffe. Though he hasn’t announced plans in either state yet, he participated in a fundraiser earlier this summer for Sherrill.

    At least one potential 2028 Democratic White House candidate, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, is planning to campaign for Sherrill and Spanberger in the closing stretch of the campaign.

    Black and Hispanic voters

    Across the country, Republicans are looking to replicate Trump’s inroads with Black and Hispanic voters. New Jersey and Virginia will be the first post-2024 test of whether they are able to achieve that.

    In the primary, Sherrill had a lower share of the vote in areas with large Black and Hispanic populations, and some have warned that Democrats are at risk of continuing to lose those voters. Ciattarelli and Sherrill are working to engage those communities, and Sherrill recently got a notable boost with an endorsement from Baraka, who performed well in areas with large Black and Hispanic populations in the primary.

    In Virginia, Republicans tout their diverse slate of candidates, with a Black woman running atop the ticket, an openly gay lieutenant governor candidate in John Reid and incumbent attorney general Jason Miyares, who is of Cuban descent.

    Earle-Sears’ campaign also points to a recent $500,000 donation from Bob Johnson, the co-founder of Black Entertainment Television, as evidence she is making inroads with minority voters while picking up fundraising in the campaign’s final stretch. Spanberger enjoys a hefty 3-to-1 cash advantage, according to recent state campaign finance reports.

    Spanberger was forced to play defense after a woman held a racially divisive sign last month at a campaign rally targeting the lieutenant governor. “Hey Winsome, if trans can’t share your bathroom, then blacks can’t share my water fountain,” the sign read. Spanberger said in a social media post the sign was “racist and abhorrent.”

    Democrats counter that their own diverse ticket, which includes an Indian-born woman as lieutenant governor nominee and a Black man running for attorney general, better represent the values of voters of the state than their GOP counterparts. The party also vows their ticket will, unlike the Republicans, work to protect residents from the federal government overreach.

    “Folks aren’t fooled in this campaign,” said Lamont Bagby, a state senator and chair of Virginia’s Democratic Party. “When we needed them to push back on the Trump administration … they did not.”

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