With so many North Jersey candidates (Fulop, Baraka, Sherrill and maybe Gottheimer), I wonder if Sweeney might have a wider path to the nomination than we think.
Imagine the map we'd get from a Sweeney vs. Bramnick race...
My opinion for a while has been that writing Sweeney off just because he lost to Durr is a bit silly. The South Jersey machine returned in full force in 2023 and he can only serve to benefit from the ticket splitting up north. A Bramnick vs Sweeney race would definitely indeed feel like a return to the past, though I think it may be hard for him to win a Republican primary in the year 2025, and I'm not particularly convinced the county party system will work to his benefit.
Also crucially, New Jersey is not the same state as is was 20/30 years ago. If we end up with so many candidates of various local machines running, which it is right now, then nobody's base is sizable enough on its own. Everyone will need to try and win some section of the now sizable anti-machine vote. As we are seeing now in the senate race however, this vote can consolidate easily with the right appeals, and that candidate will win quite easily without a single rival.
How would Sweeney appeal to anti-machine voters? Isn't he one of the leaders of the machine?
