NJ-GOV 2021 megathread

[Lord Admirale]

With tax hikes coming, I’m not so confident in Murphy’s chances. If he faces a moderate R like Bob Hugin he’s in a competitive race. Also, keep in mind that New Jersey typically votes the opposite way of who’s in the White House. He’s popular right now, but what fueled Christie’s landslide in 2013 was his national notoriety. Andrew Cuomo has taken that role in the pandemic, not Phil Murphy.

At this point, assuming Biden is president, New Jersey is a tossup for governor. If Trump somehow wins re-election, it’s safe D.

[Lord Admirale]

With tax hikes coming, I’m not so confident in Murphy’s chances. If he faces a moderate R like Bob Hugin he’s in a competitive race. Also, keep in mind that New Jersey typically votes the opposite way of who’s in the White House. He’s popular right now, but what fueled Christie’s landslide in 2013 was his national notoriety. Andrew Cuomo has taken that role in the pandemic, not Phil Murphy.

At this point, assuming Biden is president, New Jersey is a tossup for governor. If Trump somehow wins re-election, it’s safe D.

I’m not sure, New Jersey’s economy keeps getting worse and worse and tax hikes will crush it.
This is something Democrats don't understand. People don't really like taxes. I think Murphy wins regardless but if Biden wins it may be Lean D.

[Lord Admirale]

Ciattarelli spoke at a "Stop The Steal" rally per InsiderNJ, which has probably killed his chances. I've now switched my support from Ciattarelli to Murphy.

He's sewn up the GOP primary, but that absolutely destroys any small chance he had in the general. Safe D.

Hugin's choice to run for chairman rather than governor still confuses me. Arguably he's a much stronger candidate due to his self-funding and not doing something as dumb as that, and I think him having a pharma background would actually help him in the COVID era.

[Lord Admirale]

Why Monmouth didn't test Murphy just hypothetically against all the Rs runnning right now is beyond me..

Could just be assuming the race is Safe D, but that's a foolish assumption since New Jersey usually votes more Republican than expected in nearly all races. Kean nearly took down Malinowski, which no one was really expecting.

[Lord Admirale]

I've seen enough, I support Ciattarelli now. Murphy is coming across as a total asshole, and his answers on taxes are just strange.

[Lord Admirale]

I've seen enough, I support Ciattarelli now. Murphy is coming across as a total asshole, and his answers on taxes are just strange.

Murphy is running aggressive because he does not want Democrats to be apathetic since it is an off-year like 2009-10 and 2013-14

I'm not sure how well it is working if he's going to act like this. I was expecting to come out on Murphy's side but now I'm on Ciattarelli's.

[Lord Admirale]

I've seen enough, I support Ciattarelli now. Murphy is coming across as a total asshole, and his answers on taxes are just strange.

Murphy is running aggressive because he does not want Democrats to be apathetic since it is an off-year like 2009-10 and 2013-14

I'm not sure how well it is working if he's going to act like this. I was expecting to come out on Murphy's side but now I'm on Ciattarelli's.

Murphy wants to intensify the Democratic base in Essex, Hudson, Union and Camden counties, while attracting suburban women in Somerset, Middlesex, Morris and Burlington...

I can see it energizing Democratic centers but I don't see how it will help in the suburbs and exurbs. He acted a bit like Donald Trump with how he'd respond to Ciattarelli.

[Lord Admirale]

Do you see Ciattarelli making inroads in Hudson County Urban hispanic areas. Trump made inroads there in 2020 and Christie did as well in 2013

Urban areas have swung/trended towards incumbent presidents since 1992.

[Lord Admirale]

Murphy’s entire campaign is built around appealing to white liberals, which makes no sense. This may wind up being one of the worst incumbent campaigns in state history. Still think he wins but am now expecting single digits.

Isn't that the base of Murphy's appeal? White liberals in Red Bank/Middletown/Jersey City/Camden, etc.

Ciattarelli's appeal is to the typical suburban Republican base in Monmouth/Salem/Morris/Bergen, but a lot of them are Matthew Dowd-types turning blue because of Trumpism.

Trumpism is toxic in New Jersey.

Ciattarelli didn't come across Trumpian in the debate, sans his comments on vaccines.

[Lord Admirale]

You guys are very wrongly assuming that enough undecideds watched the debate, or cared about it, to make any sort of difference that will favor Ciatarelli. Murphy will win no matter what, and the margin will be determined but turnout. Ciatarelli's only chance to keep Murphy at his floor (which I think is 12%) is for turnout to benefit the GOP, as tends to happen in our off-year elections, to be fair. But even then, Murphy is still fairly popular, especially on his COVID response.

Murphy’s entire campaign is built around appealing to white liberals, which makes no sense. This may wind up being one of the worst incumbent campaigns in state history. Still think he wins but am now expecting single digits.

Isn't that the base of Murphy's appeal? White liberals in Red Bank/Middletown/Jersey City/Camden, etc.

Ciattarelli's appeal is to the typical suburban Republican base in Monmouth/Salem/Morris/Bergen, but a lot of them are Matthew Dowd-types turning blue because of Trumpism.

Trumpism is toxic in New Jersey.

Ciattarelli didn't come across Trumpian in the debate, sans his comments on vaccines.

Well, that's probably why Murphy is utilizing the campaign he is, as you see it. It's the California recall strategy where they're going to win no matter what, but to avoid overconfidence and to increase the margin Murphy seems to be attempting to incite fear of Ciatarelli as a Trumpist in sheep's clothing. He was trying to be fairly Trumpy in the primary, to be fair. The only way he wasn't was because he dared to admit that the 2020 election was fair and legitimate.

But the difference here is that Elder was unabashedly pro-Trump, Ciattarelli has mostly returned to his 2017 self. He stepped up the Trumpyness earlier this year because of the influx of South Jersey looneys (cough, JVD, cough) who were changing the power dynamic of the NJ-GOP away from the North Jersey Kean-Bramnick types.

It'll be interesting to see what the state GOP will be like regardless if Ciattarelli wins or loses, as well as how state assembly races play out.

[Lord Admirale]

Was reading about the LT-GOV debate last night, and Ciatarelli refused to answer a question last week about white privilege? And there were posters saying he did better than Murphy, when he wouldn't even answer simple questions?

Diane Allen actually had a surprisingly good answer to the question. Ciatarelli failed to do so, apparently

To 99% of voters of all colors the topic of white privilege is not something they think about while voting.

[Lord Admirale]

This is something people need to keep in mind, aside from NJ-Sen 2018 (which was a pretty unique circumstance), Republicans tend to overperform polling in New Jersey. Tom Kean was not expected to do as well as he did last November, and Republicans in NJ-05 and NJ-11 did much better than expected even as no-name candidates against popular incumbents.

New Jersey is certainly a largely local issues driven state and college-educated voters tend to split their votes. Think about Vermont, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire. All three voted for Joe Biden by health margins, but VT and NH voted for Republican governors by large margins, and MA reelected a Republican governor by a 2-1 margin three years ago.

Murphy not only refuses to back down from his millionaires tax, he's campaigning on it while the state is in its absolute worst economic condition in history. Regardless if you're for or against such a tax, you have to admit implementing it on a statewide level in any state is ridiculous. As opposed to a country, you can easily move from one state to another as a millionaire. Nothing can stop them from packing their bags and moving to Pennsylvania or head south (like me), and Murphy doesn't seem to get that.

Ciattarelli isn't perfect (Hugin would've made a much stronger GOV candidate especially during COVID) but I think people are severely underestimating Jack's chances.

[Lord Admirale]

I'm not surprised with those numbers; Trumplicans are definitely more reluctant to vote by mail now than before.

[Lord Admirale]

Latest Emerson poll has Murphy+4, this is not gonna be a landslide for Murphy at all.

[Lord Admirale]

Latest Emerson poll has Murphy+4, this is not gonna be a landslide for Murphy at all.

Didn't realize we should ignore every other recent poll for an Emerson poll.

The month-old polls?

[Lord Admirale]

Obama in his speech mentioned Ciatarelli being at a Stop the Steal rally, which I'm surprised Murphy hasn't been hammering home more.

01/06 is becoming the Dems' Benghazi/emails. It is a shame because 1/6 was 50x worse than either of those, but the fatigue of hearing about 1/6 is definitely real.

[Lord Admirale]

I wouldn't say those numbers guarantee a Murphy victory, keep in mind that even though NJ Republicans tend to be moderate, you still have Sussex, Ocean, Warren, Hunterdon, and now Salem County; all of which are very rural, conservative, and Trump country. Since a lot of Republicans still believe the election was stolen, I really doubt any of them will vote by mail.

My prediction is that we may not see NJ-Gov called for a few days. Ciattarelli will probably come out with an early lead, but will get tight no matter who wins it.

[Lord Admirale]

And you guys called me crazy for saying Ciattarelli had a chance. He didn't win, but he sure as hell got way closer than 90% of Atlas expected.