Ballot Drawing To Be Held In Freehold On August 13

Monmouth County Clerk Christine Giordano Hanlon

Monmouth County Clerk Christine Giordano Hanlon announced today that the drawing for ballot positions in the November general election will be held on Monmouth August 13 at 3:00 p.m.

The drawing, which by New Jersey law is to occur 85 days before the election, will be conducted by Deputy Clerk Judith Ricci at the Monmouth County Clerk of Elections Office located at 300 Halls Mill Road in Freehold.

This year the U.S. Senate election between Democrat Bob Menendez, Republican Bob Hugin and six Independent candidates will have the top row on the ballot. Which column each candidate, and their respective slates, will have on the ballot will be determined by the drawing. A capsule with each Senate candidate’s name will be placed in a box and Ricci will remove the capsules one at a time to determine the which slate gets column 1 through 8.

Linda Baum, with her back to the camera holding the temperature gun as Clerk of Elections Bertha Sumick looks on with amusement in August of 2015.

In 2015 Vin Gopal, then the Chairman of the Monmouth County Democrats and a honorary volunteer firefighter, accused former Monmouth County Clerk M. Claire French of rigging previous years ballot drawings by refrigerating the Republican slates’ capsule and picking the cold one first. Gopal send Linda Baum, a Middletown Democrat, to the drawing with a temperature gun to make sure all the capsules were the same temperature. They were.