Dr. Alieta Eck is not likely to be a U.S. Senator come October 17. She’s yet to choose a campaign manager for her primary race against Steve Lonegan in the August 13 special primary. She does not have a fundraising base nor the personal wealth to pay for a statewide campaign.
Lots of New Jerseyans lost personal wealth when Jon Corzine was governor. Eck told me she lost $200,000 to Corzine in the MF Global debacle. Fortunately she got $180,000 back, but that won’t fund a statewide primary or general election.
Based upon my interview with her, I don’t think she is quite ready to debate Lonegan, or the eventual Democratic nominee, most likely Cory Booker, on any issue other the healthcare, yet. But that could change. Eck is smart.
Now that she survived Steve Lonegan’s challenge to her petitions, it worth getting to know the political novice who was able to get 2,285 nominating signatures in three days, Dr. Alieta Eck. That was a task that was too much for many seasoned politicians.
From the looks of how the Special Election Senate race is shaping up, Newark Mayor Cory Booker is going to win in a landslide anyway. Booker has a huge lead over Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver and Congressmen Frank Pallone and Rush Holt in the independent polls for the Democratic nomination. Lonegan is within striking distance of Pallone, Holt and Oliver in the Monmouth University Poll released last Friday, but loses to Booker by 16 points.
The only hope for a Republican to win the Senate seat in October is for someone other than Booker to be the Democratic nominee or for Booker to be badly wounded, politically, in a bloody Democratic primary. That doesn’t look like it is going to happen.
So far, Pallone and Holt are playing nice. Pallone is sending out emails asking people to recruit their friends to ‘Like’ his facebook page and volunteer for his campaign. Holt is posting on facebook asking non-Democrats to change parties in order to vote for him in the primary. If Oliver is doing anything, we haven’t noticed.
No one is mentioning all the shootings in Newark this week, that, if they were happening in Marlboro or Newtown, CT would be making national news. No one is asking Booker for his travel schedule or where he spends his weekends. Pallone tried to make an issue of Booker’s relationship with Governor Chris Christie, but Democrats seem to like Christie more than they like Pallone. No one is making an issue of Booker’s relationship with Wall Street, because Wall Street is investing a ton of money in Newark.
Administrative Law Judge Edward J. Delanoy, Jr rejected the Steve Lonegan for Senate campaign’s challenge to Dr. Alieta Eck’s nominating petitions for the August 13, 2013 Special Republican Senate Primary this afternoon. Barring an appeal by the Lonegan campaign, Eck will be on the primary ballot. Delanoy’s order can be downloaded here.
Dr. Alieta Eck is on the GOP Special Senate Primary Ballot.
At the conclusion of the hearing on the matter yesterday, Lonegan’s attorney, F. Michael Daily, withdrew his challenge based up a failure to collect 1000 signatures from registered Republican or unaffiliated voters, leaving the challenge only to the veracity of Eck’s witnessing of the petitions.
Delanoy found that Eck may have failed to physically witness approximately 50 of the 371 signatures she collected on June 9 at her church in Somerset, but that even if she did not physically witness them, she had a right to cure the defect in her petition books. He further ruled that curing the defect was not necessary because, even if she had not verified all 371 signatures collected at the church, she still had more than the 1000 signatures necessary to qualify for the ballot.
Delanoy found that Eck acted in good faith and that Daily presented no evidence of fraud or wrongdoing on Eck’s part.
Lonegan’s spokeswoman, Nachama Soloveichik said, “We had serious concerns about the origin, collection, and notarization of Dr. Eck’s petitions and those concerns continue.”
Soloveichik did not know if Lonegan plans to appeal Delanoy’s ruling. The Star Ledger is reporting that Eck’s attorney Ted Maciag said that Lonegan is appealing the decision to Lt. Governor Kim Guadagno, the New Jersey Secretary of State.
There was a Monmouth County twist to Delanoy’s ruling. He cited the case of Scudiery vs. Falzone from 2010 when then Monmouth County Chairman Victor Scudiery challenged Mark Falzone’s primary petitions for a bid against Congressman Frank Pallone.
Steve Lonegan, the GOP front runner in the August 13 Special U.S. Senate Primary has filed a challenge to the candidacy of his only opponent, Dr. Alieta Eck based allegedly invalid signatures.
Calling Eck a “prospective candidate,” the Lonegan campaign alleged that Eck herself claimed to witness signatures that she did not in fact witness.
Lonegan’s attorney, F. Michael Daily, said in the challenge that “numerous books contain signatures purportedly witnessed by Alieta Eck and investigation has disclosed that contrary to her affirmations she did not witness such signatures.”
Daily, who has been retained by the Lonegan for Senate campaign, also alleged in the objections that other witnesses, some of whom also claimed to have gathered hundreds of signatures, are similarly invalid.
In poll conducted over the weekend before Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver got into the U.S. Senate race, the Quinnipiac Polling Institute reports that Newark Mayor Cory Booker has leads of over 40% against Congressmen Frank Pallone and Rush Holt for the Democratic Special Election nomination for U.S. Senate.
In the gubernatorial race, Governor Chris Christie is maintaining his 30 point lead over State Senator Barbara Buono, the Democratic nominee. Buono’s name recognition as risen from the high twenties to the low forties, but as voters get to know her, they don’t like her. Buono’s favorability rating is negative 18-23 percent, with 56% not knowing enough about her to express an opinion.
Presumptive GOP nominee for Senate, Steve Lonegan, trails Booker by 54%-27%. Independents favor Booker over Lonegan 50%-25%.
Lonegan is within 10 points of Frank Pallone, and is virtually tied with the Monmouth County Democrat among Independents, leading by 29%-28%.
Lonegan loses to Holt by only 5% and is also tied with Independents against Holt.
If he really wants to be a U.S. Senator, Steve Lonegan should eliminate the words ‘Obama’ and ‘Obamacare’ from his stump speech and talking points. He should never say the phrase ‘Republican backbone” in public again.
Despite the recent scandals in the IRS, State Department and Justice Department, the president remains popular. 48% of American voters still approve of the president according to the Rasmussen Daily Presidential Tracking Poll released Sunday. It is a safe bet that New Jersey voters, who reelected President Obama by 18% only 8 months ago, have a higher regard for the president than rest of the country.
Running against Barack Obama in New Jersey is a losing strategy. Running against ‘Washington’ works. Running against the IRS, government eavesdropping, rising healthcare costs and the anemic economy works. Running forliberty and prosperity works. Running forjobs, better education, better healthcare and less government intrusion into our personal lives works.
The Democratic Special Primary for U.S. Senate just got a whole lot more interesting and a whole lot more competitive.
The Star Ledger is reporting that Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver has collected 1500 signatures and will file as a candidate on Monday. She will compete with Newark Mayor Cory Booker, Congressman Frank Pallone and Congressman Rush Holt in the August 13 primary for the Democratic nomination to fill the Senate vacancy cause by Frank Lautenberg’s death.
Oliver, of East Orange, cuts into Booker’s base of African-American and urban voters far more powerfully than the suburban congressmen, Pallone and Holt.
In the Republican Special Primary, former GOP gubernatorial candidate Steve Lonegan and newcomer Dr. Aleita Eck of Piscataway are expected to file their petitions in Trenton tomorrow.
Bayshore Tea Party co-flounders Barbara Gonzalez and Bob Gordon, former State Senate candidate Leigh-Ann Bellew and former Assembly candidate Edna Walsh announced their endorsement of Eck on Sunday evening. Bellew and Walsh lost the GOP primary in the 13th Legislative District last week by a 80-20 margin, with the support of the Bayshore Tea Party.
Don’t believe for one minute that Cory Booker’s victory in the U.S. Senate Democratic primary in August is a lock.
Let me say that Cory Booker is a good friend of mine. He and I had an excellent personal and working relationship while I served as Region 2 EPA Administrator under President George W. Bush. I actually think that he would make an outstanding U.S. Senator.
There must be something in the poll data, however, that makes both Rush Holt and Frank Pallone think that they can defeat Booker in the August primary. I would say that Booker’s chances of winning the primary are 65 per cent, but no greater. If Democratic Speaker of the Assembly Sheila Oliver runs, Booker’s chances of a primary victory will be reduced – by how much I do not know.
If Cory Booker wins the August primary, however, he will be elected U.S. Senator in October and will be there for life.
Steven Lonegan and Bayshore Tea Party Group Founders Barbara Gonzalez and Bob Gordan, 2010. facebook photo.
Bayshore Tea Party Group co-founder Barbara Gonzalez blames her candidates’ landslide defeat in the GOP primary on Steve Lonegan.
In a post on faceback early Wednesday morning Gonzalez said that Lonegan, the former Bogota Mayor, former gubernatorial candidate and former Executive Director of Americans for Prosperity-NJ, promised financial support to Leigh-Ann Bellew and her team, only to renege.
“Steve Lonegan turned his back on Bayshore’s candidates after promising to help. He left us in the lurch and reneged….think about that before you get his petitions signed. Another blowhard. We would have won if we had the money/donations that he promised would come. We went on and did it ourselves and got 20% with NO money.! He can forget about our support!”
Wednesday afternoon Gonzalez wrote,
“Lonegan could have had some hard ass worker bees if he didn’t screw
Bayshore TPG. Oh well.”
Lonegan is so far the only Republican candidate of note to announce an intention to seek the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in the Special Primary on August 13.
Joseph Aziz can continue his graduate studies at Montclair State University. The school’s president, Susan Cole, caved to media pressure generated by the civil rights group, The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) and revoked Aziz’s suspension for making fat jokes on YouTube and facebook about the girlfriend of a fellow student who heckled conservative activist Steve Lonegan during a presentation at the school last September. The heckler who called Lonegan a racist and an American fascist while interrupting his presentation was never disciplined.
The YouTube video of the fat heckler was set to private within an hour of MMM asking the University for the identity of the heckler and if the heckler had also been disciplined.
Aziz declined to tell MMM the name of the heckler or the heckler’s girlfriend.
Cole revoked Aziz’s suspension in a letter dated Thursday after consulting with the University’s attorney.
“While Montclair State never should have issued its unconstitutional gag order in the first place, we commend President Cole for acting swiftly to end the situation once it became public,” said FIRE Senior Vice President Robert Shibley. “Since this unwarranted suspension prevented Mr. Aziz from attending any classes, we expect that Montclair State will make accommodations to ensure that he can get into the classes he needs as soon as possible. We also expect that the university will make sure that this unjust punishment does not appear on his records.”
Shibley offered to work with Cole on revising other University policies that violate students’s rights of free expression.
“Montclair State briefly tried to justify its decision by appealing to New Jersey’s anti-bullying law, but Aziz’s comments did not constitute bullying under the law’s definition of the term. Even if they had, Aziz’s speech still would have been protected by the First Amendment, which supersedes state law,” said FIRE’s Shibley. “While Montclair State recognized its error this time, several of the university’s policies could still be used to silence student speech in the future. FIRE would be pleased to work with President Cole to revise those policies to comply with the First Amendment, by which all public universities are legally and morally bound.”
Cole should take Shibley up on his offer. She should also make sure the University’s code of conduct is not used as a weapon against students who do not subscribe to her administration’s political agenda.
