TRENTON, N.J. (CN) — Republicans hoping to take back the narrowly held Senate are keeping a close eye on New Jersey, but the odds seem long for a GOP win despite the legal charges against the Democratic incumbent.
Prior to last year, many had expected Senator Bob Menendez to win reelection handily. However, that all changed in September when the 70-year-old Democrat was indicted on bribery, conspiracy, and obstruction charges.
The senator was accused of accepting gold bars, cash, and other lavish gifts from New Jersey businessmen in exchange for political influence in Egypt. Menendez and his wife have pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Menendez, who was first appointed to the U.S. Senate in 2006 to fill a vacant seat, will not be on the ballot on June 4, having stepped away from the Democratic primary. However, he has not ruled out running as an independent in the fall.
“I am hopeful my exoneration will take place this summer,” he said in a statement at the time, “and allow me to pursue my candidacy as an independent Democrat in the general election.”
Even though no Republican has been elected to the Senate from New Jersey since 1972, the Menendez indictments changed the safe blue seat into a wild card.
“It is an open seat, and they don’t happen all that often,” Patrick Murray, director of the Polling Institute at Monmouth University, said in an interview. The last competitive primary in the state was in 2013.
The competition is centered mostly on the Republican side now, with the Democratic contest all but decided.
Representative Andy Kim, a Democrat from New Jersey’s 3rd Congressional District, is the leading candidate on the Democratic side and is expected to secure the nomination. Kim already has thwarted a run by New Jersey First Lady Tammy Murphy and earlier this year won a court battle over contentious ballot placement issues.
The mild-mannered Kim — who made national headlines after being photographed cleaning up following the Jan. 6 Capitol riot — was the first out of the gate to replace Menendez, announcing his campaign the day after Menendez was indicted.
“It seems inevitable that Kim will win,” said John Weingart, former head of the Eagleton Institute of Politics. “He is widely respected.”
Democrats still have a strong advantage in the state, and Kim’s fundraising has dwarfed his GOP rivals, but experts say some areas are redder now than they were several years back, citing Governor Phil Murphy’s tight reelection in 2021. Republicans have an uphill battle to beat back Kim, though.
“In New Jersey, most candidates don’t know how to run a primary because they’ve never done it before,” said Dan Cassino, executive director of the Fairleigh Dickinson University poll and a politics professor at the school. “There are lots of rookie mistakes being made. Nobody knows what they’re doing.”
The leading candidates on the GOP side are hotel entrepreneur Curtis Bashaw and Mendham Mayor Christine Serrano-Glassner.
Bashaw, who hails from the beach town of Cape May, holds the edge on money, with $1.1 million in his coffers as of the first quarter filing. He also has nabbed most of the county committee endorsements from around the state.
Serrano-Glassner reported about $400,000 in the first quarter, though she has the backing of many GOP officials and received former President Donald Trump’s blessing at his Wildwood rally last month after Trump labeled Bashaw an acolyte of former Governor Chris Christie.
“It is very much North Jersey versus South Jersey,” Cassino said, adding that the line ballot system that Kim successfully fought to change for the primary remains in place on the Republican side.
Murray also noted the ballot placement issue could be influential on the GOP side, as Bashaw will appear next to Trump’s name in some counties while Serrano-Glassner will be placed next to the former president in other counties.
Also running in the primary on the GOP side are Albert Harshaw and Justin Murphy, while Patricia Campos Medina and Lawrence Hamm are on the Democratic side.
A Fairleigh Dickinson University poll from April found that Kim leads top Republican candidates Serrano-Glassner and Bashaw with a nine-point advantage. However, if Menendez were in the poll that advantage shrinks to five points, the poll found.
Some say a Menendez independent run could act as spoiler for Democrats, but there is little benefit for him to do so outside of some bid for legal leverage in his corruption case or to help his son, Robert Menendez Jr., who is seeking reelection to the House and faces his own primary challenge.
Menendez has until the day of the New Jersey primary to file as an independent in the race, and by then his son’s primary will have been determined.
The three-term senator has faced corruption charges before; in 2015 he was accused of trying to influence the State Department on behalf of campaign donor, but he was able to beat back the charges. However, this time the opposition seems more formidable.
A Monmouth University poll earlier this year found nearly three-fourths of New Jersey residents disapproved of Menendez as a senator, a record low for the embattled Democratic lawmaker.
Fellow New Jersey Senator Cory Booker has called on Menendez to resign, and Menendez’s son has tried to distance himself from his father in his own primary challenge by highlighting his first name rather than last in campaign signs.
“He [Menendez Sr.] has always been good at raising money … but I imagine it is harder to raise money now than six years ago,” Weingart said. “He basically has no friends left.”
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