Gov. Murphy To NJ: 'Don't Travel, Period' Amid COVID Pandemic

NEW JERSEY — It’s not a new message, but Gov. Phil Murphy made a stronger statement – one that offered little wiggle room this time – that New Jersey residents shouldn’t travel unless absolutely necessary.

“We’ve been saying for six or eight weeks: Don’t travel. Period,” Murphy said during a news conference.

The statement followed a message he put out on Twitter stating that, “All non-essential out-of-state travel is DISCOURAGED. Residents and visitors coming to New Jersey, with limited exceptions, are to observe a 14-day self-quarantine. This recommendation excludes transient travel.”

And that message comes a week after he scrapped his ever-expanding quarantine travel advisory that he had been issuing for weeks, saying New Jerseyans should avoid travel unless it was to New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Delaware — because jobs and family likely make travel to those locations essential. Read more here: NJ COVID-19 Travel Quarantine Now Applies To All Except 4 States

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Exceptions have also been made for front-line workers, members of law enforcement or active duty members, Murphy said.

“If there’s a legitimate reason to go to Connecticut, for example, and you need to do that to and fro in a given day, clearly that’s OK,” Murphy said. “The spirit of this is you’re going for a reason that’s real, and you’re in and out the same day.

“No one should be traveling out of state for anything beyond that which is essential for your daily life, commuting to work or seeking medical treatment, for example.”

The travel advisory was issued for states and territories with a positive test rate higher than 10 per 100,000 residents or a state with a 10 percent or higher positive rate over a seven-day rolling average. When that number reached 46, Murphy decided to stop using the metrics.

“It was and remains our sole objective to protect public health, either from folks who are Jerseyans who have traveled out or from visitors who are coming in. That’s been the spirit of this from Day One, and that continues to be,” Murphy said. “When the list of states gets up to 46, and you have a denominator of 49, that leaves three. So it’s like we’ve been saying since September at this point, just don’t travel.”