NJ Gov Race: Legal Action 'Not Off The Table' For Ciattarelli

NEW JERSEY — Even as the AP called the race a win for Gov. Phil Murphy Wednesday night, Republican Jack Ciattarelli released the following message: Count every vote.

When asked if his team would consider any legal challenge, Ciattarelli spokeswoman Stami Williams replied:

"Right now it’s too soon to tell, but nothing is off of the table."

Also, when asked how the Republican team was withstanding the pressure of a nail-biter of a race, Williams said: "It is a journey."

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Politico and the Associated Press called the election a win for Murphy. As of Thursday afternoon, Murphy has 1,247,061 to 1,206,360 for Ciattarelli, with 98 percent of the vote in. Murphy is ahead by 40,000 votes.

However, Murphy was ahead by less than one percentage point Wednesday night when the AP called the race for Murphy.

Ciattarelli has not conceded yet, saying that not all the mail-in and provisional votes have been counted.

"Phil Murphy and Jack Ciattarelli are separated by a fraction of a percent out of 2.4 million ballots cast. It’s irresponsible of the media to make this call when the New Jersey Secretary of State doesn’t even know how many ballots are left to be counted," said Ciattarelli's campaign in a statement.

"The New Jersey Republican Party is working hand in glove with the Ciattarelli for Governor campaign and Republican National Committee to guarantee a robust legal presence to scrutinize the process and ensure every legal vote is being counted," said Tom Szymanski, director of the New Jersey Republican Party said late Wednesday.

"This process will take some time to play out," he cautioned.

He added that Republican volunteers filled nearly 1,000 poll worker shifts and nearly 1,000 challenger shifts in Tuesday's election.

No matter what happens with the governor's race, Szymanski hailed Tuesday as a giant victory for the NJ GOP.

Although the results are still unofficial, here are the New Jersey Statehouse seats the Republican Party gained on Tuesday:

LD2 (Atlantic County): Senator-Elect Vince Polistina, Assemblyman-Elect Don Guardian and Assemblywoman-Elect Claire Swift

In LD3 (South Jersey, Democrat Senate President Steve Sweeney's district): Senator-Elect Edward Durr, projected to beat Sweeney, Assemblywoman-Elect Bethanne McCarthy Patrick, Assemblywoman-Elect Beth Sawyer

LD 8 (Atlantic and Cumberland counties): Senator-Elect Jean Stanfield, Assemblyman-Elect Brandon Umba and Assemblyman-Elect Michael Torrissi

LD11 (Southern Monmouth County): Assemblywomen-Elect Marilyn Piperno and Kimberly Eulner, plus Democratic Senator Vin Gopal fights to hold onto his seat in a race that is too close to call, although Gopal remains in the lead as of Thursday morning.

"And keep your eye on LD16 (Hunterdon County), where the race is too close to call and GOP candidate Vinny Panico is in a dead heat!" said Szymanski.

"Last night was a historic one for New Jersey Republicans, who picked up at least a half dozen Assembly seats, several Senate seats, along with county and local seats up and down the state," said Ciattarelli spokeswoman Williams in an official statement sent at noon Wednesday. "Jack is proud to lead our ticket and our party's resurgence. Right now, our team is focused on making sure all the legal votes are counted and our citizens can have confidence in the system."

This comes on top of Trump-backed Republican Glenn Youngkin's historic victory over Democrat Terry McAuliffe in Virginia, another state as deep blue as New Jersey.

“New Jersey and Virginia showed the nation and world that New Jerseyans and all Americans want freedom, not government mandates,” said New Jersey Assemblyman Erik Peterson, a Republican from Hunterdon County. “The voters are saying ‘no’ to indoctrinating our children, no to vaccine mandates and no to government by executive order."

"Most people thought Murphy would win by eight points. But my gut was always that it would be closer than that, and that Jack stood a shot," said Republican Monmouth County state Sen. Declan O'Scanlon, who won re-election Tuesday. "Whether Jack pulls this off or not, this was an unquestionable slap in the face to the arrogance of the Democratic Party. They assume they're going to win and they can do anything they want. Well, what this election showed is that they are going to be held accountable."

Ciattarelli often spoke about how he would have handled the epidemic differently than Murphy did: Should he win the election, Ciattarelli promised no vaccine mandates and said that masks would become optional in schools.

Murphy, by contrast, made NJ one of the first states to require teachers be vaccinated or tested. New Jersey is one of 16 U.S. states that has a school mask mandate, all of them Democrat-led states on the East or West coasts. New Jersey also had one of the longest-running indoor mask mandates.

Ciattarelli also criticized Murphy for allowing New Jersey schools to remain virtual for much of last year, and for keeping New Jersey's small businesses, such as restaurants, closed or under capacity restrictions.

"The overly-prolonged lockdowns. The restaurant industry — which employs hundreds of thousands of people — it was torture for them to watch restaurants right across the river in Pennsylvania reopen," said O'Scanlon. "And New Jersey parents could not send their kids back to school while they could go back in other states. Kids, particularly disabled kids, needed to be back in school."

Coronavirus aside, there were other issues: Murphy raised taxes twice in the past for year, on businesses and on people who earn more than $1 million. He raised taxes while passing through an agenda considered one of the most progressive in the nation, including $15 minimum wage and subsidized child care.

All of those made Murphy very popular with Democratic New Jersey voters.

Ciattarelli campaigned on a promise to freeze property taxes for those over 65 as well as change the current school funding formula, so luxury homes in Hoboken and Jersey City would start paying a higher tax rate than suburban homes elsewhere in the state.

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