Infighting Reaches a Boiling Point in New Jersey Republican Primary as Candidates Desperately Try to Out-Trump Each Other

GOP candidates in the New Jersey governor’s race continue to devote their energy to attacking each other in a vicious battle for Donald Trump’s far-right base. In a new digital ad released today, Jack Ciattarelli labels his opponent and Trump-loyalist Hirsh Singh an “Obama Apologist” over a decade-old Facebook post made by Singh. 

Ciattarelli, who headlined a “Stop the Steal” rally in Trump’s honor and says Trump’s policies “worked for the country,” is trying to position himself as the most far-right candidate in the field — a difficult task given opponents like Singh, who peddles Donald Trump’s conspiracy theories and proclaims himself as the “only candidate in this race who is proudly pro-Trump.”

The Republican candidates in the New Jersey governor’s race have made name-calling attacks on each other the key focus of their campaigns and have turned into full-on keyboard warriors online. Phil Rizzo recently bashed Ciattarelli in a tweet for a Facebook post pushing against mandating vaccines for students, calling the COVID vaccine “experimental” while Singh has made his Twitter into a Ciattarelli hate account. 

“In their endless battle to prove themselves as loyal to Donald Trump’s extremism, every Republican candidate has simply proven themselves to be completely out-of-touch with the values that actually matter to New Jerseyans,” said DGA Senior Communications Advisor Christina Amestoy. “Try as they may, whatever candidate eventually emerges as the winner of the GOP’s self-proclaimed ‘Civil War’ won’t be able to walk back the right-wing extremism they’ve embraced proudly throughout this primary.” 

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