Politico: “New Jersey’s Republican primary for governor is heated, nasty, and dripping with contempt.”
Politico: “New Jersey’s Republican primary for governor is heated, nasty, and dripping with contempt.”
The Republican primary for New Jersey governor’s race is ending the week on an ugly note. Hours after Politico described the Republican primary as “heated, nasty, and dripping with contempt,” former talk radio host Bill Spadea released a new ad touting his loyalty to Trump, and slamming Jack Ciattarelli for his previous anti-Trump comments.
Spadea’s latest attack comes as both candidates remain laser-focused on winning the President’s endorsement. While Politico reports that Trump “appears inclined towards Spadea,” and has “criticized Ciattarelli… for not seeking [his] help,” Trump’s looming influence has forced Ciattarelli to race even further to the right — even contradicting himself — to compete with Spadea, the race’s “Trumpiest candidate.” Last month, Ciattarelli changed course from his previous position on the violent January 6 rioters who stormed the Capitol, claiming, “President Trump was right to pardon the men and women present at the Capitol on January 6th…”
Ciatarrelli’s new tone might not be enough to put him over the edge. Just this week, Ciattarelli was “crushed” by Spadea in the Ocean County Republican convention, the county with the “highest GOP voter base in the state.”
Read more from Politico on New Jersey’s “heated, nasty” GOP primary:
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New Jersey’s Republican primary for governor is heated, nasty, and dripping with contempt. The two top contenders, Jack Ciattarelli and Bill Spadea, wouldn’t even make eye contact when they took a break from savaging each other during a debate earlier this month.
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So as Ciattarelli and Spadea make their appeals to the MAGA masses, they also appear to be crafting messages designed to be heard by one part-time New Jersey resident in particular: Trump.
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“If Trump endorses Spadea, I think the primary is over. We’ll just have to wait and see what the president decides to do,” said George Gilmore, the Ocean County Republican chair and Spadea backer, who’s on the payroll of a Spadea-linked PAC.
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Spadea, who until recently hosted a drive time radio show where he promoted far-right conspiracy theories about vaccines and the 2020 election, has a simple appeal: He’s the Trumpiest of the candidates.
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At the same time, [Spadea’s] emphasizing how Ciattarelli had shied away from the former president’s support when he was New Jersey’s Republican gubernatorial nominee in 2021.
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Going by Trump’s own pre-election statements, he appears inclined towards Spadea. Just before holding a rally in Wildwood last May, Trump called into Spadea’s radio show and told him “you’ve had my back from the beginning.” Trump also criticized Ciattarelli, without mentioning him by name, for not seeking Trump’s help in his 2021 campaign.
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“‘This guy never came to ask for my support. And you know what? When MAGA sees that, they don’t like it and they didn’t vote for him. He would have won easily if he did, but he didn’t do that. He thinks he’s hot stuff, I guess,” Trump said [of Ciattarelli].
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But Ciattarelli and his allies, who’ve dug through thousands of hours of Spadea’s radio show, have reposted Spadea’s criticism of Trump following the 2020 election, even if much of it was for not being aggressive enough against his critics and “the deep state.”
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Ciattarelli has his own negative history of Trump comments. Ciattarelli called him a “charlatan” in 2015 and said he should drop out of that race following the Access Hollywood tape in which Trump boasted of grabbing women by their private parts.
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