The race to replace U.S. Rep. Andy Kim (D-3rd) in the House may be getting tighter — and more heated — with candidates once seen as long odds now getting new life from the federal court’s recent abolition of the “party line” system.
Veteran state Assemblyman Herb Conaway (D-Burlington) had been presumed to be on a clear track to victory in the district primary, having gotten most of the party leadership’s support — and a favorable ballot placement — in this newly bluer district. But the preferential ballot design is no longer, and the race has gotten closer than many expected, with state Assemblywoman Carol Murphy now appearing to benefit from the leveling of the playing field.
“I couldn’t be more grateful for it, because now it’s given me an opportunity to show people that I am ready to take on D.C., regardless of being shut out for whatever reason he got the party lines,” Murphy told NJ Spotlight News.
Murphy and Conaway have known each other for 30 years and serve in the Assembly together, but she said a big difference between Conaway and herself is that she is a hustler and he has grown content and lethargic.
“I’m always on the go,” she said. “If my constituency doesn’t know who I am, that’s my fault, not theirs. And I haven’t been lazy. I’ve been accessible.”
Conaway, a doctor in addition to being a legislator, bristled at the inference and questioned if his race is at issue.
“I think, quite frankly, some of this is a pejorative,” he said. “I think if I weren’t a person of color that wouldn’t be said. I really think there are tones of racism in that argument. I’m a person who has been accomplished in my public life. I have two advanced degrees, I’ve worked very hard. I had more than one job for the last 25 years and excelled at both of those things and continue to practice medicine. So I don’t know where she got this idea that I’m lazy, but it might be a preconceived notion that she has.”
They and other Democrats in this field are generally on the same page in terms of policy. But the end of the “party line” has made primaries tougher for former frontrunners like Conaway, said Micah Rasmussen, the executive director of the Rebovich Institute for New Jersey Politics at Rider University.
“How powerful are they without the line?” Rasmussen said the county party leadership. “If they are still as powerful and they’ve figured out how to adapt … Herb Conaway should be in good shape. But if they don’t mean as much as they did before, and the endorsements on their own don’t mean that they’re fired up, then Carol Murphy has somewhat of an even shot.”
For Democrat Sarah Schoengood, the end of the “party line” has helped, but she remains a long shot.
“There’s a lot to take away,” she added. “You have to have a lot of patience and what I realized is that you have to do a lot of listening and that should be a no-brainer, but you can’t go in knowing it all.”
On the Republican side, GOP candidates said they will get a bump from voters for being aligned with former President Donald Trump. “Immediately, they ask ‘are you Trump or not Trump?’ ” said Shirley Maia-Cusick, one Republican candidate.
