With all but one Assembly race decided, the primary election has left a few lessons to take away. Maybe most notable was around the power of the party machines and whether the election showed their longtime hold on New Jersey politics may be loosening.
The primary election was the first in which there was no so-called county or “party line” ballot system, which opponents argued gave an advantage to candidates with the county organization’s endorsement.
NJ Spotlight News senior writer and projects editor Colleen O’Dea spoke about the primary election and how “the line” both held up and weakened.
“We had five candidates that were endorsed by the county party in various places who lost, and that’s highly unusual since 2011,” said O’Dea. “Only one candidate who had the party line in an Assembly race had lost, so we had five losses this year. That’s really huge.
“Now there are a lot more candidates on the ballot,” she added. “There were 29 races that were contested. But given our really party controlled system, any loss is a big deal.”
