It’s been a busy week in politics with the New Jersey primary and Gov. Chris Christie discussing a tax cut. Democratic Strategist Brendan Gill and Republican Strategist Chris Russell discussed the latest issues with NJ Today Managing Editor Mike Schneider.
The exciting ninth district Democratic race had underdog Bill Pascrell defeat Steve Rothman. “Congressman Pascrell ran a tremendous race,” Gill said. “The geography of the district heavily favored Congressman Rothman. But I think what you saw was a race where one individual ran a campaign on a succinct message and drove turnout and voters responded to that turnout.”
Although Rothman decided to run a negative campaign, Gill said, “I think Congressman Rothman and Congressman Pascrell have been very gracious to each other after the race. They both maintain their commitment to reelect our President in November. Ultimately I think what you saw in that campaign, which I as a strategist was happy to see, is that for a change voters really responded to the positive message of one campaign versus another campaign that chose to run a largely negative campaign.”
Russell said the real winner in the race was Republican Scott Garrett who represents the fifth district and will not face a challenge from Rothman, who moved from the fifth to the ninth district to run against Pascrell in the primary.
Christie criticized President Barack Obama this week after Obama gave a speech about the economy. Russell said it’s not news that Christie is on the national campaign trail for Mitt Romney, where the economy is the most important issue.
“This is the worst post-war recovery that we’ve had. I think the swing voters, the independents, have soured on President Obama,” Russell said. “I don’t think they dislike him but I think they’ve soured on him as a leader in someone who can turn the economy around.”
But Gill said that Christie can’t tout New Jersey’s actions as a model. “Gov. Christie is out selling this message nationally but you only have to look here in the state. Our economic indicators are not good. Unemployment is higher than the national average, manufacturing jobs are way down,” Gill said. “Now you have a tax cut that the governor is pushing at a time when the state severely needs revenue.”
Several Democrats have said the state can’t afford a tax cut, which Christie has been pushing for months. But Russell said a tax cut is inevitable. “A tax cut is going to happen because Sen. Sweeney and the governor are on the same page on that,” he said. “People do not want taxes increased. The whole millionaires tax is nonsense. They already pay 48 percent of the taxes in the state. What do you want them to pay? Fifty? Sixty? How high can it go?”
But Gill said officials should debate where tax cuts should happen and who’s going to pay for them. “The governor had the most optimistic revenue projections in the entire country. We are in a serious problem here,” he said. “The Democrats have done a very good job to move the governor off the income tax cut which we cannot afford and to property tax relief which is what most New Jersey homeowners are after.”
Russell said Democrats in the state have raised taxes for a long time and a tax cut is coming because of Christie.
“The point here is the Democrats have consistently been talking about property tax relief and that’s what people in this state are talking about, not an irresponsible income tax cut that we can’t afford,” Gill countered.
“They know the people in this state don’t want taxes to go up any more. No matter what people say, cutting taxes, cutting spending, smaller government is what people across the board want,” Russell said. “It’s the way to get the economy going again.”
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