Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver has begun requesting donations for her campaign for Senate. She admits that she trails her three Democratic opponents in that area because she didn’t decide to run for the position until after Sen. Frank Lautenberg died and she doesn’t currently hold federal office. She spoke with Managing Editor Mike Schneider about the truncated Senate race.
Oliver doesn’t have a Federal Election Commission account, but opponents Cory Booker, Rush Holt and Frank Pallone all do. “When you are going to declare a candidacy, you cannot file Form 2, which is your declaration of candidacy, until you have either spent or raised $5,000. So I filed my petitions on the 10th of June. Cory Booker had already established an FEC account and Congressman Holt and Congressman Pallone as incumbent current office holders already had FEC committees established,” Oliver explained. “So you take me, I come in and file petitions on the 10th, I then have to raise or spend $5,000 before I can even submit my paperwork.”
With the short campaign cycle, Oliver said she is moving quickly and actively fundraising. “But I cannot negate the fact that the three candidates in my primary already were ahead of me because we have already two members already incumbents in Congress and then Cory Booker who was going to run for this seat even before we knew that Sen. Lautenberg was going to retire and then subsequently he passed away,” she said. “So those three candidates have already been in motion prior to myself.”
Oliver has made the case that it’s time for New Jersey to have woman in Congress, which hasn’t happened in more than a decade since Marge Roukema retired. Oliver said the support of women voters can make a difference and she has found women are very excited about her candidacy and the fact that she’s willing to step up.
“Every year in the Democratic Party we host an annual Step UP Luncheon and we do it to encourage women to step up. And I think that my candidacy for U.S. Senate is just reflective of something that those of us who are engaged in political leadership do all the time. We travel around the state and encourage women to jump into running for office,” Oliver said.
She added that female candidates are treated differently than their male counterparts. “No one ever questions why a man makes a decision to file candidacy and run for office, but everyone will question a woman why are you running,” Oliver said. “No one has questioned Frank Pallone or Rush Holt or Cory Booker and asked them, ‘Why are you running?’ Why should they question myself? So I think that many women are very excited that I have stepped up as a candidate.”