Latest news with #RepublicanPrimary
Fox News
2 days ago
- Business
- Fox News
Trump front-and-center in Republican primary for governor as early voting kicks off
PINE HILL, NEW JERSEY – One week to go until primary day in New Jersey, and Republican gubernatorial candidate Jack Ciattarelli was getting a shoutout from the most powerful and influential politician in the GOP. "I'm asking you to get out and vote for a true champion for the people of your state – Jack Ciattarelli. He's been a friend of mine, and he's been a real success story," President Donald Trump told supporters as he dialed into a tele-rally on the eve of Tuesday's kickoff of early voting in New Jersey. Trump's praise came two weeks after he endorsed Ciattarelli for the Republican nomination in a primary race that turned into a battle for the president's support. "It's a really big deal," Ciattarelli said in a Monday interview with Fox News Digital after meeting with local GOP politicians and leaders at the Trump National Golf Club-Philadelphia in this South Jersey borough, when asked about the significance of Trump's endorsement. "The president's doing very, very well in New Jersey." Ciattarelli, a former state lawmaker, is making his third bid for governor. He ran unsuccessfully for the GOP nomination in 2017. Four years later, in 2021, as the Republican nominee, Ciattarelli overperformed and came close to ousting Democratic incumbent Gov. Phil Murphy, losing by just three points. In the showdown to succeed Murphy, who is term-limited and prevented from running for re-election, polls suggest that Ciattarelli is the front-runner in a Republican nomination race that includes two other prominent candidates – former businessman and popular conservative talk radio host Bill Spadea and state Sen. Jon Bramnick, a lawyer who served for a decade as state Assembly GOP leader. And Ciattarelli and Spadea spent months trading fire over which of them was a bigger Trump supporter. "It was certainly disappointing," Spadea said of Trump's endorsement of Ciattarelli. "I mean, we made no bones about this. We absolutely wanted the President's endorsement. Unfortunately, the President endorsed a poll and not a plan." And in a Fox News Digital interview, Spadea emphasized that "I have been a supporter of President Trump since he came down the escalator," as he referenced Trump's announcement in 2015 of his first presidential campaign. "There is no question that I am the common-sense conservative. I am the actual Republican in this primary," Spadea claimed. And Spadea questioned Ciattarelli's support for Trump, claiming that his rival "has disrespected him for the better part of the last eight years…We thought that that endorsement would have been better served with me." Four years ago, after he won the GOP gubernatorial nomination, Ciattarelli, when asked if he was seeking the then-former president's endorsement, told Fox News Digital "there's only one endorsement I seek, and that's the endorsement of the voters of New Jersey. That's the only one that matters." Fast forward to 2025, and Ciattarelli emphasized that "people really appreciate what he [Trump] is doing for New Jerseyans. He's put a temporary hold on the wind farms off the Jersey Shore. He's beating up on the New York Democrats over congestion pricing. He supports a quadrupling of the SALT [state and local tax] deduction on our federal tax returns. Those are big deals to New Jersey, and that's why he's got so much great support here. And I'm honored to have his endorsement." While he lost out on Trump's endorsement, Spadea said there's been a silver lining. "Our supporters are galvanized. Matter of fact, the Tuesday and Wednesday after Trump endorsed Jack, we had a surge, our two best days ever in low-dollar fundraising," Spadea said. "So it actually has had the opposite effect, our low-dollar surge, our volunteer surge, we're now knocking on more than 3,000 doors a week, and we're getting an unbelievable response from the grassroots." Spadea said that "almost every Trump supporter that we've talked to face-to-face on the ground thinks that Donald Trump made a huge mistake" in endorsing Ciattarelli. And Spadea, who was interviewed in downtown Princeton, New Jersey, added that "Trump supporters believe in common-sense policies, populism, patriotism. It's not about being told who to vote for." Asked why Trump endorsed him rather than Spadea, Ciattarelli said that "the president wants to win. He knows that I provide the best opportunity to win in November." "He knows we're going to raise the necessary money. We've raised more money than the other five Republican gubernatorial candidates combined," added Ciattarelli, a certified public accountant who started a medical publishing company before getting into politics. The fundraising advantage has allowed Ciattarelli to dominate the ad wars, although Spadea said that "in the last couple of weeks we've actually outspent my opponent on the air" and predicted that "we're going to win." And Spadea, pointing to his media career, touted that "I built the largest audience in the state, a third Democrat, a third independent, a third Republican. So my appeal is not just that conservative base in the Republican Party. I'm the only candidate running for the Republican nomination that can pull in Democrats and independents." New Jersey has long been a blue-leaning state, but Republicans have had success in gubernatorial elections. "It's not a blue state when it comes to Governor races, Republicans have won six of the last 11. That's better than 50%," Ciattarelli said. And Trump, who spends summer weekends at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, held a very large rally last year in Wildwood, N.J. And he improved from a 16-point loss in the state in the 2020 election to a 6-point deficit last November. "The president's doing very, very well in New Jersey. He performed well here last election day," Ciattarelli said. And Ciattarelli, looking ahead to the general election campaign, said he's "really looking forward" to Trump's "active participation…I think New Jerseyans are anxious to have him on the campaign trail with me and help deliver a win for us in November." New Jersey's governor's race will likely grab plenty of national attention as Election Day nears, as it's one of just two states, along with Virginia, to hold gubernatorial contests in the year after a presidential election. Ciattarelli, pointing to his ballot box performance against Murphy four years ago, said that "we were the spark that lit the fuse in '21 with that very close race. The president before performed well here last November." "The country is watching and I think we're gonna deliver a very loud and clear message that New Jersey's going Republican this year," he predicted.
New York Times
3 days ago
- Business
- New York Times
In the Age of Trump, National Politics Dominate a Republican Primary
When Donald J. Trump was in the thick of his first campaign for the White House, Jack Ciattarelli, then a Republican state assemblyman mulling a run for governor of New Jersey, called the soon-to-be commander in chief a 'charlatan' who was 'out of step with American values.' 'Sitting silently and allowing him to embarrass our country is unacceptable,' Mr. Ciattarelli said in a 2015 statement. 'He is not fit to be president of the United States.' Ten years later, Mr. Ciattarelli, the front-runner in the June 10 Republican primary for governor, has pivoted. He has praised Mr. Trump during the campaign and last month earned the president's coveted endorsement. Like many other Republican politicians across the country, including the vice president, JD Vance, Mr. Ciattarelli has worked to paper over his past criticism of the president as Mr. Trump has grown in popularity. That effort to appeal to the G.O.P.'s conservative base is seen more as a reflection of the realities of party primaries at a polarized moment in history than as a fundamental realignment of the Republican Party in New Jersey, a left-leaning state with a high percentage of affluent suburban voters. 'It's indicative of where Republicans are, but it's also indicative of where a lot of voters are,' said Peter J. McDonough Jr., a retired political strategist and former aide to Christine Todd Whitman, a Republican who was governor of New Jersey in the 1990s. 'People are mad. People are dissatisfied — whether they're Bernie Sanders or Trump voters.' Where Do the Candidates for New Jersey Governor Stand on the Issues? The New York Times sent a wide-ranging survey to candidates for governor of New Jersey about housing, immigration, abortion, transit, affordability, schools and climate. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
Biggs says he'll push for immediate changes on education, elections, and the border
The Brief The Republican race for governor is already up and running. Andy Biggs held a rally on May 31 at the Biltmore Resort in Phoenix. Republican challenger Karrin Taylor Robson leads Biggs in a latest poll among GOP voters. PHOENIX - MAGA supporters are getting behind Andy Biggs, who is running to be the Republican candidate for Arizona governor in 2026. On May 31, he held a town hall with Turning Point Action at the Arizona Biltmore Resort. What we know Biggs, who currently represents the state's 5th Congressional District, made his case to be Arizona's next governor and discussed pushing for immediate changes to education, elections, and the border. "I've already talked to somebody who I believe will be a great border czar. So Arizona will have the strongest border security in the nation. We're going to work with our sheriffs, our tribes, our local law enforcement officers, our magnificent DPS.. and we will prevent the cartels from their evil human child and drug trafficking, which is a destructive plague in Arizona," he said. Biggs already has a Republican challenger, Karrin Taylor Robson. Robson lost the 2022 Republican primary to Kari Lake. We spoke with Mike Noble of Noble Predictive Insights. Their latest survey shows Robson leading Biggs, with 24% of GOP voters choosing her, over 17% for Biggs. "Robson gained since our last poll three months ago. However, it looks like the momentum is in Biggs' favor because [Charlie] Kirk supporters look very similar to Biggs. And also, he may not be getting just an endorsement. He may be getting an army because he brings along a very young demographic and a very digital-savvy demographic," said Noble. Dig deeper But in a head-to-head matchup against Governor Katie Hobbs, both Republicans are still losing ground. Hobbs taking 41% of likely voters against Robson's 39% and 40% for Hobbs against Biggs' 38%. "Hobbs as an incumbent governor, she's definitely not built a fortress around her, but she's not in a bad position either. I'd say she's an above-average position." Noble expects this governor's race to be one of the most competitive races in the country.
New York Times
6 days ago
- Business
- New York Times
Cornyn Calls Primary Fight Against Ken Paxton a ‘Test of Character'
Senator John Cornyn of Texas believes he can win a no-holds-barred Republican primary next year with his state's hard-charging attorney general, Ken Paxton, by making the race all about the character of his opponent. It's a tall order, considering that Mr. Paxton has already faced down corruption allegations that played out in public when the Republican-controlled State House impeached him in 2023, only to see the Republican State Senate acquit him. But in an interview with The New York Times, Mr. Cornyn said that there was much more about Mr. Paxton than what voters knew, hinting that the allegations of corruption and abuse of office that led to his impeachment were 'just the tip of the iceberg.' Many more revelations would surface before the March 2026 primary, Texas' senior senator said. 'This is going to be a test of whether character still matters,' Mr. Cornyn said, seated under a painting of Superman in the offices of a small sticker printing business in Waco, Texas. Mr. Paxton remains a darling of the Republican voting base even after his 2015 indictment for securities fraud, a federal investigation into corruption allegations and his impeachment, during which former top aides accused him of using his position to benefit a friend and political donor who had helped Mr. Paxton conceal his extramarital affair. But Mr. Paxton, now in his third term as attorney general, has survived each of those inquiries. Instead of being hobbled, he appeared to emerge stronger with primary voters. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
The Independent
28-05-2025
- Business
- The Independent
Legendary Ohio State coach Jim Tressel considering run for governor to take on Ramaswamy and the Trump machine
Biotech entrepreneur and former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy looks set to romp home with the Republican nomination to be the next governor of Ohio, a year out from the party's primary. He has the backing of President Donald Trump, earned the formal support of the state party, and is leading in early polling. Can anyone derail the Ramaswamy train, capture the president's attention, and snatch the nomination? Possibly. Current term-limited Governor Mike DeWine, Politico reports, is not keen on Ramaswamy taking over from him, nor on his old Democratic rival, Sherrod Brown, winning if he were to run. The governor appears to have a plan to advance his preferred candidate, Lieutenant Governor Jim Tressel. Appointed to the role in February 2025 after former Lt. Gov. John Husted took over JD Vance 's Senate seat when he became vice president, Tressel potentially has something of an advantage in a statewide race. He is the former Ohio State football coach who guided the Buckeyes to seven Big Ten championships and the 2002 National Championship. Prior to that, he also led Youngstown State University to the playoffs 10 times and won four national championships. Most recently, he returned to YSU from Ohio State as university president from 2014 to 2023. Tressel is an Ohio hero. Speaking to Politico, DeWine acknowledged the 'conventional wisdom' regarding Ramaswamy's current advantage and the state of the race almost a year out from the primary, but believes his lieutenant is unique. 'He told me he thinks he's been to every high school in the state,' the governor said of the former coach. 'He is Ohio; he really understands the diversity of this state.' DeWine added: 'Once you get beyond the introductions, then he's got to obviously sell. I think he will.' Tressel has neither confirmed nor ruled out his potential candidacy. If he does jump into the race, he will have a hill to climb against the Trump machine that took Vance to within a heartbeat of the presidency and that has already aligned behind Ramaswamy. Can a storied history as a state football hero compete with the Trump machine? Or could it even turn the president's head? Trump has given dual endorsements before, though Ramaswamy's polling numbers would indicate that this may be unlikely in this case, given that he had 64 percent support from prospective GOP primary voters in April, compared to Tressel's 14 percent. Nevertheless, Tressel is testing the waters, making appearances at county Republican events, some now renamed as Lincoln-Reagan-Trump dinners, underlining the changing nature of the party in the state and nationwide. While he is attracting uniform respect from attendees, Politico notes that most feel the primary is already decided, with one strategist telling the outlet that 'it would take Vivek making some cataclysmic mistakes now' to alter that perception. Recalling Ramaswamy's boisterous debate performances in the Republican presidential primaries leading up to the 2024 election, that's not out of the question. As for when Tressel has to decide, he told Politico that he didn't know the timing for signing up to run for office: 'I don't even know what you have to do to sign up to run for something.' Prompted that his chief backer, Governor DeWine, would have a good idea, he added: 'Well, and that's why if I thought there was a timing problem right now I would hear about it from him.'
