Election Breakdown
After much anticipation and speculation, the election results are in and just like 4 years ago, the polls were wrong—but this time they were wrong in favor of the Democrats rather than the Republicans. Democrat Mikie Sherrill leads Republican Jack Ciattarelli 56%-43%, a 13% margin that is well above almost every public poll, which averaged a 4% lead for her.
Despite all the energy on the ground for Ciattarelli, and the seeming lack for Sherrill, it appears that there were a significant number of Democratic voters angry about the first year of the Trump Administration and looking for the opportunity to vote against the first Republican they could find. Democrats heavily campaigned against Trump, and widely circulated Jack’s answer at the debate saying he graded the first year of the Administration an “A” with little to no disagreements. His campaign, and Republicans across the state, had privately said their general election strategy was all about turning out Trump voters who would otherwise sit out an election for governor completely, and letting “persuasion” of independent voters mostly take care of itself. This seemed a risky strategy for the minority party in a state that Trump lost all three times. No doubt, staying close to the President did increase Republican turnout, the problem is it seems to have increased Democratic turnout even more.
As of the current count (which is close to final, almost all mail ballots have been counted), Jack earned just under 1.4 million votes, which is 130,000 more votes than he won 4 years ago, and more votes than Phil Murphy was elected with. The problem is that Sherrill brought out 467,000 more voters than Murphy did. More people voted for Jack in 20 out of 21 counties compared with 4 years ago, but even more people voted for Sherrill than for Murphy in every county, and her gains outnumbered his in every county except Ocean. As a result, overall voter turnout surged from 40% in 2021 (and just 37% in 2017) to over 48% this week.
Since Trump became the standard-bearer for the Republican Party a decade ago, both New Jersey and the country have seen shifting political coalitions. Areas with a large population of non-college educated white voters have been voting Republican more heavily, while suburban areas with higher incomes and large numbers of college voters have moved away from the Republicans and started voting for Democrats up and down the ticket. In 2021, Ciattarelli performed much better than Trump in these historically Republican areas, but he lost the election in part because Murphy ran up huge margins in urban areas like Hudson County. But in 2024, after the massive increase in inflation of the Biden years, Trump saw huge gains in these urban areas, particularly among Hispanic voters—closing the gap in Hudson by 18%, in Passaic County by 19%, and in Middlesex by 14%.
The theory for a Jack victory was that he would win statewide by keeping or expanding his strength in the suburbs plus benefit from the gains Trump saw in urban areas. The final results show the opposite happened—the significant ground Republicans gained last year disappeared almost entirely, while Sherrill made double-digit gains across the suburbs. It also looks like the closeness of the 2021 election was more about how specifically unpopular Governor Murphy was after the covid shutdowns and Biden’s first year in office, which kept many Democratic voters home. Sherrill, as a fresh face, was less objectionable and easier for Dem-leaning voters to come out for, especially when they’re mad about the first year of the Trump Administration and the impact of the government shutdown.
.png) |
Sherrill’s surge also led to the even further expansion of the Democratic majority in the state General Assembly. Going into the night, Republicans reasonably expected that even if Jack lost they would still likely flip 3 seats and hold all of their own. Instead, Democrats reelected all of their members, and have definitely defeated 3 Republicans—Mike Torrissi (Burlington-Atlantic, and owner of the Torrissi fuel trucking business), as well Nancy Munoz and Michele Matsikoudis from Union County. Democrats also narrowly lead Christian Barranco in Morris County and Claire Swift in Atlantic County, two seats that were seen as unlikely to even be competitive this year. The final outcome will be determined over the next two weeks. Another four Republicans (Don Guardian in Atlantic, Aura Dunn in Morris, Bob Auth and John Azzariti from Bergen) have only narrowly survived.
The new Democratic majority in the Assembly will be between 55 and 57 seats, with Republicans down to just 23-25 seats. Democrats will have a veto-proof two-thirds majority, and the largest majority they’ve had since the Watergate election of 1973. The state Senate was not on the ballot and remains a 25-15 Democratic majority. Craig Coughlin (D-Middlesex), already the longest serving Speaker ever, is expected to lead the chamber for another two years.
.jpeg)
.jpg)
