MADISON – Six Republicans keen on challenging Mikie Sherrill this fall were assembled on stage Monday night; two other possible candidates were in the audience.

It was a cozy setting at a local community center for about a hundred party faithful, all eager for the GOP to retake CD-11, a district the party easily had held for decades until 2018 when Rodney Frelinghuysen retired and Sherrill took the seat.

There was talk about energy independence, helping small businesses and parental rights. Critical Race Theory has no place in local schools, they all agreed. There were the occasional rhetorical flourishes from both the candidates and those asking questions about “radical socialism” and “Marxist-Americans.” None of this was unexpected.

Larry Casha, the most politically seasoned man on stage, said he has the “right kind of experience” to go to Congress. He is a veteran of Morris County Republican politics and now represents the county on the state committee. 

Toby Anderson, an Iraq war veteran, was unimpressed; he said an “outsider” is needed.

Larry Friscia struck an “us against them” tone, saying he’s a fighter who as an attorney took on the banking industry during the foreclosure scandal.

Tayfun Selen, a Morris County Commissioner, stressed his “American story.” He arrived in the U.S. from Turkey in 1996, took a job pumping gas and is now running for Congress. Only in America.

Robert Kovic, a one-time councilman in Bergen County, said Republicans must run a true conservative; not a “Democratic-lite” candidate.

Paul DeGroot, a retired prosecutor in Passaic County, bluntly stated the obvious.

He said the district has gotten “more blue than ever before.”

That’s indisputable. Democrats won the redistricting battle and as a result, CD-11 has moved east, picking up Democratic towns like Maplewood and South Orange and losing five towns in Republican Sussex County. There are other changes as well that seem to help the Dems.

Casha said the district is “still a jump ball,” but the change can not be overlooked.

DeGroot said the key is for Republicans to “bring back the moderates,” and along those lines, appeal to women and to immigrant groups.

One can certainly make the case that the GOP has only two of 12 House seats in New Jersey because it lost the moderates, or, if you prefer, the middle.

And women. Virtually every analysis of voting patterns suggests that women, especially those with college educations, have been leaning of late to the Democrats. College educated women, of course, describe many of the women in CD-11.

The flip side of DeGroot’s point is that there are staunch conservatives in the Republican Party who want no part of moderates, or “Rinos.”

All this can make for an interesting debate – and one that may soon get even more congested.

The two possible, if not likely, candidates in the room were Assemblywoman Aura Dunn and Morris Surrogate Heather Darling. Both were introduced, but since they have not formally joined the race, were not on stage.

Sources say GOP heavyweights, among them Chris Christie, have been urging Dunn to run. She is a former aide to Frelinghuysen, who represented the district for 24 years.

Frelinghuysen hasn’t had a public presence since leaving Congress. He has not responded to an emailed question about the looming Republican skirmish in his old district.