BELMAR – The danger of political events staged in beer halls is the potential for things to degenerate

into bar brawls. But that’s only if opposing sides show up and that wasn’t the case here this evening at Beach Haus Brewery, where Democrats convened to boost the formal CD4 launch of former U.S. Foreign Service Official Stephanie Schmid of Little Silver.

A former aid to U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-4), now Schmid – who was born in 1980, the year the Republican first won his office – wants to propel Smith out of office and render him permanently and properly capable of living out of the district where he belongs, said the challenger.

The issue of the congressman’s residency has plagued him for years, but to date not interfered with him remaining intact, presently as New Jersey’s last GOP federal representative.

Still, the ferociously pro-choice Schmid – introduced by friends as a voracious reader and writer, loyal friend and fearless advocate – wants the lifelong pro-life Smith out of there.

“He has made it abundantly clear that he does not share our values,” Schmid – a Yale grad with a political science degree who want to law school at the University of California Berkeley – told the crowd.

First sworn in as a United States Foreign Services Officer in 2011,the candidate spent seven years working for the U.S. State Department – including as a political officer in Port-Au-Prince, Haiti, and in a consular assignment in Brazil – before resigning rather than representing the country under the auspices of what she describes as the reproductive rights-attacking Trump Administration.

“Chris Smith is the champion of the global gag rule,” said the candidate, who serves as counsel to the Center for Reproductive Rights. “He is doing this in our name.”

The congressman is, in fact, currently blocking a bill to product reproductive rights, Schmid told her

audience.

“He’s hell bent on preventing a hearing on that bill,” she said, in reference to legislation for which she has worked to gather 180 sponsors in both branches of the U.S. Congress.

Starting the race with $50,000, she made a special plea to her backers for money since she is committed to refusing corporate PAC money for her campaign.

Introduced by her mother, Schimd at the start of her speech made a point to boost the candidacies of Democrats running in this year’s general election.

Democratic candidates for two freeholder seats, Moria Nelson of Asbury Park and Michael Penna of Long Branch, circulated. The pair face incumbent Republican Freeholder Director Thomas A. Arnone and running mate Dominick DiRocco, a Wall Township committeeman supplanting Gerry P. Scharfenberger, who’s seeking an LD13 freeholder seat on a GOP ticket with incumbent Assemblywoman Serena DiMaso.

“The current freeholders have failed the residents of Monmouth County in several areas, most recently with regard to the reclamation center,” Nelson told InsiderNJ. “They’re implementing costly quick fixes and don’t seem to have a long-term vision or how to resolve this problem. My running mate Michael Penna and I are looking into long-term and forward-thinking green solutions.

“The current freeholders are taking risks with our health and with our wallets, because the health of our community is directly connected to health of our environment,” she added.

Smith last year defeated Democratic challenger Josh Welle 55-43%. Welle won’t run again this year, but the man he defeated for the nomination, tavern owner Jim Keady, appears poised to run again.

The tavern owner was in the Bahamas this weekend assisting the victims of Hurricane Dorian.

At the very least, Schmid will have company from those already-declared other Democrats in CD4: David Applefield of Red Bank, representative for special projects for The Financial Times Newspaper; Tiffany Kaszuba of Howell, vice-president of Cavarocchi, Ruscio, Dennis Associates LLC; and Christine Conforti of Ocean Grove, a leadership and business coach.