You really can’t tell the players without  a scorecard.

After making plans to run against Democrat Tom Malinowski in CD-7, Rik Mehta now says he wants to run against Democrat Frank Pallone in CD-6.

Mehta has been living in Chester, Morris County, but said today he is relocating to Iselin in Middlesex County.

He is not the only candidate to switch districts after a new congressional map came out last month.
Mehta’s statement follows:

Rik Mehta will challenge Democrat incumbent Frank Pallone in New Jersey’s 6th Congressional District. Mehta was the 2020 Republican U.S. Senate nominee who challenged Senator Cory Booker and made history as the first Indian American candidate to win a statewide nomination for either party. Mehta holds the record for the most votes ever received by a Republican statewide candidate in New Jersey, receiving over 1.8 million votes. The 6th Congressional District has one of the largest Indian American populations in the country and has over a 55% black and brown population, giving New Jersey Republicans an opportunity to grow and diversify their base. Mehta is set to deliver his remarks tonight in Edison, an area that has one of the fastest growing Asian American populations in the state.
In the peak of the pandemic, Mehta championed his slogan “Save Small Business” which became a rallying cry across the state and the nation in 2020 amidst the draconian lockdowns pushed by Democrat Governor Phil Murphy. Murphy and Mehta traded jabs after Mehta opened his campaign headquarters at the Atilis gym, creating a Constitutional checkmate against Murphy, forcing him to reopen all gyms across the state.

Mehta said, “Out of touch politicians who think the Bill of Rights is above their pay grade don’t understand what it’s like to lose a business. My father came to this country with only $100 in his pocket. We didn’t have much, but we found the American Dream. It’s time that our communities and small businesses, from Oak Tree Road to Ocean Avenue, get the right representation in Washington. I’m ready to be the voice for the people and work to create economic freedom, make effective testing and treatment options to COVID available, bring medical innovation and manufacturing back to New Jersey, stand up for small business owners and protect our beautiful shores and beaches. For over 30 years, Rep. Pallone built his career off the backs of our proud immigrant communities while turning his back on our small businesses when they needed him the most. He’s not one of us and I plan to retire him in November”.

As the ranking Democrat of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Pallone pushed President Biden’s failed policies that resulted in high inflation, skyrocketing gas prices, labor shortages and a depressed economy. But even worse, Pallone led the Health Subcommittee allowing for the opioid epidemic, one of the worst public health crises in America, to ravage our nation while never holding bad pharmaceutical companies accountable. A recent report by the CDC found that close to one million Americans died from fatal overdoses from 1999 through 2020 – the same years Pallone served as the ranking member on the Health Subcommittee. Mehta said, “I spent much of my FDA career fighting to remove dangerous, unapproved drugs from the market while we were left alone by Pallone. There is no coincidence here – 30 years sitting in Congress as the ranking member of the Health Committee, Pallone never put forward a winning legislative agenda to END the opioid epidemic, hold opioid manufacturers accountable, and save American lives. So today, we’re left with over one million Americans dead under his watch and with countless numbers of families destroyed. Enough is enough. We deserve better.”