The Democratic nominee for Governor typically picks the state party chair of his/her choice, and on June 7th Phil Murphy – the double digit front-runner – will apparently have that political decision on his plate.

Sources say Murphy has no reason to dump sitting State Party Chairman John Currie, the long-serving Passaic County democratic chair, who genially stepped forward in 2013 to break the stalemate caused by state Senator Ray Lesniak (D-20) versus Assemblyman Jason O’Donnell (D-31) for the position.

Following the meltdown of Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop, Currie coalesced the North Jersey chairs around Murphy for governor, and Murphy knows it, and likely has no reason to bail on him now.

The only question is whether Currie still wants the job after four years.

Sources say the urbane chairman’s eyeballing the Passaic County clerkship, a position that the sitting officer Kristin Corrado will leave vacant if she succeeds in becoming the state senator in the 40th district. Governor Chris Christie would get to pick Corrado’s acting successor and presumably – if he decides to run for the position – Currie would take a 2018 crack at  it with his old chum, U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-9) atop the party ticket.

The timing would be perfect if that’s what the chairman wants.

When and if Murphy re-ups him on June 7th, he’d get to ride out his state party chairmanship between June and January, just in time to launch his clerk’s candidacy.

If such a scenario plays out, the question is who would succeed Currie statewide come January of 2018?

The uptick of those kinds of consideration won’t occur until after the primary, but within the context of Murphy World requiring diversity in the event that fellow Irish Americans Assemblyman Craig Coughlin and Senator Steve Sweeney respectively assume the posts of speaker and senate prez, a minority would likely be the best option to supplant departing African American Currie.

For that reason and others, look to Essex County Democratic Chairman Leroy Jones as the most likely successor to Currie.

He mans the political operations in his hometown of East Orange, one of the most disciplined and productive Democratic Party outfits in the state. He’s close to Essex County Executive Joe DiVincenzo, who’s close to George Norcross III and South Jersey, so that wing of the party wouldn’t feel left out; he critically helped Murphy secure the support of the Democratic Party when he stepped up and kept his word by standing with the Quad County Alliance, and maybe most significantly he comes from Essex, the most Democratic county in the state.

Now, there’s some political footsie going on between Passaic and Essex.

Currie wants his goddaughter, Assemblywoman Shavonda Sumter (D-35) to serve as Murphy’s running mate, while East Orange wants Assemblywoman Sheila Oliver (D-34). it’s not outrageous to consider a trade involving LG and state chair, with Sumter getting LG, for example, and then Jones – or Oliver – getting state chair; or Currie handing state chair off to his goddaughter come January in exchange for yielding LG to Oliver.