Sweeney Running for Governor
Former state Senate President Steve Sweeney wants to be governor.
Bounced out of the senate in 2021 by nonunion truck driver Ed Durr, Sweeney told NJ.com this morning that he is running to succeed sitting Gov. Phil Murphy in 2025.
An ironworker by trade, Sweeney won an LD-3 senate seat in 2001 as one of the key pieces of a surging South Jersey Democratic Organization fortified by powerbroker George Norcross III.
Sweeney became senate president in 2009 as part of a political package that included Republican Governor Chris Christie and the late Sheila Oliver of Essex County as speaker.
He ran for governor in 2017, or in the lead-up to 2017, but could not overcome the north county alliance-building of the Murphy Campaign, which succeeded in suffocating both Sweeney and Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop out of the Democratic Primary.
Now, with Murphy a lame duck and focused on getting First Lady Tammy Murphy elected to the United States Senate, Sweeney – and Fulop – have returned to become the first two candidates vying to be the 2025 nominee for governor from the Democratic Party.
Republican Jack Ciattarelli – who narrowly lost to Phil Murphy in 2021, the same year that Sweeney lost his senate seat – is also running.
Sweeney made history in 2017 as he opted for reelection instead of running statewide.
From Politico, regarding the LD-3 general election contest that year:
“About $18.7 million was spent on the South Jersey race, with an estimated $14.4 million coming from independent special interest groups, the New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission announced on Friday. The commission cited data from the National Institute on Money in State Politics to conclude that it was the costliest such race ever.”
Having spent a nationally historically massive amount of money on legislative reelection, Sweeney got coldcocked by Republican truck driver Durr in 2021, and subsequently given the heave-ho off the legislative redistricting commission in 2021 by Democratic State Party Chairman LeRoy Jones.
From InsiderNJ Columnist Carl Golden on the end of Sweeney’s senate career:
The seismic cataclysm on election day ended it all.
Sweeney was brought low by a 58-year-old commercial truck driver from Logan Township named Edward Durr who pulled off arguably the most stunning upset in legislative election history.
Durr said he was moved to take on the hopeless task of running against Sweeney because he was unhappy with the state’s restrictive laws on carrying a concealed weapon.
He spent, he said, $153 on his campaign, a sum equal to a Saturday afternoon shopping trip to Costco for most people.
When the 2022 session of the Legislature opens in January, for the first time in 12 years someone other than Sweeney will gavel the Senate to order.
This is hysterical. They will eat him alive. He’s already publicly embarrassed himself once. A Governor with a GED and sexual harassment charges that he has swept under the rug. Can’t wait for this!
Kirwan vs Sweeney – This is one of many sexual harassment cases he covered up. He’s diabolically corrupt.
https://law.justia.com/cases/new-jersey/appellate-division-unpublished/2010/a2152-08-opn.html
Just what we don’t need–Sweeney running for Governor. The corrupt leading the Democrat-Socialist corruption in Trenton. The guy is a walking, talking case example of what corruption and racketeering is defined as.
This hack couldn’t beat the drastically underfunded Ed Durr “The Truck Driver,” but he’s going to win a governor’s race? LOL!
No way We gotta stop putting these crooked Democrats as our NJ leaders people gotta wise up it might be way to late . Enough is enough We need change Be smart think about it What’s this president doing nothing Look at the economy prices inflation you name it Gotta put Trump back in it’s a must to save our country Don’t listen to these friggin Democrats.Lets put a end to it
Sweeney is a useless hack, doing the bidding of insiders. The guy commenting on his background kind of explains his power broker MO. He won’t win. Does he have an ulterior motive for running?
Kim for Senate
Fulop for Governor
Couldn’t beat an underfunded truck driver and he’s going to run for Governor? Jack will eat him alive and we’ll finally have a responsible Republican in the Statehouse who will reverse Murphy ‘s whacko policies
Norcross is raising tons of money
He invested in Atlantic Bread business which will be money from drugs and trafficking
He got Vernon hills Republic bank that will bring in hidden loot
He is causing division a mayhem at college universities in Antisemitic narratives that caused the president of UPenn to step down based on his twisted narratives and caused massive division. This is his way of getting Jewish support and more money plus he is looking to punish the Eagles owner for ejecting him
He’s also pulling in Harvard and MIT for money and social media hacking. He needs to be locked up or it will become a total loss for America and the world. Norcross and Sweeney are dangerous
He made a deal with Murphy to support his wife for senate so the Holtec and waterfront investigation is off and so is the murders of the Sheridans.
Sweeney really said this: “I will always put New Jersey’s kids, working families, and seniors first. You know that’s who I’ll fight for, because that’s who I’ve always fought for. It’s who I am — a fighter for those who can’t fight for themselves”.
What a f*cking liar. He was in the NJ Senate for 20 years and DID NOTHING TO HELP KIDS, WORKING FAMILIES AND SENIORS. I was head of a working family and now a senior. He didn’t help any of us. He could have and should have reduced all education tax portions of our property tax bills by 50-100% by decoupling education taxes from property taxes, and making it part of income & sales taxes–where everyone would pay their FAIR SHARE!!!!! Never happened under Sweeney’s 20+ year watch.
Sweeney never reduced income taxes, cut the budget, or stopped the extortion of the Garden State Pkwy that was supposed to stop charging tolls in 1999. Sweeney never stopped giving away taxpayers’ monies for Democrat-Socialist pet projects, welfare programs and making NJ an illegal immigrant sanctuary state costing New Jerseyans $4 BILLION DOLLARS PER YEAR!!!! That money could have gone to senior $10,000/year property tax rebates instead. But NOOOO!!! Sweeney lied to us and continues to lie to us about being for everyone.