PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Congressman Andy Kim has won the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate in New Jersey's primary election. He will be in a favorable position for the general election in the blue-leaning state as Democrats seek to keep control of a narrowly divided Senate.
His victory pushes indicted Sen. Bob Menendez to the sidelines of the Democratic Party after five decades in state politics. Menendez has filed to run as an independent in November, though the outcome of his trial and how that could affect the race aren’t clear.
“What I always wanted to do with this race, when I jumped in the day after the indictment of Senator Menendez, was to give the people of New Jersey a choice,” Kim said to supporters on Tuesday.
Both parties nominated a candidate for Kim's U.S. House seat in the Third Congressional District, which includes Burlington County. The race in New Jersey's second congressional district is also one to watch.
See results in these races below, as they are updated live.
U.S. Senate
With Kim's win, KYW Special Contributor Larry Kane said the day would be "remembered as the Andy Kim primary."
Republicans chose Curtis Bashaw to run against Kim in November's general election to replace embattled Sen. Bob Menendez. Curtis Bashaw had the county line support in 14 counties. Christine Serrano-Glassner could not beat him with support in five counties, as well as support from Donald Trump, who endorsed her during his visit in May to Wildwood — shore-area hotel owner Bashaw’s home turf.
“New Jersey families deserve better than this one-party Democratic monopoly that has represented them for far too long in Washington,” Bashaw said on Tuesday.
A federal appeals court recently upheld a lower court’s decision in April to scrap the county line ballot system for the Democratic primary, but not the Republican side.
President
Micah Rasmussen, director of the Rebovich Institute for New Jersey Politics at Rider University, said he expected the contest to replace Menendez, and the other congressional races, not to be enough to excite voters to come out and vote. This will become more clear when the final results are tallied.
Rasmussen said he expected no more than 10% of voters to come out. That's not typical for a presidential election year, but there’s no real primary race for either President Joe Biden or the recently convicted Donald Trump, he says.
U.S. House
Third Congressional District
In the battle to replace Kim in the state's Third Congressional District, two Assembly members, Herb Conaway and Carol Murphy, went against one another after being running mates for years. Murphy has criticized Conaway’s support for the county line system, which was widely viewed as a method that favored candidates with establishment backing — but Conaway walked away Tuesday with the nomination.
Rasmussen says this district is now considered heavily Democratic after redistricting added blue areas of Mercer County and removed red areas of Ocean County.
Second Congressional District
The Democratic primary for the Second Congressional District was a rematch from two years ago. Joe Salerno joined them on the ballot this year.