Despite Money Ruling NJ Primaries, Mehta and Prempeh set to face Establishment

This summer, victories in New Jersey’s primary contests largely seemed to rely on who out-raised who, as all but two of the state’s 16 House and Senate contests were won by those with more money on hand.

Two Surprises in New Jersey Primaries

The Federal Election Commission confirmed that 14 out of the 16 House and Senate contests earlier last month were won by the candidates who out-raised their opponents, including all of the nine incumbents facing challengers.

The 3rd District’s Republican primary saw business executive David Richter lend himself $600,000 to outspend union official Kate Gibbs for the nomination against Democratic Rep. Andy Kim. Former banker Frank Pallotta’s $435,000 personal loan helped him get more resources than any other candidate in the 5th District GOP primary, for the seat now held by Democratic Rep. Josh Gottheimer.

South Jersey’s 2nd District was won by educator Amy Kennedy, who raised over $1 million, and then lent herself another half a million dollars which gave her a 3 to 1 advantage over Brigid Callahan Harrison – a political science professor at Montclair University.

The state’s Democratic incumbents also came out ahead due to another factor – name recognition and reputation. Both money and name recognition are something most of the progressive challengers lacked compared to the incumbents.

Only in two Republican primaries upsets happened – and by upset we mean the candidate with less money winning over his opponent. One was pharmacist and lawyer Rik Mehta, who bested Engineer Hirsh Singh and won the GOP Senate nomination against US Sen. Cory Booker.

The other was Air Force veteran Billy Prempeh, who was out-raised by former political campaign manager Tim Walsh, but nevertheless won the 9th District primary and is now the GOP nominee to take on Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr.