When Senator Frank Lautenberg died in June, it was a foregone conclusion in New Jersey politics that Newark Mayor Cory Booker would look to take his seat. If Booker wanted it, the seat was his. After all, New Jersey had not elected a Republican to the United States Senate in more than 30 years. Similarly, the state had not leaned Republican in the Presidential election since 1988.
Enter, Steve Lonegan, the former mayor of Bogota, NJ, a tough talking, confident politician who has watched the margin of error between him and his opponent shrink in recent weeks.
With the election only hours away, Republican Lonegan believes that the liberal-leaning state will choose old-fashioned conservative values over a man who he refers to as the “poster child for a poll-driven, speech coach, consultant-trained candidate,” the senatorial candidate told Rare in a phone interview over the weekend.
Lonegan’s has contrasted his campaign with the notion that Cory Booker is not a genuine politician, but rather a self-contained puppet of the Obama administration. New Jersey needs a “leader, not a Tweeter,” his campaign slogan goes. The line references his opponent’s massive online following and widespread national name recognition, a presence that Lonegan believes should trouble the people of New Jersey.
Lonegan believes that Booker should focus more on the state’s problems and not “[run] around Hollywood and San Francisco trying to hang out with a bunch of movie stars.” The idea that Mayor Booker is pre-occupied with his own brand and image has been a hallmark of rhetoric during the four-month long campaign. Lonegan decries Booker as an “example of another politician whose own self-promotion at the expense of the taxpayers has come before his commitment to govern.”
While many in the state have applauded Booker’s connection to his citizens, Lonegan doesn’t buy it. He believes that Mayor Booker’s track record in Newark indicates that he is unfit to hold a higher office. Lonegan is quick to point out his opponents failures and refers to Newark not as a city in northern New Jersey, but as a “black hole.”
“Robberies have hit a 14-year high, where murders are off the charts and crime is up,” Lonegan said. “High school dropouts rates range from 15 percent to 17 percent, unemployment has hit 14 percent.”
“It just demonstrates that when you don’t pay attention to your business, and anyone who has run a business knows, that when you neglect your business, it falls apart. And Newark is falling apart,” Lonegan added.
Though the Republican candidate admits that the country is divided, he is proud of his ability to bring the party together. Lonegan boasts marquee Republican names on his side through his entire campaign.
“I have brought together the entire Republican Party, from Governor Christie, to Governor Palin, to Governor Perry to Rand Paul, to Tom Coburn,” he said. “The entire party from the tea party, the conservatives, the pro-life, not so pro-life, the pro-gun, not-so pro-gun.”
At a recent campaign rally, Governor Palin spoke on Lonegan’s behalf, repeating his signature phrase: “New Jersey needs a leader not a Tweeter.”
According to the candidate, the Republican unity has brought in outsiders as well. Polls show Lonegan leading among New Jersey independents.
“[People] recognize that the real threat to our liberty is Barack Obama and his administration,” Lonegan said. “It’s not fellow Republicans or independents; it’s the Obama administration. There is a huge contingent of conservative Democrats, those are the working union men and women, guys that go to church on Sundays and go shooting on Saturdays, and like to hunt and fish and they are Boy Scout leaders and football coaches. Those are my voters.”
Despite the candidate’s gravitas and tough talk, recent polls still show Cory Booker holding a commanding double-digit lead. Already a tough road to a win, Lonegan’s chances were further wounded in recent days by allegations from his opponent and the New Jersey Star Ledger, that while mayor of Bogota, Lonegan received hundreds of thousands of dollars in a state bailout. Lonegan refers to this issue as one from the “junk pile of ideas,” and describes the allegations as “absurd.” According to Lonegan, the funds he received were mere “pennies” in comparison to funds Booker’s Newark receives regularly.
The spotlight on Lonegan’s Bogota scandal allows him to continue his comparison to Newark, he shared.
“All the money gets poured into what I call the big black hole in Newark, just like the big black hole in space that sucks things in and nothing comes out of,” he said.
“That’s what has happened, billions of tax dollars have been poured into the coffers of Newark, never to be seen again and there is no improvement. If you poured those billions in and Newark became this utopian city, that would be different. But all of a sudden it has disappeared, in the pockets of politically connected hacks.”
Only the polls will reflect how New Jerseyans feel about Steve Lonegan. The citizens of New Jersey are not looking for “someone who is going to agree with them on everything, they want someone who is going to speak with honesty and principle,” Lonegan shared.
Whether the people agree remains to be seen.
