CNN
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New Jersey Rep. Rob Menendez Jr. will survive his Democratic main problem Tuesday, CNN tasks, warding off Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla within the face of backlash to the congressman’s scandal-tarred father, Sen. Bob Menendez.
The senator is on trial in New York Metropolis on federal corruption and bribery fees. He has pleaded not responsible. Menendez Jr., who’s working for a second time period in New Jersey’s eighth Congressional District, sought to avoid his father’s authorized bother and deal with his personal resume.
That job turned harder because the marketing campaign dragged on and because the elder Menendez’s trial started to make headlines. The senator’s Eleventh-hour determination to file for reelection as an unbiased (he dropped out of the Democratic main) additionally difficult his son’s path. However robust assist from the hobbled-but-powerful celebration machine will seemingly have helped the congressman overcome any Menendez fatigue within the North Jersey district.
Bhalla’s bid was hampered partially by his personal ethics allegations. He’s going through a lawsuit from a former Hoboken official and has been accused of buying and selling a business hashish license for a profitable authorized contract. (Bhalla’s workplace has denied any wrongdoing and stated the method went by way of all the suitable channels.)
Menendez Jr. highlighted these considerations in a flurry of junk mail and on-line adverts.
Rep. Andy Kim will win the Democratic nomination for Senate in New Jersey, CNN tasks, setting him up as the favourite to succeed indicted Sen. Bob Menendez on this deep-blue state.
Kim, a three-term congressman from South Jersey, entered the race in September, the day after Menendez was indicted on bribery and corruption fees. He rapidly emerged as the favourite even with New Jersey first girl Tammy Murphy launching her marketing campaign later that fall. However within the face of mounting nepotism fees and a grassroots progressive backlash, Murphy dropped out of the race in March.
With Murphy’s exit, Kim gave the impression to be on a glide path to the Senate in a state that final elected a Republican to the chamber in 1972. Menendez, who’s on trial in New York Metropolis, introduced in March that he wouldn’t search reelection within the Democratic main. However on Monday, he filed to run as an unbiased – a transfer that might make the race extra unpredictable, with management of the Senate hanging within the steadiness. Democrats maintain a slender majority within the chamber however face a troublesome panorama this fall.
A 41-year-old former diplomat and the son of Korean immigrants, Kim was the primary Asian American elected to Congress from New Jersey.
His anti-corruption message and the success of his high-profile authorized problem to New Jersey Democrats’ unbalanced poll design – which favored celebration machine-backed candidates – rapidly made the congressman a hero to progressives.
Democratic Rep. Invoice Pascrell will fend off a main problem in New Jersey’s ninth Congressional District, CNN tasks, defeating Mohamed Khairullah, the mayor of Prospect Park, who was essential of the congressman’s assist for Israel’s conflict in Gaza.
Pascrell, 87, first entered Congress in 1997 and had hardly ever been confronted with a severe main contest. A staunch supporter of Israel for many years, he had lengthy benefited from a spot atop the poll underneath New Jersey’s arcane “county line” system – which was discarded this year after a courtroom battle.
Khairullah, who’s Muslim, made headlines final yr after he was turned away from an Eid reception on the White Home to mark the tip of Ramadan.
Throughout the marketing campaign, he charged Pascrell with turning his again on the district’s Muslim neighborhood by failing to reply extra forcefully to Israel’s conflict in Gaza. The district is residence to a big inhabitants of Palestinian and Jewish voters, which has additional elevated the problem. Pascrell in March referred to as for a “conditional ceasefire” however held again in criticizing the Israeli authorities.
“The size of struggling in Gaza is ghastly and unacceptable, and my coronary heart aches for these affected,” Pascrell said in an announcement on the time. “Solely with a ceasefire of hostilities can we offer the sturdy assist and medical care mandatory to deal with this disaster of historic proportion.”
Three months later, the Israeli offensive continues, with humanitarian support solely trickling into the besieged enclave because the civilian dying toll rises.
This story has been up to date with extra reporting.