Grading Every Candidate’s Performance In The New Jersey Democratic Gubernatorial Primary Debate
Sean Spiller (F): The former science teacher isn’t going to like getting a big fat F, but it has to be done. Wow… In my view, Spiller is the biggest and clearest loser of tonight’s debate. Aside from possibly having the least speaking time (which may have been a fundamental issue of the moderators and forum), he also came across as weak. He failed to measure up on that stage. With all that star power, Spiller got lost in the lights.
He got hit on the left flank significantly by Mayor Baraka this evening. If he can’t get traction within the progressive lane of the electorate, he doesn’t have a pathway to viably win the primary. If Spiller is smart, he considers dropping out this week, putting his money behind another candidate, and hoping for Lt. Governor as a reward. Stranger things have happened in NJ politics, but I think his campaign is on 35 million dollars of life support.
Josh Gottheimer (C-): I seriously considered giving him a D, but I had to check my bias at the door. He also didn’t get hit too hard by his opponents tonight. I thought for sure that someone would go after his massive wealth (that he said he would put in a blind trust and never did) that seems to have doubled during his time in Congress. Instead, his opponents took a policy critique-based approach instead of a scorched earth personal critique. He gets the lowest passing grade possible.
If this was the 1990s, I think Josh Gottheimer would have run away with the primary, but it’s 2025. Gottheimer seemed out of place from the opening bell. Speaking of openings, let’s talk about his opening statement. I know he made his bones as a speechwriter for the Clinton administration, but he seems to think that type of politics still works in a blue state Democratic primary.
Mikie Sherrill might not walk the walk, but she does talk the talk. Josh Gottheimer is an open and proud, diet Republican. I think I heard him mention cutting taxes more times than I did at the 2012 Republican National Convention. His policies appeal to a very select group of voters. Most of these voters are not registered Democrats. Is it possible his campaign could have crossover appeal in a general election? Yes. Do his policies and message he outlined tonight align with the average NJ Democrat? I would lean towards no. This will make it very difficult to come out on top of this primary when added up with the other factors going against him. He was hammered for voting for the Laken Riley Act by both Fulop and Baraka. It's going to be difficult for him to win a Democratic primary when he's positioning himself as the most conservative candidate.
He didn’t have a catastrophic performance tonight. He was, however, heavily overshadowed like Spiller and got lost in the crowd. And let’s just be honest about it; it doesn’t help that he was the shortest person on the stage by far. I am not a tall person by any stretch of the imagination, but there is a reason the phrase is “Tall men make good Presidents.”. Gottheimer simply has a lot of negatives going his way. He doesn’t appear natural on camera, he looks weak next to his competition, and he is just generally unlikable. I also will leave you with this question. If tax cuts are so popular among NJ Democrats, why was he the only candidate bringing them up at every opportunity? Either he knows something the other 5 don’t, or he has the wrong theory for election success.
Steve Sweeney (C+): For some reason I didn’t think he would perform as well as he did. While he may have surpassed my initial expectations, he didn’t blow it out of the water. He didn’t get hammered by anyone for his connections to George Norcross and was able to avoid a lot of potential gut punches. He’s also the only candidate in the Democratic field that is SOUTH JERSEY. His accent says it all. The entire rest of the field is from the urban core. I think many of us might be discounting this distinct regional advantage he has.
Sweeney came off as down-to-earth and blue-collar last night. In ways he reminded me of Sherrod Brown in terms of his style. Despite what those of us in the political class might think of him, to average joes he seems like a pretty normal guy. It didn’t hurt that no one seemed to hit him for losing to a no-name truck driver that spent 5000 bucks on his campaign or being a lackey for South Jersey’s most powerful and corrupt family. Instead he engaged in charming moments like the one he had with Ras Baraka when they were deciding who would speak first. There is a scenario where the most populous Democratic counties are split between 5 candidates, and Sweeney is able to sweep the South/Central Jersey. My dad was a truck driver for 20+ years. He's also reliable Democrat. I could absolutely see my father hypothetically watching the debate last night and thinking Sweeney is the right man for the job. His blue-collar appeal is stronger than I anticipated or remembered. He's been out of the limelight for a few years now. I think we all have possibly been underestimating him.
Mikie Sherrill (B-): I really wanted to give her a C, but the entirety of her debate performance didn’t merit a grade that low. Checking my bias at the door again. Her opening statement was fake at best and cringe at worst. It gave off bad high school play vibes. Also, what is up with that Minnesota/Wisconsin accent she has going on? As far as I know, she was born and raised in Northern Virginia. Why does she sound like a cast member of Fargo? I guess I had never heard her talk long enough to hear this. Why am I bringing this up? Is it a case of George W Bush where consultants are telling him to play up the accent and buy a ranch? It smells fishy to me.
She got better as the debate progressed on, possibly out of necessity and a realization that she wasn’t getting any speaking time. I think this was evident when she decided to call Moms for Liberty doing gender inspections “bullshit”. She saw that the debate was turning away from her and began to take opportunities later in the evening to stand out from the crowd. Using profanity in that moment was a calculated political decision to save her debate performance from irrelevance.
Like many of the candidates, she benefited heavily from her competitors avoiding taking body shots. It was revealed that both she and Josh Gottheimer have taken donations from Elon Musk. None of her competitors directly called her or Gottheimer out for it, and only Baraka alluded to it. She is still the front runner to win it all in June, but did she look like the front runner last night? I can’t say she did.
Steve Fulop (B): Fulop gets a B because he had some breakout moments, like the story about ICE raiding his father’s apartment building. He doesn’t get an A because he didn’t change the fundamentals of the race last night. He’s really not very charismatic. In fact, he kind of seems like a nerd? I've seen people making jokes about his appearance. He was consistently overshadowed by the man (Baraka) standing to the left of him, both literally and metaphorically.
Did he mention being a veteran once tonight? If he didn’t, he really missed a major opportunity because no one would guess it judging the book by its cover. Fulop needs to get his message and brand together. This is part of why I am only giving him a B. He failed to discuss the most admirable parts of his resume. He ceded ground on the right to Sherrill by allowing her to seem like the only veteran on the stage last night and ceded ground on the left to Ras Baraka. His best resume attribute is being a vet. If he’s serious about winning, he needs to start talking it up because it seems to me that tonight the left wing consolidated around one candidate tonight. If he wants to win in June, he may need to rethink his theory for victory.
Ras Baraka (A-): A star was born tonight. I really wanted to give him an A+, but I had to check my bias at the door again. That being said, he was the clear winner of tonight’s debate, and not just because he outdebated his competitors. He controlled the speaking time like Tom Brady controls a game clock in a two-minute drill. Like I said in my previous grade for Mayor Fulop, Ras Baraka completely consolidated the left wing of the NJ Democratic Party this evening. Steve Fulop ceded ground to him, and in my opinion, he nailed Sean Spiller's campaign coffin shut tonight. He also schooled Gottheimer on the plight of poor public school students. It’s obvious that the mastermind behind the first AOC campaign is running the show for him.
His opening statement was the best of the bunch. His closing statement might go viral. He’s the most charismatic candidate I’ve ever seen run for governor on our side in my lifetime. He created an enemy in Gottheimer tonight and possibly eliminated the opponent closest to his own ideology. I think a lot of New Jersey Democrats are quaking in their boots tonight after watching Baraka dominate the entire debate. He achieved essentially all of his goals tonight, if not more. Unless Mikie Sherrill pulled a Curtis Bashaw and had a stroke on stage, I don’t think the debate could have gone better for him. He is the clear outsider in a time when anti-system politics is in. I didn’t realize how good of a politician he was, and he certainly blew my expectations out of the water. He’s an excellent debater and extremely charismatic. There are 2 members of Congress, a former State Senate President, a former mayor and major trade union leader, and the sitting mayors of the state’s two biggest cities in this field. Baraka was the most charismatic by far. That should tell you something. If every candidate decides to stay in the race till June this is going to be an extremely close contest.