Doherty will run for Warren Surrogate, Steinhardt will seek his Senate seat

Five-term State Sen. Michael Doherty (R-Warren) will run for Warren County Surrogate in November, with former GOP State Chairman Doug Steinhardt intending to run to succeed him, the New Jersey Globe has confirmed.

Doherty will  replace Nancy Brown as the Republican candidate for surrogate in November.  Brown dropped out of the race on Friday, citing personal reasons.

Warren County Republicans have called a convention for September 1 to pick a new candidate and set a deadline for surrogate candidates to submit a letter of intent of 8:30 PM today.

Brown, a longtime party stalwart, was nominated to run in an election created by the death of Kevin O’Neill, a three-term Republican, died on April 25 at age 76 with more than three years left in his term.

Doherty, 59, one of the most conservative members of the New Jersey legislature, is hugely popular in Warren County, winning 65% there in his Senate re-election bid last year.  Democrats have not won a countywide race in Warren since 1999 and have not picked a surrogate candidate for the upcoming election.

That would trigger a special election convention after the November general election to fill the remaining year of Doherty’s Senate term in the 23rd legislative district.

Steinhardt, 54, the longtime Warren County Republican chairman who spent fifteen years as mayor of  Lopatcong, is the leading candidate to succeed Doherty.

He will enter the race with support from leaders in Warren, Hunterdon and Somerset counties.

In January 2021, Steinhardt launched a run for governor, but dropped out a few weeks later, citing obligations to his law firm.   As state party chairman, Steinhart was a forceful critic of Gov. Phil Murphy’s policies.

Assemblyman Erik Peterson (R-Franklin), who has represented the district since 2009, could also run for Senate at the convention without having to give up his Assembly seat.

Peterson already faces some electoral risk next year after finishing third in a seven-candidate Republican congressional primary in New Jersey 7th district with 15.4% of the vote.

But the Republican convention – this would be run under the 2011 map, not the new one adopted earlier this year – might be friendlier terrain for Peterson.  He came within seven votes of beating Tom Kean, Jr. at the Hunterdon convention and lost Warren to Kean by 8 votes.  In Somerset, Kean won by 38 votes.  (These are not apples to apples comparisons, since congressional and legislative districts don’t line up.)

Some Republicans expect Peterson to face challenge for re-election to the Assembly next year.

Doherty, a 59-year-old West Point graduate and the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, has served in the legislature for 20 years, all of it in the minority.

He had served as a Warren County Freeholder from 2001 to 2004 – he unseated Democratic incumbent Ann Stone by 11 points — and as an assemblyman from 2002 to 2009.

Doherty won a special election for State Senate in 2009, defeating incumbent Marcia Karrow (R-Raritan) in the Republican primary for the seat left vacant earlier in the year when Leonard Lance (R-Clinton Township) resigned to take his seat in Congress.

Karrow had won a January 2009 special election convention against Doherty for Lance’s Senate seat by 52 votes, 195 to 143.  Doherty won the June primary by 997 votes, 52.4% to 47.6%.  Karrow is now the Republican nominee for mayor of Flemington.

Following the death of State Sen. Gerald Cardinale (R-Demarest) in February 2021, Doherty became the ranking minority member on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

In New Jersey, when there is a vacancy for a county constitutional officer, there are no special elections.  Instead, the terms resets, so Doherty in November 2022 would be seeking a five-year term.

In 2015, Doherty became the first Republican elected official in New Jersey to endorse Donald Trump for president.

A 54-year-old Eagle Scout and former college football player, Steinhardt ran for mayor of his hometown at age 31 and defeated the Democratic incumbent, William Baker, by 12 votes.  In a rematch three-years later, he won with 80% and never again faced a general election opponent.  He’s been county chairman since 2004.   One of his law partners is former Democratic Gov. Jim Florio.

Steinhardt is still considered a potential candidate for governor in 2025.