Rep. Andy Kim (D-Moorestown), the Democratic nominee to succeed Senator Bob Menendez, spoke in Princeton on Saturday morning during a local candidates forum.
Kim, who will face Republican Curtis Bashaw in the November election, took a few minutes to explain why he was running for Senate, which he said was to follow his “North Star” of service. The Democrat said he visited a public housing complex in the city of Salem yesterday, where unfixed holes in the roof and black mold made the housing dangerous for residents.
Kim said poverty affects every county in New Jersey and that determining solutions to the issues will be his priority in the Senate.
“When you want to ask why it is that we’re trying to be able to win this election, it’s not just about winning for winning’s sake,” Kim said. “This isn’t really about just some tribal battle between two parties. It’s about trying to figure out what it is that we think it means to live in this country.”
Kim spoke for a little more than five minutes at the Joint Effort Witherspoon-Jackson Community Princeton Safe Streets panel in Princeton’s First Baptist Church. The panel also included candidates for the Mercer County Commission and Princeton’s school board.
“I do believe that the next four to five years are going to shape the next four to five decades,” he said.