Republicans in New Jersey continue to outpace Democrats in voter registration, whittling down what was a one-million voter edge four years ago to a still-significant 929,827.
The GOP added 25,977 new voters since the June 4 primary election, 45,144 since January 1, and 49,270 since the last general election, according to statistics released today by the New Jersey Division of Elections.
While Democrats picked up 22,817 since last month’s primary, they are on a different trajectory: the number of registered Democrats in New Jersey has gone up by 20,356 since the beginning of the year – less than half of the Republican gains – and are up 16,992 since the November 2023 election. That means the GOP has outpaced Democratic registration by nearly 3-1 margin since last fall.
In total, New Jersey added 13,405 new voters since primary day, 64,971 since January 1, and 81,152 since November 2023.
In the hotly contested 7th congressional district, the Republican registration edge has increased by 11.4%, from 16,805 on Election Day 2022 to 18,718 as of the 2024 primary.
The state’s electorate is now 38.3% Democratic, 24.2% Republican, and 36.3% unaffiliated, sometimes called independents.
In 2001, the last time Republicans had a governor and majorities in both houses of the Legislature, 55% of New Jersey voters were not affiliated with either party. In roughly 23 years, that number has dropped by 19 points. Democrats comprised 25.3% of the voters in 2001, while 19.5% were registered as Republicans.
New Jersey Democrats first gained their million-voter advantage in July 2020, when the presidential election between Donald Trump and Joe Biden supercharged voter interest and led to hundreds of thousands of new voter registrations. The party had steadily grown throughout the Trump presidency, eventually adding 450,000 new voters between November 2016 and November 2020; Republicans added around 230,000 voters in the same period.
Once Biden was elected president, the trends slowly began to reverse, and Republicans have gained ground in most recent registration reports.
At the same time as they crossed the million-voter mark in the summer of 2020, registered Democrats also grew to outnumber unaffiliated voters for the first time in state history. As of this month’s report, there are still 135,335 more Democrats than unaffiliated voters.