A look at the 2014 primary to pick Cory Booker’s opponent

Jeff Bell’s upset victory over four-term U.S. Senator Clifford Case in the 1978 Republican primary was one of the great political campaigns in New Jersey history.  Bell was a 35-year-old speechwriter for Ronald Reagan’s 1976 presidential campaign, and Case became the only incumbent U.S. Senator in New Jersey history to lose a primary.

Bell had no lines in that race, but he ousted Case by 3,473 votes, 51%-49%.  Bell is one of twelve people to defeat a U.S. Senator who had served four terms or more in a primary election.

By the time Bell returned to New Jersey to challenge U.S. Senator Cory Booker in 2014, Bell’s amazing feat had faded into obscurity.  He lost the general election to Bill Bradley by 12 points, and lost a Senate primary to Millicent Fenwick four years later. A Monmouth University poll showed that 83% of New Jerseyans didn’t know who Bell was.

Bell said he decided to challenge Booker only after he personally failed to recruit a stronger candidate.

He won the Republican primary with 29% of the vote, defeating Richard Pezzullo by 4,598 votes in a four-way race that also included Brian Goldberg and Murray Sabrin.

This became Bell’s second statewide primary win — 36 years apart.

Pezzullo had the county lines in Camden, Monmouth, and Union; Goldberg had Atlantic, Cumberland, Essex, Hudson, Hunterdon, Mercer, Ocean, Passaic, and Somerset; and Sabrin had Middlesex.  Bell skipped the conventions process.

GOP primary turnout was just 13.5%, with just 145,000 votes cast in a state with nearly 1.1 million Republicans.

Bell won six counties: Bergen (57%), Burlington (39%), Cape May (61%), Morris (37%), Somerset (36%), and Warren (48%).  Pezzullo carried Camden (44%), Gloucester (31%), Hunterdon (30%), Monmouth (55%), Sussex (45%), and Warren (48%).  Goldberg took Atlantic (64%), Cumberland (55%), Essex (49%), Hudson (42%), Mercer (37%), Ocean (56%), and Passaic (42%).  Sabrin was the top vote-getter in Middlesex (30%) and Salem (39%).

The key for Bell is that he also finished second in nine counties.

None of the candidates spent much money: $69,000 for Bell, $81,000 for Sabrin, $45,000 for Pezzullo, and $9,400 for Goldberg.

Booker, elected to the Senate a year earlier after Frank Lautenberg died in office, defeated Bell in the general election by a 56%-42% margin.   The results of Bell’s two races, both in mid-term elections of Democratic presidents, were somewhat similar: he lost in 1978 by 238,760, and by 252,569 in 2014.