On Saturday evening, hours after losing the Monmouth County Democratic convention, U.S. Senate candidate Tammy Murphy reached out to several county chairs on a text message chain with a request: could they come to her Middletown home on Sunday to talk about what happens next?
But some of the chairs had other plans — Hudson County’s Anthony Vainieri politely declined because he had committed to picking up food and setting up for a Super Bowl party later that day — and the pow-wow was rescheduled for Monday.
Vainieri made it on Monday, along with LeRoy Jones of Essex, Paul Juliano of Bergen, Arlene Quinones Perez of Hunterdon, and Peg Schaffer of Somerset. Gov. Phil Murphy and a campaign consultant, Mike Delamater, were part of the meeting.
Party leaders expressed strong concerns that the results of the Monmouth convention could create some momentum for Rep. Andy Kim (D-Moorestown) in upcoming contests. Kim defeated Murphy in Monmouth, 57%-39%.
They made some suggestions to Murphy as she moves forward into convention season, including her outreach to local party leaders and improving the flow of information back to the county chairs.
Hunterdon’s convention is coming up on February 25.