A quintet of Democratic politicians, each of whom have experienced the effects of the county organizational line in different ways, filed an amicus brief yesterday in support of Rep. Andy Kim (D-Moorestown)’s lawsuit to eliminate the county line.
The five amicus curiae are Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla, who is running off-the-line for the 8th congressional district this year; former Assemblywoman Valerie Vainieri Huttle (D-Englewood), who ran off-the-line for State Senate in 2021; Jersey City Councilman James Solomon; former Piscataway Council candidate Staci Berger; and current 3rd congressional district candidate Joe Cohn.
“Each of the amici, through their involvement in Democratic primaries as detailed above, has firsthand experience with the negative Line effects of the ‘weight of the Line,’ the ‘primacy effect,’ ‘disadvantage for unbracketed candidates,’ ‘ballot gaps between candidates running for the same office/Ballot Siberia,‘ and/or ‘forced association’ as described in Plaintiffs’ Motion,” the brief states.
Kim, who is running this year for U.S. Senate, first filed his anti-line lawsuit two weeks ago. In it, he argues that the line – the unique New Jersey system that lets county parties put their endorsed candidates in the same row or column on primary ballots – confers an unfair advantage for certain candidates and should be ruled as unconstitutional.
Kim and his co-plaintiffs, congressional candidates Sarah Schoengood and Carolyn Rush, are all battling the power of the line in their campaigns this year. In the Democratic Senate primary, Kim is facing First Lady Tammy Murphy, who has never sought elected office before but who will run on the line in many New Jersey counties thanks to her support from top Democratic leaders.
The five candidates who filed the amicus brief yesterday have all similarly fought against the line in their own elections. For Huttle, her break with the county line came three years ago, when Bergen County Democrats supported Assemblyman Gordon Johnson (D-Englewood) for an open State Senate seat instead of her; she ended up running off-the-line and losing to Johnson 72%-28%.
“I still spoke with voters after the election, including good friends, who stated that they could not find me on the ballot, that they did not understand that I was not listed on the Line, or did not understand they could vote for me and other candidates who were listed in the Line,” Huttle wrote in her brief today. “I have seen firsthand how the Line contributes to voter confusion.”
Berger’s section of the brief similarly focuses on her past unsuccessful campaigns; she argued that her 24-vote loss for a council seat in 2022 was largely due to the advantages conferred on her opponent by the county line.
Solomon, meanwhile, wrote that he has witnessed the line’s effects when he campaigned for local progressive county-level candidates in Hudson County who lost to the county organization’s preferred candidates. Solomon himself, though, has never had to deal with the line, since Jersey City doesn’t utilize the line system for its local elections.
“I owe my elected office as a Jersey City councilman to the absence of the Line in Jersey City’s municipal elections,” Solomon wrote. “While candidates may run on tickets with each other and receive support from party organizations in the elections, the ballot design is fair and not designed to cause confusion among the voters… I won my election [in 2017] by 247 votes – a 5% margin – that certainly would have been dwarfed by the advantage received by the candidates who would have been on the line.”
And while Bhalla is currently running for Congress against Rep. Rob Menendez (D-Jersey City), his section of the amicus brief focuses on an ultimately abandoned run for State Assembly in 2015, when he was a Hoboken councilman. Bhalla said he was never given a fair shot by party leaders, who have total control over the line in Hudson County.
“Despite this hidden and undemocratic approach, the [Hudson County Democratic Organization’s] decision appears on the official ballot circulated by the County Clerk,” Bhalla wrote. “This is a direct migration of a private (that is, the Party organization) decision then being incorporated into a public (that is, the primary election ballot) document and process.”
Cohn, finally, focused on his own troubles even competing for the line in the race for Kim’s open House seat. Cohn did not successfully file to compete at either the Monmouth or Mercer County Democratic conventions; he said that he made an effort to file for each convention, but that party leaders either did not inform him of deadlines to file or did not receive his emails putting his name in contention.
U.S. District Judge Zahid Quraishi will hear Kim’s lawsuit on Monday, though it’s not clear yet when he will ultimately issue a ruling. The clock is ticking, with New Jersey’s filing deadline arriving on March 25 and the window for county clerks to prepare primary ballots beginning soon afterwards.
Amicus Brief and Application