For the 24th time since 1958, former Gov. Thomas Kean will support the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate in New Jersey.
“I’m proud to endorse Curtis Bashaw for the United States Senate. Curtis has decades of experience working with Democrats and Republicans in the public and private sectors—creating jobs and growing our economy,” said Kean. “In these times of divisiveness in Washington, Curtis is the kind of leader we need who will put Country over Party. I know he will be an outstanding Senator for all of New Jersey.”
When Kean, then 23 years old, cast his first vote in a U.S. Senate election in 1958, his father, ten-term Rep. Robert W. Kean (R-Livingston), was a candidate for the open seat of retiring Republican H. Alexander Smith. He worked on that campaign.
Bob Kean won the Republican primary by a 43%-36% margin against Bernard Shanley, who served as White House Appointments secretary in the Eisenhower administration – and later as the longtime Republican National Committeeman. A third candidate, Bob Morris, a former chief counsel to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Internal Security, took 21%.
He had been the frontrunner in the general election against Democrat Harrison A. Wiliams, Jr. (D-Plainfield), who had served three years in Congress before losing re-election in 1956. But 1958, the sixth year of Eisenhower’s presidency, turned out to be a Democratic wave – Democrats flipped 15 U.S. Senate seats and 49 House seats; Williams beat Kean by four percentage points, 51%-47%.
Tom Kean flipped an Assembly seat in 1967, served as Speaker in 1972 and 1973, and as Minority Leader from 1974 to 1977. He nearly went to Congress in 1974 – he lost a GOP primary to Millicent Fenwick (R-Bernardsville) by 83 votes – and was elected governor in 1981: he won the primary with 31% and the general by 1,797 votes statewide, 49.46% to 49.38%. Kean was re-elected in 1985 with a record 70% of the vote.
Governor Kean’s father and son each ran against a U.S. Senator who was later convicted on bribery charges: Williams went to prison during the Abscam scandal, and Bob Menendez, who defeated Tom Kean, Jr. in 2006, faces prison after a Gold Bar scandal.