The filing deadline for the special July 16 primary to succeed the late Rep. Donald Payne Jr. (D-Newark) has now passed, and it looks like it will be a crowded race for his deep-blue, majority-Black seat: 11 Democrats and one Republican submitted petitions to run.
The Democratic field includes three sitting elected officials from the 10th district, a political director for Rep. Andy Kim (D-Moorestown)’s Senate campaign, a top state economic development official, a former Payne staffer, and five others, making for a chaotic multi-way election where the winner might prevail with only a small percentage of the vote.
Whoever wins the special primary (and, eventually, the special general election in September) will only serve out the remainder of Payne’s term, which ends in January 2025. The choice of who will replace Payne on the general election ballot for a full term rests with the 10th district’s county Democratic organizations, which could – but don’t have to – select the same nominee as the special primary winner.
This list of candidates is not final; those who just barely reached the threshold of 200 petition signatures could be subject to challenges next week that might throw them off the ballot. But for now, here’s who’s set to run for the 10th district this summer.
LaMonica McIver
Petition signatures: 1,081
Slogans: Essex County Democratic Committee, TBD (Hudson, Union)
LaMonica McIver is the president of the Newark City Council, a position she has held since 2022, and has represented the city’s Central Ward on the council since 2018.
McIver is the early institutional favorite for the seat, garnering endorsements from the county Democratic organization in Essex County, where a majority of the 10th district’s Democrats live, and from the mayors of Newark and Irvington. Her support in the seat’s Union and Hudson portions is less clear, though Union Democrats are considered likely to back her.
That support will presumably come with substantial fundraising assistance and boots on the ground – though unlike in most New Jersey primaries, McIver won’t have the benefit of the county organizational line, since there will only be one race on the ballot in July.
If elected, McIver would be just the second woman of color to ever represent New Jersey in Congress, a distinction several of her fellow 10th district candidates would meet as well; at age 37, she’d also be the youngest member of the state’s congressional delegation.
Derek Armstead
Petition signatures: 810
Slogan: TBD
Derek Armstead is the mayor of Linden, a position to which he was first elected in 2014, becoming the city’s first-ever Black mayor; he was previously a member of the Linden City Council for 20 years.
Armstead is the only Democratic candidate to hail from Union County, which makes up around one-quarter of the district’s Democratic electorate. In a race with a huge number of candidates from Essex County, and from Newark in particular, that could be a major asset.
But Armstead is not on good terms with a large portion of the Union County Democratic organization, including county Democratic chair Nick Scutari, limiting his ability to consolidate the Union vote behind him. One neighboring Union County mayor, Roselle’s Donald Shaw, is already backing McIver instead.
Jerry Walker
Petition signatures: 493
Slogans: People Before Politics (Essex), Jerry’s History Is Helping Others (Hudson), The Peoples Politician (Union)
Jerry Walker has been a member of the Hudson County Board of Commissioners representing southern Jersey City since 2018. A former college basketball star, Walker also ran for mayor of Jersey City in 2013, and was gearing up for another mayoral campaign in 2025.
Walker is the only notable candidate to hail from the Hudson County portion of the district, which is home to a little over one-sixth of the district’s Democratic electorate; like Armstead, that could give him a geographic advantage against a field of mostly Essex County contenders. But he didn’t file with the Hudson Democratic slogan, indicating that he may not have official organizational support in Jersey City.
Brittany Claybrooks
Petition signatures: 352
Slogan: TBD
Brittany Claybrooks is a former East Orange councilwoman, serving on her hometown’s governing body from 2019 until 2023, when she was denied party support for a second term.
Perhaps more importantly, the 32-year-old Claybrooks was until recently the North Jersey political director for Rep. Andy Kim’s U.S. Senate campaign. If Kim, or at least his political network, gets involved in the race to aid Claybrooks, that could jumpstart her fundraising and make up for her institutional disadvantages.
Darryl Godfrey
Petition signatures: 815
Slogan: Democrat for Healthcare, Jobs, and Affordability
Darryl Godfrey is the chief operations officer of the New Jersey Redevelopment Authority, an independent state-created financing authority designed to assist urban communities.
Godfrey, a native of Newark’s West Ward, was previously the executive vice president of the Brick City Development Corporation under then-former Mayor Cory Booker. While he lacks the political experience of some of his opponents, he has said he’s prepared to partly self-fund his race, which could keep him competitive.
Shana Melius
Petition signatures: 495
Slogan: TBD
Shana Melius is a former staffer to the late Rep. Payne, working for three years as a digital coordinator and constituent services staffer for the congressman.
Melius, who lives in Newark, previously worked in the office of New York Rep. Yvette Clarke. She is also a veteran, serving for eight years as a U.S. Army reservist; the founder of several nonprofits and organizations related to social justice issues; and a longtime professional in the music industry.
Sheila Montague
Petition signatures: 266
Slogan: Together We Serve
Sheila Montague is a frequent candidate for local office in Newark, running against Mayor Ras Baraka in 2022, for school board in 2020, 2021, and 2024, and for city council in 2014, losing each time. Montague is also a professor at Essex County college and a former public school educator.
Debra Salters
Petition signatures: 213
Slogan: Salters Get It Done! (Essex), TBD (Hudson, Union)
Debra Salters is a community activist and life coach from Newark who has run for office twice before: once as an independent for the state legislature in 2021, and again for the Newark School Board in 2024, coming in fourth place in a race for three seats.
Alberta Gordon
Petition signatures: 609
Slogan: Elected Not “Selected” Restoring Choice
Alberta Gordon is a data engineering manager and a Democratic district leader in Newark’s South Ward with a compelling life story: in 2010, her twelve-year-old son was riding his bicycle home from football practice when he got caught in the crossfire of a shooting and became paralyzed.
John Flora
Petition signatures: 290
Slogan: TBD
John Flora is a teacher in the Jersey City public school system who ran against Payne in the 2020 Democratic primary and got less than 5% of the vote.
Flora is one of two white Democrats who filed for the seat, which has been held by a Black member of Congress since Payne’s father, Rep. Donald Payne Sr. (D-Newark), took office in 1989. Flora also lists his address as being in Hunterdon County, well outside the boundaries of the 10th district. (Confusingly, his address is in the 7th congressional district, where a different John Flora ran for Congress in 2022.)
Eugene Mazo
Petition signatures: 243
Slogan: TBD
Eugene Mazo is a Rutgers University law professor who has filed for Congress in the past primarily to challenge various aspects of the state’s ballot slogan laws.
In 2022, for example, Mazo filed to run in the Union County portion of the 8th congressional district on the “Supported by the Governor” slogan, even though Gov. Phil Murphy had endorsed a different candidate; a judge rejected that slogan, so Mazo switched it to “Endorsed by the Washington Post,” a newspaper that is not incorporated in New Jersey. The battle ended up being moot anyways, since Mazo left the race soon afterwards due to issues with his petitions.
Since Mazo has not yet filed slogans for the 10th district race, it remains to be seen what fight he plans on picking this year.
Carmen Bucco (R)
Petition signatures: 416
Slogans: Essex County Republican Party Organization, Hudson County Republican Committee, Regular Organization Republican of Union County
Carmen Bucco is the lone Republican who filed to run in the solidly Democratic district, meaning he’s essentially guaranteed a spot on the September general election ballot.
Bucco, a small business owner, is now on his 10th bid for public office – 11th, if one counts the regular and special contests for the 10th district this year as different elections. Most recently, he lost a bid for State Senate in 2023 75%-25%.