Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-Paterson) has won renomination in the 9th congressional district, the New Jersey Globe projects, beating back a Palestine-focused Democratic primary challenge from Prospect Park Mayor Mohamed Khairullah.
As of 12:41 a.m., Pascrell has 77% of the vote to Khairullah’s 23%.
On the Republican side, U.S. Air Force veteran Billy Prempeh leads Hector Castillo 73%-27%; Prempeh is now set for his third straight campaign against Pascrell after previous losses in 2020 and 2022.
Pascrell’s Passaic and Bergen county-based district includes one of the largest Palestinian American communities in the country, a community that the longtime congressman has historically been on good terms with. That changed last year, however, when the war in Gaza began and many local Muslim and Arab leaders in the 9th district grew frustrated with Pascrell’s pro-Israel stance.
After casting around for an alternative candidate to rally around, they landed on Khairullah, who has led his small Passaic County borough since 2005. Upon entering the race in March, Khairullah campaigned hard on the Gaza issue while also making the case that it was time for new, younger representation, and he raised a decent amount of money for his effort.
But that paled in comparison to the financial and institutional strength Pascrell brought to the contest. Although there was no county line on voters’ ballots, Pascrell still brought the full might of the Bergen and Passaic County Democratic organizations into the race, sporting endorsements from nearly every local legislator and mayor in the 9th district and even three borough council members in Khairullah’s home of Prospect Park.
Khairullah’s message did seem to hit home in certain parts of the 9th district; for example, he’s winning several voting districts in Paterson’s 6th Ward, which includes much of the city’s Palestinian American community. But that’s only a small part of the district, and Pascrell proved to be very popular just about everywhere else.
At age 87, Pascrell is set to soon become the oldest member of the House; the current oldest member, fellow 87-year-old Grace Napolitano (D-California) is retiring this year. Assuming Pascrell wins in November – a likely outcome in a strongly Democratic district – he’ll be nearly 89 by the time his next term is up.
That’s prompted many local politicians in the 9th district to begin maneuvering to one day succeed him; two of them, Paterson Mayor André Sayegh and Assemblywoman Shavonda Sumter (D-North Haledon), publicly flirted with campaigns this year before bowing out. But as evidenced by his solid primary win today, Pascrell is showing no signs of wanting to go anywhere just yet.