Rep. Rob Menendez (D-Jersey City) – who overcame the biggest challenge of his political career this year following the downfall of his father, former Senator Bob Menendez – has easily won re-election to a second term representing New Jersey’s 8th congressional district, the New Jersey Globe projects.
As of 1:27 a.m., Menendez leads Republican building inspector Anthony Valdes 59% to 35% in a heavily Democratic, majority-Hispanic district that spans Jersey City, Newark, and Elizabeth. There are still some more votes left to count, but if that result holds, it would be a massive decrease for Democrats compared to previous years; Menendez won his first term in 2022 by a 74% to 23% margin.
Just three years ago, Menendez was an attorney and an appointed commissioner of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey who had never run for office before. But when Rep. Albio Sires (D-West New York) announced his retirement, Democratic leaders in the 8th district immediately backed Menendez to replace him, a sign of just how deep his father’s influence ran; Menendez ultimately won both the Democratic primary and the general election with token opposition to claim his first term in Congress.
When the elder Menendez was indicted on federal bribery and corruption charges last fall, however, things got far more complicated for the freshman congressman. The younger Menendez was not implicated in any way in his father’s wrongdoing, but there was no guarantee that his constituents were going to give him a pass; at certain points it seemed hard to imagine that voters would elect anyone with the name “Robert Menendez” to public office.
Taking up the mantle against Menendez was Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla, an on-again off-again ally of the Hudson County Democratic organization who decided to break with them in a big way for his congressional campaign. Bhalla ran to Menendez’s left on some policy issues, but the core of his argument was anti-corruption: vote out the family of “bad apples” that’s been propped up by the political machine for decades.
Menendez hit back in kind, saying Bhalla “wants to run against my father because he’s scared to run against me” and slamming the mayor over various ethical issues back home in Hoboken. The congressman had the full force of all three county Democratic organizations in the 8th district behind him, including Union City Mayor Brian Stack, whose get-out-the-vote operation in northern Hudson County was a bulwark against any anti-Menendez slippage in the district’s gentrifying urban core.
Menendez also had a representational argument to make: the 8th district is the only majority-Hispanic district in the state, and if he lost, the state could have gone without any Latino members of Congress at all. (That turned out not to be true, though no one could have known that at the time; after Rep. Bill Pascrell’s death in August, Democrats chose Nellie Pou, a Latina state senator, to replace him on the general election ballot.)
Ultimately, Menendez’s coalition proved to be the sturdier one. He won 52% to 38%, carrying almost every town in the district save for Jersey City and Hoboken and getting massive majorities among Hispanic voters.
And in such a safely Democratic district, that primary win was tantamount to re-election. After sailing to Congress with no drama in 2022, Menendez had to face his first real test this year, and he made it through; now, following his father’s conviction on all charges and resignation from the Senate, he’ll start his second term as the only Menendez in Congress.