Saying he is “passionate about challenging incumbent candidates regardless of party,” perennial candidate Roger Bacon will challenge Rep. Tom Kean (R-Westfield) for the Republican nomination for Congress in New Jersey’s 7th district.
A self-proclaimed MAGA candidate who supports Donald Trump, Bacon says Kean “represents maintaining business as usual in government.” A veteran, he is the founder of the Warren County Minutemen Facebook group.
This is his tenth campaign since 1992.
Bacon took on Rep. Tom Malinowski (D-Ringoes) in the 2022 Democratic primary and received 5.5% of the vote. He filed to challenge Gov. Phil Murphy in 2021, but quickly fell victim to election law maven Raj Parikh, who had him thrown off the ballot for failing to gather enough signatures. (Parikh set a New Jersey record for getting two gubernatorial candidates tossed in the same day.)
If he qualifies for the ballot, he’ll become the first person to run against both Kean and Malinowski in a primary.
He mounted his first political campaign in 1992, taking 1% of the vote as the Libertarian candidate for Congress in the 2nd district. Rep. Bill Hughes (D-Ocean City) defeated Assemblyman Frank LoBiondo (R-Vineland) by fourteen percentage points.
In 1993, Bacon ran for the State Senate in the 23rd district as a Libertarian; with no Democratic nominee, he won a career-high 8% against incumbent Bill Schluter (R-Pennington).
The Libertarian’s picked Bacon to take on Rep. Marge Roukema in the 5th district in 1994; he finished fourth in a six-candidate race with 1.5%.
Bacon became a Republican in 1996 and challenged Roukema in the primary. She defeated George Matreyek by a 75%-18% margin, with Bacon receiving 6.6%.
After a twelve-year hiatus, Bacon returned to office-seeking as a party-switcher in 2008 as a candidate for the Democratic nomination for Congress in the 5th district for the chance to take on Rep. Scott Garrett (R-Wantage). Bacon received 7% against Dennis Shulman, a blind Rabbi from Demarest (61%), and attorney Camille Abate (32%).
In 2009, he challenged Gov. Jon Corzine in the Democratic primary. Corzine received 77% against former Glen Ridge Mayor Carl Bergmanson (8.6%) and 9/11 denyer Jeff Boss (8.3%); Bergmanson received 6%. Corzine’s loss of 23% of the Democratic primary vote was viewed as a harbinger that he had problems with voters of his own party.
He took twelve more years off before emerging as a Murphy primary opponent.
Bacon sough the Democratic nomination for State Senate in 2023 for the chance to take on State Sen. Douglas Steinhardt (R-Lopatcong), but lost the primary to Denise King by a 93%-7% margin.
Bacon said he “stands for putting America and Americans’ freedoms FIRST! In stark contrast to the current politically driven regime Roger has workable Constitutional plans for secure borders, election security, sound fiscal, foreign, and energy policies, and other pressing issues.”