Serrano Glassner announces bid to unseat Menendez

A small-town mayor with national political connections announced today she would seek the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate against incumbent Bob Menendez in 2024.

Christine Serrano Glassner, the two-term mayor of Mendham Borough (pop. 6,014), took direct aim at Menendez, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the target of a federal corruption probe.

“New Jersey deserves better than this dark cloud of corruption that has been following Bob Menendez for a decade,” said Serrano Glassner, a businesswoman and mother of two.  “Bob Menendez has failed New Jersey – because he’s more interested in enriching himself and his cronies than he is in delivering for hardworking New Jersey families.  That’s why it’s high time for ‘Funny Money’ Menendez to be put into permanent retirement.”

Serrano Glassner, 60, served in President George W. Bush’s administration as a Regional Advocate for the U.S. Small Business Administration and was a top executive at the Empire State Development Corporation for eight years while George Pataki was the governor of New York.

“We need a fighter – someone who believes hardworking Americans matter and who will stop Joe Biden’s failed economic policies,” she said.  “Someone who believes parents’ rights matter and who will keep woke ideology out of our schools.  And we need someone who will stand up to Washington, D.C., and do what’s right for New Jersey.”

Glassner has cast herself as a conservative Republican and as a proven vote-getter at the local level.

She was elected to the Mendham Borough Council in 2016 and ran for mayor in 2018, defeating 18-year Councilman Stanley Witczak in the GOP mayoral primary with 57.5% of the vote.  In the general election, she beat Democrat Mark Washburne, a community college professor and former congressional candidate, by twenty percentage points.

Last year, Serrano Glassner was re-elected mayor with 61% against Democrat Melissa Rawley-Payne.

Her husband, veteran political strategist Michael Glassner, has worked on national campaigns since the 1980s.  He served as chief operating officer of President Donald Trump’s 2020 re-election campaign and as political director and deputy campaign manager for Trump in 2016.  He is a protégé of Lewis Eisenberg, a former U.S. Ambassador to Italy and Republican National Finance Chairman.

Menendez’s team thinks Serrano Glassner’s connection to Trump will put her on the wrong side of New Jersey voters.

“Before she runs against Senator Menendez, the mayor is going to have to run from her record. She has supported Donald Trump not once, not twice, but now three times,” said Michael Soliman, Menendez’s top New Jersey political advisor.  “She owns Trump’s disgraced legacy from January 6th to Charlottesville to a Supreme Court that gutted a woman’s right to choose, denies voting rights and makes our streets less safe with more guns. I’ll put Bob Menendez’s record against hers any day.”

A Monmouth University poll released last month puts Menendez’s approval ratings upside-down at 36%-45%.  The investigation into Menendez by the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York reportedly involves potential undisclosed gifts to Menendez and his wife.

Former New Jersey State Treasurer Andrew Sidamon-Eristoff told the New Jersey Globe last month that he was considering a challenge to Menendez.

A Princeton resident, Eristoff served as a New York City Councilman in the 1990s, as New York City’s Finance Commissioner under Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and then as Gov. George Pataki’s state Commissioner of Taxation and Finance.  His great-grandfather was Henry Phipps, who was Andrew Carnegie’s business partner.

Eristoff endorsed Libertarian Gary Johnson for President in 2016 and Joe Biden against Donald Trump in 2020.  He’s backing former Gov. Chris Christie in 2024.

If Eristoff enters the race, it sets up a Republican primary between a former member of Christie’s cabinet who publicly endorsed Biden and a local officeholder from Morris County who has supported Trump for the last eight years.

“As a fighter for New Jersey residents and businesses throughout my career in federal and state government and based on my experience as a mom and a mayor, I am ready to go to work,” Serrano Glassner said.  “We need a leader to fight for the hardworking men and women of New Jersey – and for America.  I am that leader, and I will defeat Bob Menendez and end his career of cronyism.”

Three Republicans are already in the race: Shirley Maia-Cusick, an immigration consultant from Hunterdon County with a Bella Abzug-like affection for big hats; Daniel Cruz, a former Andover Regional School District Board of Education member who won 17% of the vote in a GOP State Senate primary two years ago; and Gregg Mele, a perennial candidate and the 2021 Libertarian candidate for governor.

Menendez had $7.8 million cash-on-hand as of June 30.

The New Jersey Globe first reported Serrano Glassner’s interest in the U.S. Senate race.

Serrano Glassner launched her campaign with a 79-second video touting her accomplishments as mayor and her view of Menendez.

Script: “I’m Christine Serrano Glassner.  I’m a working mom.  I’m a businesswoman, and I’m a mayor of my small community.  New Jersey deserves to have elected officials that really take into consideration and listen to what New Jersey residents and business owners need right now.  As a mom and a mayor, I see what’s going on in this state. Parents are worried.  They’re worried about their children’s future.  They’re struggling to make ends meet.  Senator Menendez has been in politics his entire life.  He’s under investigation yet again.  New Jersey deserves someone with integrity, someone who will work hard to tackle the tough problems that are facing all of us.  Someone who will put us first.  Someone who cares more about our families — our New Jersey families — than his cronies.  Here in Mendham, we’ve focused on improving services while keeping taxes down.  We’ve increased our open space.  We have brought this town into the new millennium.  That’s the kind of leadership we need in Washington, D.C.  I want to use all of my skills and my talents and my conviction to work for the people in this state.  I’m Christine Serrano, Glassner.  That’s why I’m running for U.S.  Senate.”

New Jersey has not elected a Republican to the U.S. Senate since 1972, when Clifford Case won his fourth term.  Since then, 48 states have elected a Republican U.S. Senator; only Hawaii has gone longer.  Despite New Jersey’s preference for Democratic senators, the state has had a Republican governor for half of the time since 1972.

If she wins the GOP nomination, Glassner would be the fourth Republican woman to run for U.S. Senate; her party nominated Millicent Fenwick in 1982, Mary Mochary in 1984, and Christine Todd Whitman in 1990.  Democrats have not nominated a woman for U.S. Senator since 1930, when 32-year-old Thelma Parkinson (later Thelma Parkinson Sharp) ran in a special election for a ten-week term.

When he ran for re-election in 2018, Menendez won by eleven percentage points against a candidate who spent $36 million of his own money just one year after facing corruption charges.  In that race, Menendez set a record for the most votes ever received by a statewide candidate in a New Jersey midterm election.

Menendez faces potential Democratic primary challenges from Kyle Jasey, the son of Assemblywoman Mila Jasey (D-South Orange), and bizarrely, Kevin Cupples, the city planning director in Seaside, Oregon (pop. 7,113).

This story was updated at 9:47 AM with comment from Soliman.