The Democratic field for retiring Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-Ewing)’s seat got a little less crowded last night, with one underdog candidate making the decision to end his campaign and endorse a rival.
Elijah Dixon, an entrepreneur and democratic socialist from Trenton, told his supporters at an event yesterday that while he still saw a path to victory for himself, he worried about the possibility that outside special interest groups could try to influence the race and benefit from a split in the progressive vote. With that in mind, he said he’ll instead throw his support behind Adam Hamawy, a doctor and Army veteran who has emerged as one of the race’s frontrunners.
“It is a decision that I have made not because I believe we cannot win, but because I know it is possible we could lose,” Dixon said. “And the risk to our communities of having someone win the seat who would be willing to sell out the interests of working families for the benefit of the billionaire class does not sit well with my spirit.”
It’s too late for Dixon to remove himself from the ballot, so Democratic voters in the 12th district will still see 13 names when they go to vote in June, and some voters are already receiving their mail-in ballots this week. There’s reason to believe, though, that most voters will know to skip Dixon; in the February 5 special primary for the 11th district, two candidates who had ended their campaigns before Election Day but remained on the ballot still got last and second-to-last place.
Four other Democratic candidates (Iziah Thompson, Ray Heck, Mike Anderson, and Rick Morales) had declared their intention to seek the seat but didn’t submit nominating petitions by the filing deadline last month; one of them, Thompson, had been running in a similar democratic socialist lane as Dixon.
Hamawy has not leaned into the “socialist” label for his own campaign, but he’s nonetheless become the standard-bearer for a certain faction of the Democratic Party’s left wing, earning endorsements from several pro-Palestine groups and from the Justice Democrats. He’s also the field’s best fundraiser so far, raising around $550,000 during his first few months in the race. (Dixon, for comparison, raised $8,000 and had not qualified for the New Jersey Globe’s April 26 debate.)
Looming over the crowded primary, though, is the possibility that pro-Israel, pro-cryptocurrency, and pro-AI outside groups could millions to boost or attack certain candidates, much as they did in several Illinois primaries last month – and as one of them, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, did in New Jersey in February. No one knows yet which groups may get involved or which candidates they’d support, but Dixon said those worries influenced his decision to endorse Hamawy.
“We are living in a time where our laws allow for billionaires with ties to international corporations to flood our elections with money, to elect candidates who will advance their interests and not the interests of the people who entrusted them with their vote,” he said. “We do not know when this will happen here but as sure as the sky is blue, for an open seat like ours, we know that it is going to happen.”