Tina Shah won’t run for Congress

After spending months exploring a bid for the Democratic nomination for Congress in New Jersey’s 7th  district, a high-profile physician who held posts in the Obama and Biden administrations has decided not to run.

Tina Shah, who grew up in Somerset County, instead last week took a new job as chief clinical officer at Abridge, a company that seeks to reduce doctor burnout by using artificial intelligence to medical conversations into clinical documentation.

That could mean the current field of candidates – three, maybe four Democrats seeking to take on freshman Rep. Tom Kean, Jr. (R-Westfield) – is locked.   New Jersey Working Families State Director Sue Altman, Roselle Park Mayor Joe Signorello, and former U.S. Department of State official Jason Blazakis are already in the race; Summit Council President Greg Vartan has said he is exploring a bid.

Former State Sen. Raymond Lesniak (D-Elizabeth) has decided not to run.

“I gave it some long thought, but I am so much involved in the (Lesniak) Institute (at Kean University), and I can do more there than I could as a freshman Member of Congress,” he said.  POLITICO had first reported that Lesniak was mulling a House bid.

Lesniak pledged to be involved in the campaign to unseat Kean, as long as the candidate isn’t Altman.

“No way.  No how.  Never,” he said about backing Altman.  “She has radical positions.”

Shah had spoken to several party leaders and consultants about challenging Kean next year – one party bigwig said at one point Shah said she was in, only to move back to the maybe list a week later.

She served as a senior advisor to U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy in 2022, and as national director of clinician wellbeing at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs from 2016 to 2017.   She frequently appeared on television as an expert in the area of physician burnout.