Van Drew says he’d like Andrzejczak to keep USDA post

Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-Dennis) said today that he hopes Bob Andrzejczak, a former Democratic state senator from Cape May County and one of Van Drew’s close allies during his days in the state legislature, gets to keep his job as the New Jersey executive director of the USDA Farm Service Agency even when control of the presidency shifts from Joe Biden to Donald Trump.

“I think he’s a good man, and he certainly cares about agriculture,” Van Drew said. “I’ve heard from many farmers about how he’s been proactive, he’s been involved, he’s been there. He’s actually worked the job; it wasn’t just a patronage job that he got and then boom, he’s not doing anything. He’s not particularly political; he’s more of a veteran hero than he is a Republican or a Democrat.”

Back when Van Drew was a Democratic state senator representing far South Jersey, he recruited the 26-year-old Andrzejczak, who had lost his leg while serving a tour of duty in Iraq, for an open seat in the State Assembly as a member of the “Van Drew Team.” When Van Drew was elected to Congress in 2018, Andrzejczak was chosen to replace him in the State Senate.

But the 1st legislative district, and South Jersey more broadly, was in the process of shifting towards Republicans, complicating Andrzejczak’s 2019 re-election bid. He ran as a right-of-center Democrat and didn’t rule out voting for Trump in the 2020 presidential election, but he nevertheless lost 53% to 47% to Cumberland GOP Chairman Mike Testa, who still holds the seat today. (Van Drew defected to the Republican Party a month later.)

Andrzejczak’s lack of loyalty to the Democratic presidential nominee, though, didn’t stop Biden from naming him to the state-level USDA post in January 2022. Andrzejczak is one of the only notable New Jersey politicians to have had a role in the Biden administration; Sue Fulton, a former New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission chair, held a job in the Veterans Affairs Department after the Senate declined to confirm her to a Secretary of Defense post.

Whether or not the Trump administration will heed Van Drew’s advice and retain Andrzejczak is yet to be seen; Van Drew is Trump’s closest ally in New Jersey politics, but the congressman said that he hasn’t yet talked to the president-elect about Andrzejczak’s role.