With O’Rourke ending NJ-7 campaign, Warren Dems switch to Varela

In the wake of Megan O’Rourke’s decision to end her campaign for New Jersey’s 7th congressional district, Warren County Democrats – who endorsed O’Rourke at their convention just three days ago – will shift to Brian Varela instead.

Warren County Democratic Chair Charles Boddy told the New Jersey Globe that the decision to award the party slogan to Varela was made by a six-member party executive committee earlier today. Varela finished in a close second place behind O’Rourke at Saturday’s convention, so Boddy said that letting him use the slogan in O’Rourke’s place was “just logical.”

O’Rourke, who had been the only Warren County native in the race against Tom Kean Jr. (R-Westfield), defeated Varela 16 votes to 14 in the second round of voting. It was O’Rourke’s first convention win, and seemed for a short while to breathe new life into her campaign for the closely watched district.

Shortly after the filing deadline yesterday, however, O’Rourke announced that she was dropping out of the race entirely. Her campaign did not specify whether she had failed to collect enough signatures to file or whether there were other reasons behind her exit.

“Megan O’Rourke ran a fantastic campaign focused on the issues that matter to New Jersey families everywhere, especially in her home county of Warren,” Varela said in a statement after getting the Warren slogan. “I will miss seeing her on the campaign trail, and am proud to pick up where she left off.”

Varela had previously gotten the Democratic endorsement in Sussex County, so he now has party support in the 7th district’s far northwest corner to himself. That corner of the district, though, is sparsely populated, and rival Democratic candidate Rebecca Bennett won the official endorsement in the district’s other four counties, collectively making up more than 80% of its Democratic primary vote.