In the strongest indication yet that he’ll enter the race for the Republican U.S. Senate nomination, former News 12 New Jersey reporter Alex Zdan has posted a campaign-style video on social media with a new website giving potential supporters a way to provide their contact information.
Zdan has been making appearances at political events as part of his exploration of a run for the seat now held by indicted three-term Democratic incumbent Bob Menendez.
The video includes clips of Zdan as a journalist “fighting for the truth,” questioning Menendez, and frequently sparring with Gov. Phil Murphy, with a generic message of “holding the powerful accountable.”
The window to compete for organization lines in the GOP U.S. Senate primary is narrowing; the deadline to file letters of intent for Republican conventions in Hunterdon and Somerset counties is two days away, with deadlines of February 1 in Bergen and February 15 in Burlington. Candidates can file letters of intent and then withdraw them, but they can’t miss the deadline and expect to participate in the conventions.
The leading candidate so far is Christine Serrano Glassner, the mayor of Mendham Borough. She has national ties as a former member of President George W. Bush’s administration; her husband has been a top political advisor to Donald Trump for more than eight years.
Developer and hotelier Curtis Bashaw, a former New Jersey Casino Reinvestment Authority executive director, is preparing to enter the race. That might be the same for Melinda Ciattarelli, the estranged wife of Republican gubernatorial candidate Jack Ciattarelli.
Three minor candidates have also entered the GOP Senate race: Daniel Cruz, a former member of the Andover Regional School District Board of Education; perennial candidate Gregg Mele, the 2021 Libertarian nominee for governor; and small business owner Michael Estrada, who won 1% of the vote in an independent State Assembly bid six years ago.
The 38-year-old Zdan covered Menendez’s 2017 corruption trial and Murphy’s governorship for nearly six years and developed relationships across the state as the host of News 12’s weekly Power & Politics show. He won extensive praise from Democrats and Republicans after he became a victim of massive layoffs at News 12 in October.