On the ground, Ciattarelli tackles Murphy’s pandemic response

Republican gubernatorial candidate Jack Ciattarelli was out on the streets of Medford Monday.

He came to the Burlington County town of about 23,000 with a simple message: Gov. Phil Murphy’s handling of the pandemic, from businesses to schools, had harmed the state, and Ciattarelli was the one who would pick up the pieces.

His message met friendly ears at The Pop Shop, a colorful restaurant built inside an old bank on Medford’s main street. There, owner Joanne Gardner said she was having trouble filling out her staff after a slow pandemic season.

The restaurant had received a loan under the Paycheck Protection Program to keep its employees on payroll through the worst of the crisis, but she worried about filling vacancies that have appeared in the intervening months.

“We’re living under a dictator,” she said, referring to Murphy.

The hiring troubles, Ciattarelli said, came because of generous unemployment benefits made available as a result of the pandemic, repeating a pledge to suspend $300 weekly supplemental unemployment benefits some have pointed to as a cause of slowed economic recovery.

Governors in some other states, most of them Republican, have announced they would suspend the additional payments, fearing the unemployed were getting paid more through benefits than they would receive at a job.

The candidate jabbed Murphy on a variety of topics, moving through criticisms aimed the state’s business climate, schools, nursing homes and others as he made his pitch for Murphy to be a one-term governor.

Schools were the focus at Girlfriends on Main, a clothing boutique a few buildings down from The Pop Shop. Angela Cocivera and Nadine Garber, the boutique’s owners, said they had to shut down for months at the height of the pandemic.

Sometimes they snuck into their own business to send get out whatever message they could. On Monday, they said Murphy had forgotten about South Jersey.

“He does not know where South Jersey is,” Cocivera said. “He doesn’t realize that life exists below exit seven except for Atlantic City because of their tax revenue.”

Murphy, a resident of Monmouth County, makes infrequent trips to South Jersey. He was there last month to sign a bill providing $25 million in federal aid to the state’s small businesses. That even was in Medford.

His tour finished outside Braddock’s Tavern, a bar about a block away from the previous two stores where Ciattarelli, Assemblywoman Jean Stanfield (R-Westampton) and her running mates, Lumberton Township Administrator Brandon Umba and former Hammonton Councilman Michael Torrissi, mingled with patrons and passersby.

There was scant indication that Ciattarelli was running in a primary. Hirsh Singh’s name was brought up inside the boutique, though it found little favor. Singh, the gathered owners, elected officials and passersby agreed, would fare poorly in the state’s general election.

Hudson County pastor Phil Rizzo and former Somerset County Freeholder Brian Levine didn’t even get a mention.

That’s something of a departure from Ciattarelli’s campaign literature, which has savaged Rizzo and Singh over property taxes and a record of electoral losses, respectively.

Rizzo sold his home to his church for $1.65 million. The arrangement allows him to live there without property taxes.

Singh’s campaign for governor is his fourth run for public office in five years. He ran for governor in 2017, for House in 2018 and Senate in 2020.

But Ciattarelli insisted he wasn’t going negative in the GOP primary.

“I think it’s fact based when I remind people that Hirsh Singh has lost race, after race, after race, including in territories where people know him best, like his home counties. I don’t see that as negative. I see that as fact-based,” he said, adding, “I don’t think it’s going negative when you’re stating facts.”

Ciattarelli and Singh are set to meet Tuesday for what could be the only gubernatorial primary debate of the cycle. No other Republican candidates qualified, and Murphy is unopposed in his bid for the Democratic nod after two would-be challengers were knocked off after filing deficient petitions.

Singh backed out of a debate, hosted by NJ PBS, set for Wednesday because it was being held virtual. The candidate said the debate’s format, which he agreed to infringed on his “medical freedom”

He’ll attend the Tuesday debate, which NJ 101.5 will host in-person. Ciattarelli is hoping his opponent shows up to both.

“If he doesn’t, then we’ll make due,” he said.