Niki Arbittier will make it to the New Jersey State Senate tomorrow, a decade after being the Republican nominee for State Senate in the 3rd district against Senate President Steve Sweeney.
Running as Niki Trunk, Arbittier’s candidacy set off a small fight between the state’s top two Republicans, Gov. Chris Christie and Senate Minority Leader Tom Kean, Jr.
Kean thought the 3rd was winnable and viewed Arbittier, then 39 and a former official in the State Comptroller’s office and the Medicaid Inspector General’s office, as a strong candidate against Sweeney in what was, on paper at least, a competitive legislative district.
In a special U.S. Senate election in October 2013, Republican Steve Lonegan carried the 3rd over Democrat Cory Booker.
Sweeney and Democratic powerbroker George Norcross significantly outraised Arbittier, despite her help from Kean’s Senate Republican Majority leadership PAC.
Christie, on a path to a landslide re-election bid, was uninterested in going after Democratic senators in South Jersey, including Jeff Van Drew (D-Dennis), Jim Whelan (D-Atlantic City), and Sweeney. Republican polls at the time – all reviewed by Christie – showed that the four Senate seats were winnable, but not easily. Christie was unwilling to fight Sweeney and Norcross.
Arbittier went had TV ads accusing Sweeney of “Pushing people around,” but without Christie’s help, she couldn’t get anywhere.
Sweeney beat Arbittier by ten percentage points and 5,446 votes, 55%=45%. Sweeney won Gloucester by 3,681 votes (56%-44%), Salem by 642 votes (52%-48%), and Cumberland by 1,113 votes (61%-39%).
Christie’s lack of support for Republican State Senate candidates in 2011 and 2013 caused consternation within the Senate GOP caucus. When Christie sought to dump Kean the morning after his re-election, he could not muster enough votes, and Kean was re-elected.
Arbittier had been an attorney at the law firm of Gloucester County Republican Chair Jaccci Vigilante. She was recommended for a Superior Court judgeship by State Sen. Ed Durr (R-Logan), the Republican who defeated Sweeney two years ago, and nominated Gov. Phil Murphy in March.
She will appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee tomorrow and could get a full Senate confirmation vote when the Senate meets at 2 PM.
If confirmed by the Senate, Arbittier will succeed Judge John Mathussen, a former GOP state senator from Gloucester County who reached the mandatory retirement age of 70 in January.