The Republican candidate for State Senate in a competitive South Jersey district is trying to turn Democratic powerbroker George Norcross into a campaign issue.
Christopher Del Borrello, who is seeking the open 4th district seat, maintains that fighting Norcross was one of the reasons he decided to run for the Senate.
“The Norcross Political Machine has a history of bullying, corruption, and self-dealing that has spanned decades – instilling a cloud of fear and intimidation across South Jersey,” he said.
Del Borrello also pointed to the involvement of a super PAC tied to Norcross in the recent Republican primary, where Democrats sought to influence GOP voters in support of a different candidate, Gloucester County Commissioner Nick DeSilvio.
“The Norcross Machine demonstrated how fearful they were of me and my Assembly running mates by using a Democrat, dark money Super PAC to meddle in our primary election,” Del Borrello said. “They failed — big time.”
The bid to inject the Democratic insider into the campaign comes one day after The Philadelphia Inquirer reported Norcross is the subject of a “wide-ranging probe” by the state attorney general’s office and the FBI. The issue, says the newspaper Norcross once owned, is whether he exerted political influence to muscle rival developers to purchase Camden riverfront property.
“This November, we will defeat them at the ballot box and restore good government to South Jersey, and I am hopeful that state and federal prosecutors will ultimately be successful in proving future charges that expose them in a court of law,” said Del Borrello.
Del Borrello is a former Washington Township councilman who now lives in Gloucester Township. If he wins, he’ll have senatorial courtesy in all of Camden County.