Seven weeks after being tossed off the general election ballot, it’s possible that Penns Grove Mayor LaDaena Thomas has scored an upset victory as a write-in candidate in the Salem County municipality of 4,837 people.
Superior Court Judge Benjamin Morgan found that her seeking write-in votes in the primary despite filing as an independent violated New Jersey’s Sore Loser Law.
Official election results show that 245 write-in votes were cast, which makes up about 44% of the total votes. Republican Louis Pasquale leads Democrat John Washington, a former mayor, 176 to 140, 31%-25%.
It’s not clear how many of the write-in votes were cast for Thomas, and how many of those will be validated by county election officials. That probably won’t happen for a few days.
John Rambo, the owner of a local auto repair shop and a Washington foe, launched a write-in campaign on Thomas’ behalf in the Democratic primary. Thomas denied being part of that, although she did mention it on Facebook.
Morgan found that the write-in campaign was enough to toss her from the ballot under a statute that doesn’t permit unsuccessful primary candidates from running as independents.
A state appellate court rejected Thomas’ appeal. Among other things, they said she could have attended the court hearing, even though she was undergoing heart surgery at the time.