New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie wasted little time in answering the burning question of how he would go about replacing the late Democratic Senator Frank Lautenberg. True to his maverick instincts that have driven some national Republican leaders to distraction, Christie announced Tuesday that he will order a special primary and general election this year to allow voters to determine a successor to Lautenberg, 89, a five-term liberal Democrat who died on Monday.
Christie, who is up for reelection in November and harbors presidential ambitions, by law could have appointed a Republican to hold Lautenberg’s seat through 2014 and then hold an election for a new six-year term. That would have handed national Republicans an additional seat in the Senate for the next 18 months that would have greatly increased their leverage in battling the majority Democrats over immigration reform, budget and tax issues and other critical issues.
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That move would have also averted the prospects of a potentially high profile Senate campaign this fall at the same time Christie hopes to rack up huge margins in his reelection campaign in November. Adding a special Senate election to the electoral mix this fall could put Mayor Cory A. Booker of Newark at the top of the Democratic ticket and potentially energize the Democrats, who currently outnumber Republicans in New Jersey by 700,000 registered voters.
But Christie insisted today that New Jersey’s voters were entitled to decide for themselves who should succeed Lautenberg, and announced at a news conference in Trenton that he will order a special election primary on August 13, followed by a special election on Oct. 16.
“I’m not going to play politics with this,” Christie told a reporter. “We’re talking about a long time, now, 18 months is a long time, and there will be a lot of consequential things that are going to be decided – or could be decided – in the United States Senate in that 18 months. And I just thought that was too long a period of time for any person to have the sole authority to pick who represents the state in the United States Senate. I believe the people have the right to make that decision.”
“They need to have a voice and a choice and I’m giving it to them,” he added. “I understand the political advantage that would come to me if I were the sole person who decided who would be in the Senate, representing New Jersey for 18 months. But I just did not feel comfortable doing that.”
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But the governor also opens himself up to criticism from Democrats over the price tag of holding a separate election, which would cost the state millions, the month before a normal election is slated. Christie sought to preemptively assuage such concerns, saying Tuesday that “the state will be responsible for all the costs of this election.”
Meantime, Christie is expected appoint an interim senator, but he said he has not made that decision yet. The governor said he will appoint the person he deems to be the best qualified, regardless of whether they opt to run in the special election or simply serve as a placeholder until that time.
Christie's sharp tongue prompted criticism from Republicans when he appeared with President Obama at the Jersey Shore in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy, which struck the state about a week before the 2012 election.
"New Jersey isn’t a conservative state by any means--Obama won the state by 17 points last November," wrote columnist Ed Morrissey in The Fiscal Times. Christie’s presidential aspirations depend on winning a second term this year, which means he has to walk a path that puts him between Obama and the Republican base.
Maybe so, but that path is beginning to look more like a tightrope.
