By Matt Rooney | The Save Jersey Blog
The world economy continues to sputter and Russian continues to play a dangerous game of geopolitical chicken with the West, but in one of the country’s most competitive 2014 congressional contests, the biggest issue on the table right now is… income?
It all started on Tuesday when Steve Lonegan sought to counter news of 160 elected official endorsements and a $1.5 million cash on hand edge for his competitor Tom MacArthur by releasing a strongly-worded open letter from committee members Beverly Marinelli of Burlington County and
Lavallette Mayor Walter LaCicero of Ocean County Republicans.
The pair rapped fellow GOP’ers for looking “silly” endorsing MacArthur in light of recent Lonegan angles of ideological attack, and on the subject of campaign finance, mocked Lonegan’s well-heeled opponent for setting “a new record for a Congressional candidate with the fewest number of contributors to his campaign… ever” (the latter critique, based upon the fact that MacArthur’s formidable war chest was almost entirely self-donated, was also repeated by National Journal).
Team MacArthur promptly responded by charging Lonegan with gross hypocrisy, referencing the former Bogota Mayor’s latter-day declaration that taxpayer-funded campaigns were little more than “welfare” for politicians, referring to New Jersey’s “Clean Elections Act of 2008” experiment.
MacArthur GC Chris Russell also questioned why Mayor Lonegan hadn’t released his tax returns in recent cycles despite having described such disclosures as ‘very important and necessary’ back in 2005. Russell asserted that Lonegan’s reluctance stemmed from an ongoing civil lawsuit (Docket #L-2169-11), filed by Wayne resident William Brennan, alleging that Lonegan “made a false statement or engaged in fraudulent course of conduct… that caused the State of New Jersey to pay out money in the form of campaign matching funds to which Lonegan was not entitled and Lonegan accepted these matching campaign funds.”
Brennan’s accusations harken back to Lonegan’s time with AFP-NJ. You can click here to read the August 2011 Case Information Statement and here to read the corresponding letter to then-Attorney General Paula Dow.
“Mr. Lonegan should live up to his newfound rhetoric on transparency, which he called ‘critically important’ on Monday” said Russell in a campaign press release. “If the public deserves a ‘full and clear view’ of his finances today, why weren’t they entitled to the same before his 2009 run for Governor?”
Where all of this leads is anyone’s guess, Save Jerseyans, although regular readers know how I feel about GOP-on-GOP violence. I also have a strong natural aversion to Republicans criticizing a candidate for spending his or her own money in a campaign. Doesn’t that run counter to everything we’re supposed to believe?
In any event, NJ GOP insiders openly admit (off the record) that Lonegan’s name recognition, grassroots network and penchant for no-holds-barred campaigning are keeping this race interesting and somewhat unpredictable down the stretch. It’d still be an upset to remember if Lonegan pulled this out with less than 1/10th of the COH of his opponent and without the line in either county comprising the district.
The clear winner right now?
Democrat presumptive nominee Aimee Belgard, a less-than-inspiring candidate with only half of the cash that the late John Adler had on hand at this point in his 2008 campaign (the last time the seat was open), but who nevertheless gets an unearned two-month reprieve while the GOP candidates try to claw, kick and bite each other into submission.
Tom’s got bigger problems. He earned that money as CEO of a Third Party Adjuster Group, which is fighting no less than 42 lawsuits over non-payment of valid claims across the country. In a district where thousands are still waiting on insurance companies and adjusters over their losses in Sandy, and many have been ill-used, with valid claims flatly denied and stone-walled – forcing the folks to either seek counsel and go to court (as though they could afford that further burden) or walk away. MacArthur claims to have created “thousands of jobs”…I reviewed the history of the company, and while they do have > 1000 “employees”, these were acquired due to the purchase or acquisition of companies where they already worked. If Anheuser-Busch suddenly showed up with a checkbook and bought Pinelands Brewery, would they be creating jobs? No. How many of those adjusters are full time? Not many, I’ll bet. They have none in NJ – the company has no licensing (nor does Mr. MacArthur) according to the New Jersey Department of Banking and Insurance web-site. All of this could have been easily checked.
So, do any of the voters know someone screwed over in a workmen’s comp case? Over an injury in an automobile accident? Need a medical procedure as recommended by their physician, only to have the coverage for it declined as “unnecessary”? That’s how this guy made his money – leading whole teams of people who said “no” when they were supposed to say “yes”, and accepting that they might occasionally get sued, but that most folks just hang their head and walk away.
That’s who YOU want leading our fight for better health care in Washington? The guy is the very poster boy for death panels (when it’s someone else).
Meanwhile, there’s that whole voter fraud thing…
If Lonegan wins the primary, that’s still not going away. Promise.
Meanwhile Lonegan made his money as a community organizer, tricking people like you in to thinking that by helping him, you are somehow standing up for what you believe in even though Lonegan is as big a hypocrite as they come. Just another rat following the pied piper of egomania. I’m sure the tinfoil hat set will eat all that stuff up though, its just a shame you already have that demo locked in.
Sorry, Carl. You have me wrong. I am in the race in November, against the winner of the primary. I am a fiscal conservative/social moderate who actually lives here. Lonegan is going to beat MacArthur, and it will be he, Aimee, and I in November (The Libertarians are sitting this one out). Neither deserves your support – Lonegan nor MacArthur – and you now have an alternative to Aimee Norcross, er, Belgard, as well.
“Stand for what’s right, or settle for what’s left” -FJL
If you would know more – http://democratic-republicanparty.org, or https://www.facebook.com/FrederickJohnLaVergneForCongress
Partial list of what we’re up to…as though we had already been elected.
Article the First
Pension Reform
Ballot Reform
Election Reform
Farmland Preservation
Environmental Preservation
Change the Rules Pledge
State Constitutional Convention
Article Five Constitutional Convention
PERS restoration
Support for Education and training for veterans
Student Aid opportunities
Health Care Reform
Tax Reform – Fair Tax
Energy Policy
Prosecution of slamming – Gloucester City slamming fraud
Education/Historic Preservation
Arts in Education
Gold Star Mothers – Madison Rising Concert to raise funds for the Mothers’ Memorial
Beach/Riparian Lands access
Judiciary Reform
Sandy investigation…but problem solving, first
Assistance to Affordable Housing
Community Advocacy Program
Organ/Marrow/Blood donors
Orphan Pharmaceuticals
ADA – in NJ, promote prompt access and tailored pay-out
Expedite Physician pay.
Do we revisit WPA/NRA/CCC?
PubliusNJ- what banner are you running under?
Who posted this, Elizabeth Warren?
The transformation of Steve Lonegan, New Jersey’s onetime Mr. Conservative, into a garden variety liberal populist is the biggest attraction of this campaign.
What is it about? It is about money. We already watched the guy who had deluged criticism on the heads of Governor Christie and anyone who stood with him turn into the most slavishly devoted follower of the Gov overnight and why? Because he needed dough and wanted the Gov to show up and help him raise it.
Now “Fidel” Lonegan, who once upon a time told his masses of followers that (October 2012 AFP Rally) the highest ambition in a CEO’s life should be to “play golf” and not worry about his “so-called responsibilities to society”, has gone Marxist on us. Insurance companies should now become welfare agencies and should do away with their claims adjusters because LIKE VOTING FRAUD, insurance fraud doesn’t exist, right?
Solidarity with the People! You go Fidel. Lonegan for Commissar!
“Fiscal conservative/social moderate”??? And I’m Nick Sacco!
No way mister, you showed us your ideological colors upstairs.
Up the Revolution, hey?
Hey Publius, I found a good recording of your song. Please share it with Comrade Steve.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2jnX2y30DE
pretty nasty about Steve….
However long winded you are the fact of the matter is that in this race Tom is the true consertive base on both candidates record. Put everything else aside
There is absolutely nothing conservative about Tom MacArthur. Most Republicans in this state are very liberal. I live in Ocean County, where the completely Republican board of freeholders just voted unanimously to increase spending and raise taxes as they do every single year. These Republicans all endorsed MacArthur. If Lonegan were a liberal, you would think they would have endorsed him instead of trying to actively recruit someone who better represented their values. Finally, I can’t think of one good thing that MacArthur has done for this state’s taxpayers. Lonegan has fought excessive borrowing from both parties, organized opposition to Obamacare in New Jersey, and helped defeat the very unpopular “asset monetization” plan put forth by Gov. Corzine. He has been a friend to taxpayers in a state that desperately needs them. MacArthur can put out as many distortions and outright lies as he wants. Taxpayers know who has had their back, and who sat on the sidelines. The votes in the primary will prove this.
He was a barely adequate mayor of a town smaller than Island Heights.
Actually, that last applies to both, doesn’t it…
And I told you about the insurance thing before the London Daily Mail. See above.
Apparently, Joe, for you and the other Rs in Burlington, the out-of-district tuition for endorsement was pretty cheap.