I’m a big believer in letting you make your own decisions in these primaries, Save Jerseyans, but I also think you need to know when a candidate’s lies reach the “pants on fire” level.
You may’ve seen perennial GOP candidate Hirsh Singh complain on Thursday that gubernatorial primary frontrunner Jack Ciattarelli is taking in millions of dollars in public matching funds.
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But here’s the thing: it looks like Singh was trying to get matching funds for himself.
These screenshots are from 2021 ELEC filings from the Singh campaign; the first is from January, and the second is from May. Note the name of the account… “Singh for Governor Matching Funds.”
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New Jersey primary candidates needed to bring in a minimum of $490,000 from – and this is important – donations of $4,900 or less by April 5th to qualify for matching funds. The proximate issue for Singh is that his loan exceeds the self-funding limit for matching funds.
As of the most recent report, Singh brought in a little more than $100,000 including donations from his parents. His debate-qualifying total is powered by a large loan from himsself. Meanwhile Ciattarelli easily qualified and Phil Rizzo failed to qualify due to apparent paperwork filing errors.
The most reasonable conclusion:
Singh wanted matching funds (see the name of the account), realized he wasn’t going to come close to qualifying, and decided to spin Jack’s qualifying for them as a primary campaign issue. Unfortunately, this is classic Hirsh stuff. You may remember that his 2020 U.S. Senate campaign drew the Attorney General’s attention after telling voters to “request a duplicate ballot” if they’ve already voted for one of his primary opponents.
Remember, folks… you need to research EVERYTHING yourself.
Believe what these mailers and social media posts are telling you only after you’ve independently confirmed it.
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