Republican hotelier Curtis Bashaw (R-Cape May) has won the GOP Senate nomination, defeating Mendham Mayor Christine Glassner relative decisively.
Bashaw had eclipsed the 50% mark with almost 50% of the statewide projected Republican vote tabulated.
The current margin is 8-points, an insurmountable margin for the South Jersey developer and businessman who invested a significant amount of his own cash into the contest.
Glassner ran very strong in her home county of Morris and neighboring Bergen; she fell far short in most of the rest of the state including at the Jersey Shore which more than cancelled out her strength in pockets of North Jersey.
His win is notable for a few reasons. If Bashaw wins the general, he’d be the first openly gay Republican in the upper chamber. Bashaw also won the nomination notwithstanding a late endorsement by Trump of his adversary, Glassner, whose husband is a close associate of the 45th president.
Bashaw will take on Democrat Andy Kim and Bob Menendez, who filed to run as a Democrat independent, in November. Republicans haven’t won a U.S. Senate seat in New Jersey since before Watergate but hope that Biden’s sagging numbers and a potential three-way race can even the odds.
