By Matt Rooney
Socialism is on the march in New Jersey. Democrat-Socialist Analilia Mejia is the Democrat nominee in NJ-11 to succeed Mikie Sherrill, Save Jerseyans, and her unapologetically Marxist ideas have made national headlines. The trend isn’t contained to our governor’s former adopted home district.
Meanwhile, in the state’s most competitive GOP defense district, the baby-faced Brian Varela is vexxing Democrat national leaders who prefer Sherrill clone Rebecca Bennett.
It’s not hard to understand why. Varela is, to date, the only NJ-07 candidate to formally endorse Mejia (who may face another contested primary in June). Mejia served as a national political director for Bernie Sanders and as co-executive director of an organization which promoted defunding the police. Mejia is also – drum roll, please – anti-ICE. Varela is, too. In fact, he’s called for an “immediate end” to ICE. Internal polling reportedly shows that the pair’s hard-left drift is paying dividends.
“Dangerous radical Brian Varela is a darling of the far left whose progressive agenda would raise taxes and make New Jerseyans less safe. Voters aren’t buying what this progressive hero is selling,” opined NRCC Spokeswoman Maureen O’Toole.
Voters as a whole may not be ready to go full-socialist in a district like NJ-07, but the Democrat base certainly seems enamored with Mamdani-like candidates as the search for an increasingly angry counterpoint in the Era of Trump.
This energy may carry them to House gains in 2026. We’ll see. It may also, however, doom the party in 2028 in a much less forgiving Electoral College contest:
ICE bought property in Roxbury for a detention center. The town doesn’t want it. Local officials don’t want it. Residents packed meetings to stop it. But ICE did it anyway. When a community’s voice in our district gets silenced by an agency with unchecked power, I’m going to call… pic.twitter.com/Q9X8qTj8XH
— Brian Varela (@Varela4NJ) February 18, 2026
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MATT ROONEY is SaveJersey.com’s founder and editor-in-chief, a practicing New Jersey attorney, and the host of ‘The Matt Rooney Show’ on 1210 WPHT every Saturday evening from 7-9 PM EST.
