Takeaways from New Jersey election: Trump looms large and signs of Democratic enthusiasm

NORTH BERGEN, N.J. (AP) — New Jersey primary voters chose their nominees — and President Donald Trump notched a win in his endorsement belt — in one of two high-stakes governor’s races being held this year.

While officials from both parties say November’s general election will hinge on local, pocketbook issues, the outcome will also be closely watched as a harbinger of how both parties might fare in next year’s midterm elections, and as a test of both Democratic enthusiasm and how the GOP fares without Trump on the ballot.

Here are five takeaways from Tuesday’s primary results:

Trump notches a decisive win

2025’s off-year elections have been rough for Republicans and Trump.

The president went all in on Wisconsin’s state Supreme Court race this spring, backing conservative Brad Schimel, even as polls showed Schimel lagging his Democratic-backed rival. Schimel went on to lose by a whopping 10 points, even after billionaire Elon Musk and groups he backed poured $21 million into the race.

This time, Trump’s chosen candidate, Republican front-runner Jack Ciattarelli, easily won the nomination.

“Jack Ciattarelli is a WINNER, and has my Complete and Total Endorsement – HE WILL NOT LET YOU DOWN,” Trump wrote in a social media post announcing his endorsement last month. “MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, ELECT JACK CIATTARELLI!”

After losing in 2021 to term-limited Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy by the slimmest of margins, Ciattarelli is hoping his third try for the office will be the charm.

The endorsement was a blow, in particular, to Ciattarelli rival Bill Spadea, a conservative radio host who ran by vowing to enthusiastically back the president’s agenda.

Ciattarelli, he complained in one ad, “did more than disagree with the president. He disrespected him. Me? I’ve been a supporter of President Trump since he came down the escalator.”

He said voters should feel free to flout Trump’s advice: “I’ve disagreed with him in the past. It’s ok for you to disagree with him now.”

Trump, who spends many summer weekends in the state at his Bedminister golf club, alluded to the name dropping during a tele-rally he held on Ciattarelli’s behalf. “Other people are going around saying I endorsed them. That’s not true,” he said.

Another primary all about Trump

Candidates on both sides of the aisle vowed to tackle pocketbook issues, from high property taxes to grocery prices, to housing and health care costs.

But Trump loomed large.

On the GOP side, most of the candidates professed their allegiances to the president.

Ciattarelli said in ads that he would work with Trump and end New Jersey’s status as a sanctuary state “on Day One.” (Currently, the state’s attorney general has directed local law enforcement not to assist federal agents in civil immigration matters.) He also pledged to direct his attorney general to end lawsuits filed against the Trump administration, including one challenging Trump’s effort to end birthright citizenship.

Democrats featured him heavily, too.

In one ad, Democratic Rep. Mikie Sherrill — who won the Democratic primary Tuesday and will take on Ciattarelli in November — featured an armada of pickup trucks waving giant Trump flags and warned that, “Trump’s coming for New Jersey with Trump-endorsed Republican Jack Ciattarelli.”

“We’ve gotta stop them,” it said.

In another, she tells viewers, “I know the world feels like it is on fire right now,” and vows to “stand up to Trump and Musk with all I’ve got.”

Past insults forgotten

Back in 2015, Ciattarelli labeled then-candidate Trump a “charlatan” who was unfit for the office of the presidency and an embarrassment to the nation.

“Instead of providing the kind of leadership that appeals to the better angels of our nature in calling us to meaningful and just action, Mr. Trump preys upon our worst instincts and fears,” he wrote.

When Ciattarelli ran in 2021, he distanced himself from Trump, without the outward insults.

Trump nonetheless complained about the treatment on Spadea’s radio show last year, saying Ciattarelli “made some very big mistakes” and would have won had he sought Trump’s support.

But like Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and so many others, past insults gave way to alliance.

Trump offered his enthusiastic backing in a tele-rally, and in his endorsement, said that, “after getting to know and understand MAGA,” Ciattarelli “has gone ALL IN, and is now 100% (PLUS!).”

A changing state

November’s presidential election offered warning signs for Democrats in the state. While Trump lost to Democrat Kamala Harris, he did so by only 6 points — a significantly smaller margin than in 2020, when President Joe Biden won by 16 points.

“New Jersey’s ready to pop out of that blue horror show,” Trump said in the tele-rally held for Ciattarelli last week.

Trump also made stunning gains in several longtime Democratic strongholds, including New Jersey’s heavily Latino Passaic County. He carried the city of Passaic and significantly increased his support in Paterson, which is majority Latino and also has a large Muslim community.

Indeed, 43% of Latino voters in the state supported Trump, up from 28% in 2020, according to AP VoteCast.

November’s election will serve as a crucial test for Democrats and whether they can regain Latino support — both in the state and nationally.

In the primary, strategists, unions, organizers and candidates pivoted away from immigration and focused on pocketbook concerns in their appeals.

“At the end of the day, if you’re worried about paying your bills and being safe at night, everything else is secondary,” Rep. Josh Gottheimer, one of the Democratic candidates, told the AP. “I think that is front and center in the Latino community.”

One exception was Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, who was arrested while trying to join an oversight tour of a 1,000-bed immigrant detention center. A trespass charge was later dropped, but he sued interim U.S. Attorney Alina Habba over the dropped prosecution.

In one of his final campaign ads in Spanish, he used footage from the arrest to cast himself as a reluctant warrior, with text saying he is “El Único,” Spanish for “the only one,” who confronts Trump.

Democrats rally around a former Navy helicopter pilot

Sherrill emerged from a crowded field that included two members of Congress, Baraka, Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop, teacher’s union president and former Montclair Mayor Sean Spiller and former state Senate President Steve Sweeney.

Sherrill leaned heavily on her biography as a former Navy helicopter pilot, federal prosecutor and a mother of four, using images of herself in uniform in her ads. Her campaign logo features a mini helicopter.

Democrats hope November’s general election — along with a gubernatorial election in Virginia — will draw a swell of angry voters eager to show their disdain for Trump’s sweeping second-term agenda, foreshadowing Democratic gains in next year’s midterms.

There were signs of strong Democratic enthusiasm in early voting numbers. As of the last day of early in-person voting Sunday, more than 330,000 Democratic ballots had been cast, well outpacing the number of votes cast prior to last year’s Democratic presidential primary.

That compares to just 130,000 ballots cast by Republicans during the same time — a number that also tops early votes cast in last year’s Republican presidential primary and reflects the broader trend of Democrats being far more likely to vote early than Republicans, who tend to turn out in far greater numbers on Election Day.