Murray Sabrin

Former Republican U.S. Senate candidate Murray Sabrin said today that he won’t run for Governor next year.

Towards the end of his Senate campaign, Sabrin said that, if he didn’t win, he would consider running for Governor to keep U.S. Attorney Chris Christie, the establishment Republicans’ favorite prospective nominee, from getting the nomination.

Reached on vacation in Alaska today, Sabrin said that he would devote his energy towards advancing his philosophy of limited government and laissez faire economic policy.

State Sen. Joseph Pennacchio lost his bid for the GOP U.S. Senate nomination
While dozens of candidates were making last minute appeals on primary day, Republican Senate candidate Joe Pennacchio spent the afternoon working on dental fillings and root canals. The next day, about 12 hours after congratulating rival Dick Zimmer on his victory, Pennacchio was at his Mount Arlington dental practice again, engaging in his pre and post-election routine: going to work.

“I make a habit of working my regular job on election day and the next morning,” he said. “It grounds me. It tells me who I am, gets me back with the people and in the mix.”

Pennacchio, a conservative, lost to the more moderate Zimmer, 46% to 40%, with Murray Sabrin, a finance professor at Ramapo College, taking 14% of the vote. But despite a respectable showing, Pennacchio was true to the persona he cultivated during the campaign, exemplified by his “Jersey Joe” moniker and the slogan that accompanied it: “He’s one of us!”

It's almost a month after the primary, but former Republican Senate primary candidate Murray Sabrin's unorthodox campaign continues to produce reverberations.

James Hogan, who ran for the Republican congressional nomination on Sabrin's slate in the 6th District, wrote a blog entry
excoriating the campaign for its unusual strategy and press release blitzes, which he said ultimate hurt both Sabrin and his down-ballot candidates.

Hogan placed third in the primary with a little over 1,000 votes, behind Robert McLeod, the winner, and Peter Cerrato.

Still, Hogan professes no bitter feelings towards Sabrin - just a slight feeling of bamboozlement.

Claiming to have nailed down the likely identity of someone who pretended to be him in email correspondence at the height of the Republican Primary, State GOP Chairman Tom Wilson today sent out a message to Republicans fingering a key supporter of Senate candidate Murray Sabrin.

"Efforts to trace the source of the emails were hampered by the inability of the Internet service providers to provide the details necessary," Wilson told Republicans in his email message sent today.

"However, the account was re-opened at some later point and was successfully traced to the former residence of Patrick Donohue, who owns Max Consulting in New York City," Wilson said of the early April transmissions.

Max Consulting is listed on Federal Election Commission (FEC) reports as having received more than $123,000 from the underdog campaign of Sabrin, who confirmed Donohue was the campaign’s fund-raiser.

Fresh from his U.S. Senate candidacy, newly minted Bergen County Committeeman Murray Sabrin walked into Republican Headquarters tonight to cast his vote for county chairman. 

Sabrin was accompanied by his wife, Florence, who started a freeholder bid here on Sabrin’s rebel slate before Chairman Rob Ortiz’s allies successfully challenged her petition signatures.  She is now also a county committeewoman. 

Sabrin, a Fort Lee resident, wouldn’t say who he planned to vote for, but he eliminated one of the three choices.

“Let’s put it this way: it’s not Rob Ortiz,” said Sabrin.

Sabrin for Senate spokesman George Ajjan won 29% of the vote against Rep. Bill Pascrell in 2004
If Murray Sabrin’spress releases from the primary campaign were to be taken literally, the New Jersey political scene would have been even more of a Bizarro World than it already is.

Republican Senate nominee Dick Zimmer would have been under federal investigation. Sabrin would have been endorsed by Gannett, or rather, the corpse of newspaper mogul Frank Gannet. Joe Pennacchio would have been a fascist. Tom Wilson would have resigned in disgrace from his post as Republican State Chairman. Chris Christie would not be the favorite potential GOP candidate for Governor next year. And Sabrin, who ultimately got 14% of the vote on primary day, would have been the clear frontrunner throughout the Republican Senate race and would have won every debate he participated in.

“Throughout this campaign we employed a creative strategy to try to cut through in a race where the press was paying very little attention to Murray Sabrin,” said George Ajjan, a former Republican kamikaze congressional candidate and frequent Republican pundit/blogger who worked as Sabrin’s communications director.

Ajjan was the operative who devised Sabrin’s unorthodox communications strategy that was at times clever and funny – like the time that Sabrin managed to get a blog entry on the Wall Street Journal’s Web site for letting $20,000 in campaign contributions ride in a 20-1 shot in the Kentucky Derby – but also earned ridicule from members of the Republican political establishment who bore the brunt of many of Sabrin’s press releases.

Ajjan won’t call his communications strategy misleading. He prefers the term “creative,” and notes that the press releases went out to the press and political insiders, as opposed to the general public, which saw a polished, mild-mannered candidate with a good grasp of economic issues.

[img_assist|nid=18131|title=Frank Lautenberg, 84, won the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate, defeating Rob Andrews by a wide margin|desc=Getty Images Photo|link=none|align=none|width=420|height=265]

Incumbent Frank Lautenberg has won renomination for a fifth term in the United States Senate. He leads Rep. Rob Andrews by a 61%-34% margin. Morristown Mayor Donald Cresitello is running a weak third with 5% of the vote. Lautenberg won huge margins in Bergen, Hudson, Essex and Passaic counties, carried Middlesex and Union comfortably, and held his own in several South Jersey counties.

In the GOP primary, former Rep. Dick Zimmer leads State Sen. Joe Pennacchio by a 46-40% margin. Ramapo College Professor Murray Sabrin has 14% of the vote.

Can’t wait until tomorrow night to see who wins the major U.S. Senate and Congressional primary contests?

Below are some predictions from pollsters, political science professors and observers who track Garden State politics.

The observers were unanimous in their predictions for the Democratic Senate primary, foreseeing a relatively easy victory for incumbent Frank Lautenberg. On the Republican end, the outlook was not so clear cut, with observers split between state Sen. Joe Pennacchio and former Rep. Dick Zimmer. Ramapo College Finance Professor Murray Sabrin will have the support of presidential candidate Ron Paul’s fans, and could take some conservative voters away from Pennacchio.

In the heated Republican primary in the 7th congressional district, state Sen. Leonard Lance is the clear favorite. The 3rd district congressional primary, however, is a toss-up. In what has been perhaps the nastiest race of the election cycle, it was tough decide who had the edge between Medford Mayor Chris Myers and Ocean County Freeholder Jack Kelly.

These races will likely be determined by a very small number of voters. Even the most optimistic of outlooks puts voter turnout at approximately 30%, and most say they expect significantly less than that.

Republican U.S. Senate candidate Dick Zimmer as he appeared in ABC television debate on Sunday.SOMERVILLE - State Sen. Joseph Pennacchio (R-Morris) never convinced party leaders that he could be the darling of the GOP, most of whom instead backed former U.S. Rep. Dick Zimmer for U.S. Senate.

Now, with a full day remaining before Election Day, maverick conservative leader Steve Lonegan, a former mayor of Bogota and gubernatorial candidate, says he will vote for Pennacchio, while questioning Zimmer’s ability to generate energy among rank-and-file Republicans.

NEWARK - Borrowing from American regional painting, Sen. JosephState Sen. Joseph Pennacchio (R-Morris) Pennacchio (R-Morris) followed up on his press conference attack of former U.S. Rep. Dick Zimmer by issuing a mailer lampooning Zimmer’s use of a farmland assessment tax break.

The piece shows the heads of Zimmer and former state Sen. Ellen Karcher (D-Monmouth) pasted on the bodies of the farmer and his wife in Grant Wood’s "American Gothic."

"It’s silliness," said Zimmer U.S. Senate campaign spokesman Ken Kurson. "We have no response. No comment."