Who is Jack Ciattarelli? Most New Jersey residents, love him or hate him, know very well who Phil Murphy is. Some people, in light of the recent Project Veritas videos released by Jersey resident James O’Keefe even know who Phil Murphy isn’t. Fewer New Jerseyans know who Jack Ciattarelli is.
The problem is, Murphy’s opponent Jack Ciattarelli is gunshy when it comes to going after his opponent Phil Murphy. In Ciattarelli’s heated primary election. he held back few punches when it came to his conservative opponent Hirsh Singh.
When it comes to Murphy, Ciattarelli is being more calculated and that’s costing him votes, according to a new poll by Monmouth University that still shows him down 11 points.
Jack Ciattarelli is missing a knockout punch and Monmouth University director of polling, Patrick Murray agrees. Ciattarelli trails Murphy 50% to 39% in the latest poll.
“We’ve had a couple of debates and a slew of advertising since the last Monmouth poll. Ciattarelli has chipped away at Murphy’s lead but hasn’t delivered the knockout he needs,” said Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute.
“Even if we figure in potential error margins for these partisan group results, Ciattarelli cannot win this race based on registered Republicans and unaffiliated voters alone. That outcome would require a pretty sizable collapse of Democratic turnout,” said Murray.
Even as Project Veritas dropped bombshell hidden videos on the Murphy campaign, Ciattarelli is refusing to go in for the kill against Murphy during the final week before the election. Ciattarelli has mostly ignored the videos produced by the conservative investigative reporters.
It could end up costing him the election next Tuesday.
New Jersey Republicans like fighters. In 2008, Chris Christie inspired Republican voters to come to the polls against former Governor Jon Corzine. In invigorated the base and told it like it is. Ciattarelli is trying to play a more reserved role during his campaign, to appear to be the more mature elder statesman.
This is New Jersey, we don’t care for elder statesmen here. Hardcore conservatives in New Jersey want to see action and they want to know they have leaders that will fight for things like freedom, gun rights, criminal justice and other hotbed topics. Many have said they are simply staying home next Tuesday instead of voting for Jack who in any other state in America except maybe California, would be considered a Democrat.
Then there’s Jack’s identity crisis. Despite getting millions of dollars in state funding for his campaign, Ciattarelli’s campaign has done a terrible job at getting his name out to the masses prior to this week’s television appearances.
“The partisan difference in voter motivation seems to be related to the national mood as much as anything going on in the New Jersey campaign. Republican enthusiasm may help narrow the gap a bit down the stretch, but it’s not clear that it can close it in the next few days,” said Murray.
Ciattarelli’s campaign has disputed the findings of the Monmouth University polls.
Chris Russell, a high-paid campaign consultant for Ciattarelli once again raged on Twitter over the latest Monmouth Unversity Poll, calling it voter suppression and pointing fingers at the media.
“Polls like this border on irresponsible and risk voter suppression,” Russell, a never-Trumper by trade said. “If Patrick is wrong and this is a close result on Nov 2 – and I believe it will be – there needs to be a big time examination of this post-election day. Looking at you NJ press corps.”
The Murphy campaign has been laser-focused on rallying their base throughout the election cycle, focusing on their move forward agenda while the Ciattarelli campaign has essentially been all over the map on their campaign messaging.
Ciattarelli has been performing a juggling act that has tried hard to keep conservatives interested while still appealing to moderates, and that approach might be what ends up costing him the election next Tuesday. He is also still paying for his past aggressions against former President Donald J. Trump among conservatives.
Trump has not endorsed Ciattarelli and is not expected to.