John Crowley

Former Bogota Mayor Steve Lonegan will announce today that he'll seek the Republican nomination for Governor.

Conservative activist Steve Lonegan will formally announce his gubernatorial candidacy this afternoon.

Lonegan, the 52-year-old former mayor of Bogota, will kickoff his 2009 campaign at the Courtyard Marriot in Edison at 1:00pm, according to his Web site.

This will be Lonegan’s second try for his party’s nomination. In 2005, he won eight percent of the vote in the Republican primary, coming in fourth out of seven candidates. But since then he's developed a higher statewide profile, authoring a book and heading the anti-tax group Americans for Prosperity.

Chris Christie resigns, Wayne Bryant is convicted, Jon Corzine remains upside-down, Democrats take Monmouth, and the race for Leonard Lance's State Senate seat takes shape.

Democrats think today's Quinnipiac gubernatorial poll indicates that Gov. Jon Corzine is well on his way to being understood and embraced by the electorate after making several unpopular and tough, but necessary decisions.

Republicans see the poll as demonstrating lackluster support for the Corzine, considering he's spent a combined $100 million on his two previous statewide races, and early enthusiasm for U.S. Attorney Chris Christie's potential candidacy among those who have heard of him.

Meanwhile, non-partisan political analysts see the poll as a wash, with promising and troubling results for both Corzine and U.S. Attorney Christopher Christie, who is viewed as a likely gubernatorial candidate.

Corzine leads Christie in the poll, 42% to 36%, although only 37% of voters think Corzine deserves to be reelected and his approval rating remains net negative. Christie remains a relative unknown, with only 30% of respondents knowing enough about him to form an opinion.

Assemblyman Joseph Cryan (D-Union), the Democratic State Chairman, said that's the number that caught his attention. Despite dozens of positive front page headlines about his indictments and convictions of prominent public officials since he was sworn in, 70% of voters still barely know anything about him.

On top of that, although Corzine still has a net negative approval rating, he's improved significantly since the last Quinnipiac poll in September.

John Crowley entertains the New Jersey GOP on the Mississippi River at the Republican National Convention this summer.

Biotech businessman John Crowley of Princeton hasn’t yet made a decision about whether he will run for governor, but his chief political confidante makes it clear that Crowley will make a decision as his own man and not based on party politics. 

“I will say that any decision John makes has nothing to do with Chris Christie,” said Bill Spadea, president of Building a New Majority, a grassroots GOP organization Spadea started with Crowley earlier this year. 

The core of the Republican establishment in New Jersey wants Christie, the retiring U.S. Attorney, to go against Gov. Jon Corzine in 2009.

Morris County Freeholder John Murphy

A veteran of the last GOP gubernatorial primary, Morris County Freeholder John Murphy says he likely won’t run for governor if either biotech businessman John Crowley or U.S. Attorney Christopher J. Christie gets in the race to challenge Gov. Jon Corzine.

“Being from Morris County, it would not be prudent for me to run against Chris, who’s also from Morris, of course, and has great name ID,” Murphy said. “I’m not a glutton for punishment.”

Then there’s Crowley, a question mark ever since he looked ready to run against U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-Cliffside Park) then backed down – only to resurface as a GOP organizer and host of a riverboat cruise down the Mississippi River at the Republican National Convention.

Building the New Majority Gains Momentum Down the Stretch Grassroots Organization Focusing on Municipal and County Races across New Jersey

Biotech millionaire John Crowley is still mulling a bid for the Republican nomination for Governor.  If he wins, he'd be the first Governor with no previous public sector experience since Woodrow Wilson moved from college president to Governor in 1910.  But in U.S. Senate races, the lack of political experience is more prevalent: New Jersey sent first-time candidates to the Senate in 1942, 1978, 1982 and 2000.

And if you're an extreme political junkie: if Leonard Lance wins a House seat tomorrow, he'll join a fairly elite group -- New Jersey  Congressmen who have served in both the State Senate and General Assembly.  The last ones were Bob Menendez in 1992, Jim Saxton in 1984, Harold Hollenbeck in 1976, Joseph Maraziti in 1972, and Elijah Hutchinson in 1914.

Gov. Jon Corzine continues to struggle to win the approval of New Jersey voters
Voters' feelings on Gov. Jon Corzine remain tepid, although they've slightly improved, according to a Fairleigh Dickinson University PublicMind poll released this morning.

Corzine’s approval rating stands at 45%, while 39% of respondents disapprove of the way he’s handled his job. 17% are unsure or mixed. 40% of voters have a favorable opinion of the Governor, while 43% are unfavorable.

Only 23% of voters think the state is heading in the right direction – the same number that FDU found last month.

Republican Dick Zimmer trails U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg by 8 points in a new poll for The Record
A poll released today by the Bergen Record shows incumbent Sen. Fran Lautenberg with an eight point lead over his challenger, former Rep. Dick Zimmer, while a hypothetical head-to-head 2009 gubernatorial match-up between Gov. Jon Corzine and U.S. Attorney Chris Christie is in a statistical dead heat.

Lautenberg is still one point short of that important 50% support mark, leading Zimmer 49% to 41%, although 51% of respondents felt that the 84-year-old Lautenberg was too old to serve another term. Lautenberg and Zimmer are nearly tied among men, though Lautenberg holds a 15% advantage with women.

Meanwhile, Gov. Corzine holds a two point lead against Christie – 43% to 41%.  That’s well within the poll’s plus or minus 4% margin of error.  When put up against Princeton biotech executive John Crowley, who’s said to be mulling a gubernatorial run, Corzine gets 48% to Crowley’s 24%, which according to columnist Herb Jackson is” a possible sign that Christie’s support is based on more than just anti-Corzine sentiment.”

Former Gov. Thomas Kean and Scott Morrison of Camden County at the Hilton: Politicker photo

MINNEAPOLIS - From Hurricaine Gustav, to the Labor Day late night cruise with the Crowleys, to Bush cringe, to the Sarah Palin story, to the Blue Grille Bar in the Hilton, to Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz) and back to the Blue Grille, and back to the East, New Jersey Republicans led by State Chairman Tom Wilson forged a convention of small but diehard members.