The New Jersey Democrats have been caught in a dirty trick in the home stretch of the gubernatorial race, PolitickerNJ reports, sending out robocalls promoting independent Chris Daggett to a Republican-leaning county.
The calls went to Somerset County, which has usually been a Republican stronghold. It did vote for Barack Obama in 2008, but it also voted for Bush in 2000 and 2004, and for the GOP candidates for governor in 2001 and 2005, and for Senate in 2000, 2002, 2006 and 2008. (In two of those elections listed, Jon Corzine was the Democratic nominee.)
State Party chairman Joe Cryan had previously denied that the calls came from the Dems, though they did in fact say at the end that they were paid for by “NJDSC” (New Jersey Democratic State Committee), and listed the party’s address. A party spokesperson has told PolitickerNJ that Cryan was unaware of the calls when he’d made the denial.
Daggett brushed off the call. “Voters hate robocalls. This is just another instance of the dishonest ways Democrats and Republicans use to win campaigns and to fool voters,” he said in a statement. “It is little wonder more and more voters are rejecting these kind of desperate dirty tricks and turning to my campaign for a positive message about how to make New Jersey more affordable and competitive.”
The polls have shown that this race could be determined by where Daggett voters go on Election Day — how many Corzine-leaner or Christie-leaners break away from him, and how many stick by him to the end.
The polls have also suggested that Corzine is currently losing more votes to Daggett than Christie is. A call like this to a GOP county would presumably go some way towards countering that problem, except for the fact that the Dems were just caught in the act.