Seema Singh

Assemblyman Bill Baroni won big in the 14th district state Senate race, blowing out Democrat Seema Singh with 62% of the vote.  He won Hamilton Township with 76%.

But the politically competitive district remains split, with two Democrats capturing seats in the State Assembly.

Incumbent Linda Greenstein prevailed in her bid for a fifth term, and her running mate, labor leader Wayne DeAngelo, outpaced Baroni’s running mates, Tom Goodwin and Adam Bushman.  Greenstein received 28,172 votes; DeAngelo, 25,037; Goodwin, 24,245; and Bushman, 23,663.

Elizabeth Meyers, campaign spokeswoman for state Senate candidate Seema Singh, Assemblywoman Linda Greenstein, and Assembly candidate Wayne DeAngelo, goes over the ground game at Democratic Party HQ in Hamilton.

Republican mayoral candidate John Bencivengo peruses the town's financial assessment statement in Hamilton.

It’s all politics in Hamilton a day before Election Day as Republican mayoral candidate John Bencivengo climbs out of his sport utility vehicle and walks into the office of Council President Dave Kenny.

Kenny and the Republican Council have been fighting with Democratic Mayor Glen Gilmore over the town’s budget and pressuring the mayor through the courts to release details of Hamilton’s financial health before, and not after, the mayoral election.

Moments earlier, the appellate division of the state Superior Court upheld Kenny’s appeal, and denied Gilmore’s motion to issue a stay in the release of the town’s annual financial statement. Now Bencivengo watches as Kenny receives by fax the financial statement from Bowman and Company, the company charged with preparing the information.

District 13 Sen. Joseph Kyrillos huddles with Assemblyman Sam Thompson.Stumping throughout central Jersey on Sunday, Gov. Jon Corzine dismissed the recently formed Common Sense America as a closeted anti-gay group masquerading as a champion of fiscal conservatism.

In defiance of Fair and Clean Elections in the 14th district, the Princeton-based outfit has spent an estimated $450,000-worth of ads against Democratic Assemblywoman Linda Greenstein and by extension, her running mate, labor leader Wayne DeAngelo.

"It’s not going to end up having a major impact," said Corzine, with Greenstein, DeAngelo and state Senate candidate Seema Singh, at his side in Hamilton’s Golden Dawn Diner.

New Jersey CWA Legislative and Political Director Bob Master today Seema Singh is running a smear campaign and strongly endorsed Republican Bill Baroni for State Senate. "Bill Baroni's opponent would like to obscure this record by call him a 'Bush Republican.' Well, we've never met a 'Bush Republican' with a record like this," Master said. "These smear tactics don't work because Bill's record of independence, and his support for working families, is impeccable. Let's stop the name calling and focus on the issues that really matter to the voters of the 14th District."

U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg in Monroe today

U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg today stood with the district 14 Democratic Assembly candidates in Monroe Township and lambasted a hard right group for continuing to run ads against Assemblywoman Linda Greenstein.

"I talk to John Kerry all the time, and he wishes he fought back harder," Lautenberg said of the failed 2004 Democratic Presidential nominee, who was Swift-boated by a right wing attack machine.

Seema Singh is frustrated. Not with the voters of her district for not hearing her message, but with the press for not promulgating it.

From the beginning of the 14th district State Senate campaign, Bill Baroni has had the upper hand in everything but campaign dollars in this Clean Elections district. All along, he’s had the power of incumbency, along with the reputation of a centrist Republican reformer, while Singh’s campaign has been beset by damaging revelations about her tenure as Ratepayer Advocate, a pending state ethics investigation, and general missteps -- like the comparisons to Baroni and George W. Bush that have backfired and drawn criticism from traditionally Democratic-leaning organizations.

But the press leaves Baroni untouched and is eager to jump on her, said Singh.

“The press has not (been fair),” said Singh. “They have pushed stories that have been initiated by my opponent. But as far as the people of the district are concerned, I’ve received a lot of love, a lot of affection – an outpouring of support.”

It looked as though half the town crowded into Steinert High School for the 14th district state Senate debate Monday between Assemblyman Bill Baroni and Seema Singh, but then again this is Hamilton, where even in the pizza parlors there are signs exhorting people to vote, and where legislative candidates get asked for their autographs.

On key issues Baroni sought to distinguish himself from the Democrats and exploit their weaknesses, while ladling in enough evidence of being pro-environment and pro-good government to put distance on what most New Jerseyans see as the failed leadership of his party at the national level.

The labor-endorsed senate candidate even properly referred to the opposition as the "Democratic Party," eschewing the Bush Republican practice of refusing to associate Democrats with the small-d adjective "democratic."

The 14th district State Senate candidates are girding for battle at Steinert High School tonight, and once again GOP Assemblyman Bill Baroni is heading into a Fair and Clean Elections debate with the Georg W. Bush factor fairly smothered.