RARITAN - Soldiers in the light rain looked up at Jack Ciattarelli, where he stood under the boulder shoulders of the John Basilone statue in the river town he grew up in and fired the last oratorical rounds of the 2025 campaign, as if fed from the machinegun ammunition belt of the statue itself.

Basilone was a Congressional Medal Honor winner in WWII.

It's that spirit Ciattarelli tried to metaphorically discharge above the heads of the crowd here tonight, his crowd, at the onslaught he faces, and they face: the prospect of another four years of Democrats running the statewide power table.

But he couldn't deny, nor could Ciattarelli's followers, another presence, more complicated than a fallen war hero.

"There are a lot of differences between me and my opponent," said the Republican nominee for Governor on the eve of Election Day. "You know what the biggest one is, right here and right now?

"I now where the hell Raritan is," he noted. "Did you see her streaming live and she said 'we're leaving Middlesex County and going up to Burlington County?

"She's no Jersey girl," said Ciattarelli, a native of the state who's tried from the beginning to cast her as an outsider, even as Democrat Mikie Sherrill tried to paint him as a President Donald J. Trump lapdog.

He pointed to the polls.

They're close.

But the vote-by-mail ballots submitted by Democrats show a 290K margin over Republicans.

He drew people's attention to endorsements.

Fifteen endorsements of his candidacy by Democrats.

"When Democrats are endorsing the Republicans, it tells you how badly Democrats are running this state," Ciattarelli said.

A Democrat today told InsiderNJ that some of the Democrats Ciattarelli trotted out, among them North Bergen Mayor Nick Sacco and former Assemblyman Jamel Holley, will only inflame the party warlords who short-circuited them to begin with, who otherwise might not have found true organizational passion for Sherrill's candidacy.

Nothing causes NJ political diehards to put the warpaint on like local gang rivalries - and the prospect of finally flattening someone still flailing for attention.

Courted by Chris Christie and Phil Murphy alike, the most volcanic GOTV property in the state, Brian Stack campaigned with Sherrill tonight - and yesterday.

The polling shows men leaning Ciattarelli and women leaning Sherrill.

"She's a woman, that's fine - but I'm here to tell you I'm a man," the Republican declared.

Assemblyman Erik Peterson (R-23) came out to the rally in support of his former colleague, and commended Ciattarelli.

"It's going to come down to will the Republicans come out and vote on Election Day, and if they do, Jack will win. If they stay at home, Mikie Sherrill will win. Democrats have done a good job getting people out before Election Day. Their tank of voters isn't that great. Our voter tank is almost full. I'll just say this: the one thing I heard going door to door is people said they wanted to vote on Election Day. I heard that house after house after house."

Manville Councilman Joe Lukac poked fun at Sherrill. The local Republican echoed Ciattarelli's puzzlement over the Congresswoman's seeming unfamiliarity with NJ culture, in this case referencing the Democrat's campaign trail rejection of the uniquely New Jersey delicacy pork roll as "gross.”

"I'm from Manville, as you know," Lukac told InsiderNJ. "We've been working hard on the streets and remember, just a special message for Mikie Sherrill - pork roll's good and the people of Manville love it."

They amounted to fighting words here tonight on the eve of the election, summoned by Jack loyalists and party members who want him to win, but kept it light and without rancor in the shadow of the statue of ultimate sacrifice. Somone asked someone else about tomorrow, and the unavoidable larger looming shadow of Trump, stuck to Ciattarelli, less noble than Basilone, if ever there were an understatement, and in a campaign sense painfully more defining.