Tom Kean Jr.’s No Good Very (Very) Bad Day: With 12 Days to Go, Kean Jr. Faces Barrage of Brutal Press Coverage While Bennett Racks Up Endorsements

“That’s a tough spot to be — your enemies hate you, but your supporters don’t love you,” one Republican operative sympathized.

SOMERVILLE, NJ — With two days until early voting and 12 until Election Day, Rebecca Bennett’s campaign is full steam ahead. Meanwhile, things seem to be unraveling once more for Tom Kean Jr. Today, Rebecca earned the endorsement of the Gannett and Philadelphia Inquirer Editorial Boards, and was featured in articles from NJ.com and New York Magazine contrasting her positive vision for the district with Kean Jr.’s lack thereof.

Take a look at some of today’s reporting:

New York Magazine: Can an Invisible Congressman Win Reelection?

• Tom Kean Jr. needed to vanish to become interesting. He’d been in public office for 25 years — first as a New Jersey state assemblyman, then a state senator, then a congressman — without making much of an impression.

• Over the past few months, he has launched a kind of political science experiment: Can you win a tough reelection fight in a key House district against a formidable opponent by largely staying out of view?

• [Carlos Santos] can’t divulge where Kean will be because the campaign doesn’t publicly release its schedule and many of Kean’s appearances are invitation-only. My interview requests to the campaign and to Kean’s Capitol Hill office went unreturned. It’s a different way to run a campaign, I say. “Yes,” Santos replies, tightly.

• Mike DuHaime has been the political director of the Republican National Committee, and he ran Chris Christie’s first winning bid for New Jersey governor. He has known the Kean family for decades. “On the trail, Tom is hearing from people who are sharing personal stories with him and they’re appreciative of him being forthright about his depression, ” DuHaime says. “Will that add up to some votes? I don’t know.”

• Kean, in his single debate with Democrat Rebecca Bennett, refused to distance himself from Trump on the Iran war or tariffs.

• The Trump drag and the strangeness of Kean’s absence aren’t the only factors shaping this race, however. The Democratic primary yielded in Bennett a nominee who is both engaging and a good ideological fit for the general-election audience.

• When I meet her, Bennett is wearing white sneakers, sensible blue jeans, and a jacket that is — what exactly is that color? She consults with an aide, and they decide on fuchsia. “I spent 15 years wearing a flight suit every day,” she says with a laugh. “When I got out, I didn’t know how to dress. I was looking at regular clothes and saying, ‘Where are all the pockets?’”

• Ask about whether the party nationally has embraced too many cultural-identity issues and Bennett tacks rapidly back to her pragmatic message. “What I hear every day on the campaign trail when I’m talking with voters is things are not working for them — whether it’s ‘Prices are too high’ or their kids can’t find jobs … We gotta go, we gotta try, we gotta iterate. It’s not about spending the next 20 years talking.”

• She has proved a fast learner as a first-time candidate, shedding much of her initial stiffness. Bennett weaves in endearing anecdotes about her two young daughters — “The other day, my older one didn’t want to do something and she goes, ‘It is my body, my choice. ’ And I was like, ‘That’s great, but you gotta brush your teeth’” — while not hesitating to knock out some teeth.

• Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is “an absolute disgrace.” Her opponent, Kean, is ” a coward.” How? “Why is he continuing to do what Mike Johnson and Trump tell him to do? He’s a rubber stamp. He’s not willing to face voters; he’s not willing to talk to them.”

NJ.com: Is this Tom Kean Jr.’s last stand? The nation — and Trump — are watching

• It’s easy to see why Democrats loathe Kean. Though he has taken bipartisan, moderate stances on issues such as the environment and the SALT tax deduction, he has often voted with Trump. And he occupies a swing seat Democrats held just a few years ago and desperately want back.

• Some Republicans, meanwhile, are privately lukewarm on the congressman, saying he’s too cautious and far from charismatic.

• “That’s a tough spot to be — your enemies hate you, but your supporters don’t love you,” one Republican operative sympathized.

• “Does he even have it in him?” another Republican strategist asked, questioning if Kean has the “campaign mode” for the increasingly grueling district. “As a Republican, it’s hard to watch.”

• “My life is the story of the American Dream. Because I was able to go to college on an ROTC scholarship and I worked two jobs on top of that to pay the bills,” Bennett said at her recent event with Jeffries at a church in Linden.

• “This Trump administration is trying to destroy democracy. They are enriching themselves and they are making our problems worse. Tom Kean has been lockstep with the national Republican Party every step of the way.”

• For her part, Bennett, has largely steered clear of criticizing Kean’s absence, but has instead attacked Kean’s support of Trump’s tariffs and the Iran war. “I’m glad that he got access to the care that he needs,” Bennett told NJ.com. “I continue to wish him a speedy recovery. “And also, his voting record is terrible and he is absolutely failing this district,” she added.

USA Today Network New Jersey Editorial Board: Tom Kean Jr. or Rebecca Bennett? We pick this candidate

• With Kean in lockstep with President Donald Trump on the Iran war, tariffs, cuts to health care programs and other issues, the mantle of moderate in this race belongs to his challenger, Democrat Rebecca Bennett.

• For that reason — and to provide much-needed balance to Trump's chaotic governance — we recommend that voters send her to Washington.

• Bennett, a health care executive and former U.S. Navy pilot, earns our endorsement with a detailed platform focused on affordability, as well as an outspoken critique of Washington gridlock rooted in her 15 years of military service.

• A Bridgewater mother of two young daughters, Bennett, 39, would bring valuable insights from her time in the armed forces and business, as well as the fresh perspective of a young parent.

• Beyond the tax relief [Kean] touts in Republicans’ One Big Beautiful Bill — financed, it should be noted, by deep cuts to social services — we see few new ideas in his campaign to tackle the cost-of-living crisis facing many New Jerseyans.

• Kean appears content to run on Trump’s playbook. That’s not good enough at a time when nearly two-thirds of Americans say the country is on the wrong track and an equal share of state residents say it’s getting harder to afford the basics.

• So voters have a critical choice: Kean is a career public servant with deep ties to the district. The son of a legendary New Jersey governor, he is the status-quo choice. Bennett offers generational change — and a more robust platform to take on the challenges facing New Jersey families.

• Bennett, with her engineering and military training, showed a reassuring grasp of policy nuance in a meeting with editorial board of The Record and NorthJersey.com.

• She spoke knowledgeably about regulatory red tape in health care, the slow pace of energy development and the mechanics of expanding service on the Raritan Valley rail line.

• We invited Kean to meet with our editorial board this fall. His campaign did not respond to repeated calls and emails. Bennett met with us for an hour to discuss her political philosophy and agenda.

• In the most egregious example of his play-it-safe strategy, Kean refused to state a position for months as local officials fought a Trump administration plan to open an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Roxbury Township. Despite pleas from the town’s all-Republican council, Kean didn't come out against the center until a Sept. 27 debate, weeks after a lawsuit had already put the proposal on hold. Bennett declared her opposition in February.

• Kean cites SALT relief as proof he can stand up to his party, along with his resistance to Trump’s attempts to cancel the Gateway tunnel project. He was hardly the only New Jersey politician in those fights, however, and it’s unclear how much of a leadership role he played.

• Both candidates have lobbed personal attacks. We find them distractions at best. Kean’s suggestion that Bennett is an out-of-touch millionaire is bizarre coming from a congressman with a net worth of $10 million, and his contention that she made money off denying care to patients is misleading, blaming her for decisions she had no hand in.

• Bennett did admit to avoiding church for a time because she disagreed with Trump voters in the congregation, but there’s no evidence this kind of pettiness defines her. It’s hard to malign the character of a veteran who put herself in harm’s way for her country.  

Philadelphia Inquirer Editorial Board: Zack Mullock in N.J. 2nd Congressional District and Rebecca Bennett in N.J. 7th Congressional District | Endorsement 

• The former Navy helicopter pilot and health technology executive told the Editorial Board she felt called to run for office for the same reason she joined the military, which is her love for America and the opportunity it stands for.

• To put that opportunity back in people’s grasp, Bennett wants to rollback Trump’s tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans and help make healthcare, housing, energy, and childcare more affordable.

• The incumbent — the son and namesake of the former New Jersey governor and the scion of a family that traces its political lineage to the Revolution — was a traditional conservative stalwart during his almost two decades in the General Assembly. Under Trump, he has abandoned some of those values, including backing the president’s tariffs, which have raised prices at home and hurt America’s standing abroad. Kean also supports the president’s war of choice in Iran, which continues to roil world energy prices and has led to increasing pain at the pump.

• Earlier this year, Kean disappeared without explanation for nearly four months. When he reemerged, he said he had been in treatment for depression. As this board has expressed, Kean deserves praise for going public with his diagnosis, but he is still an elected official with duties to his constituents. His monthslong lack of transparency remains troubling.

• Kean did not respond to multiple invitations to meet with the Editorial Board.

• As for Bennett, she described herself as a commonsense candidate who is interested in solving problems. She said that she is ready to work across the aisle — and with partnership-minded people across the country — to move the Garden State forward.

• Washington could use some of that can-do spirit. That is why The Inquirer endorses Rebecca Bennett.