Jack Ciattarelli tried to escape the shadow of Donald Trump by holding an Election Day eve rally at the John Basilone WWII valor statue in Raritan. But the Republican could never get out from under the narcissist-in-chief, who once derided as “losers and suckers” brave Americans from the Greatest Generation who died defending our freedom.

It's sad, really. Ciattarelli McGreeveyized himself over a four-year period, connecting everywhere with real people, listening to them talk to him about their problems, and devising real solutions. But too many Trump factors added up to bury Ciattarelli in his third shot at governor.

The Republican nominee tried to frame New Jersey’s unaffordability troubles as a statewide problem, only to have Trump land on his candidacy like a continuing dump truckload of radioactive, neon-orange waste.

If Trump hadn’t been president, Ciattarelli likely would have walked into office. The Republican had, as he said, “the wind at his back” in 2025. Consider the fact that no one representing the same party in New Jersey has served three consecutive times since Richard Hughes’ election in 1961 (following the two terms served by fellow Democrat Robert Meyner). But with the GOP defined by the White House, Ciattarelli had too heavy – and grotesquely unwieldy - a lift in Jersey. It didn’t help that he could find no point of disagreement with Trump.

Throughout, Ciattarelli demonstrated sufficient competencies to maintain the appearance of a close race, although Mikie Sherrill – headbutted and energized, but mostly aided and abetted by a ham-handed and hateful President – smoked him in the last month.

Let’s go back to the beginning. Don’t forget that Trump came into office promising to fix the economy. The problem is it got worse with him in there.

Inflation’s up. Unemployment’s up. His tariffs exacerbated the price of goods. His so-called “big, beautiful bill” impacted energy, healthcare, and higher education costs for New Jerseyans – and gravely. Her rival wanted to talk about taxes. But Sherrill briskly equipped herself with talking points to counter Ciattarelli’s message about a dysfunctional state.

The Republican still looked like more than just a live dog in there.

Then he blew it, and the wheels came off down the stretch.

He attacked the one part of Sherrill’s game she’s consistently demonstrably passionate about, and that’s her own biography, specifically her service in the military. Perhaps siloed in Trump’s hit-below-the-belt, G. Gordon Liddy-like universe, the Ciattarelli Campaign tried to muck up Sherrill’s helicopter pilot credentials. Maybe Jack and company thought they could bully Sherrill. That backfired when she punched him at the debate, repeatedly and roughly. That unsteadied Ciattarelli.

At that point, and for the rest of the campaign, Sherrill found her stride, repeatedly assisted by, obviously, Trump, who simply refused to get out of Jack’s way.

The economy wasn’t getting any better, as the Republican President’s government shutdown smashed into people’s SNAP benefits and contributed to new waves of anxiety and volatility. Trump whined about Democrats, then announced his (probably illegal) termination of the Gateway Tunnel. A $20 billion project aimed at reducing traffic in and out the region’s core by replacing dangerous and outdated infrastructure, a job creator for thousands, the tunnel represented a significant 21^st Century upgrade. Trump scrapping it looked like petty vindictiveness. It was Joe Biden’s project, after all. But more importantly, it belonged to the people. Ciattarelli’s response hardly gave the appearance of someone who lacked understanding of its value to commuters and workers.

It was frankly devastating, especially up north.

Keep in mind that while all of this was going on, the presence of Trump’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in masks in vulnerable communities with substantial Latino populations heightened people’s unease. Latinas who backed Trump in 2024 or sat on their hands, suddenly appeared politically engaged against him. African Americans responded too, in the aftermath of Trump’s DOJ throwing Newark Mayor Ras Baraka in handcuffs and disgracefully slapping U.S. Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-10) with felony charges.

Ciattarelli tried to walk through it with message discipline, but as much as he attempted to define himself, a Jersey dude, the weight of the guy Sherrill kept referring to as “his boss” proved overwhelming. When the Republican nominee went down to Cape May for a MAGA rally, complete with YouTube “stars” from Trump world, New Jersey independents and moderates looked on in horror.

It didn’t help Ciattarelli that his own party was in shambles in New Jersey. Still cut into pieces from the GOP Primary, the party organizations were fighting one another. Bill Spadea, bruised after coming in second place, routinely trashed his conqueror on the radio and refused to endorse. Third place statewide finisher Jon Bramnick likewise never endorsed. The GOP tried to say the right things in public, obediently pointing their fingers at Democrats, even as they privately pulled out their hair and gnashed their teeth over Trump. Excoriated with being wimpy for simply always doing what Trump demands, they could only “fight back” by backing Trump’s endorsed gubernatorial candidate. From the beginning, Mikie Sherrill – a law-and-order military veteran - presented a unique challenge to the GOP. Self-demonized by their prop-up of an infernally whining convicted felon in the White House, the awful specter of Officer Brian Sicknick hanging over the landscape in the late lawman’s home state, they imploded – handcuffed drag-alongs in Trump’s Doctor Faustus nightmare.

Through it all, 100% MAGA Jack could not differentiate, forced to participate in “tele-rallies,” while Sherrill on the weekend prior to election day brought back Barack Obama, extremely popular in New Jersey through two general elections, whom Trump once tried to banish from the highest office in the land by making the idiotic, racist and hateful case that he likely wasn’t even born in America.

As much sense as Ciattarelli tried to make, it got to the point whenever he opened his mouth that people could only hear the pinched and infernally self-pitying victim’s voice of golfcart jockey Donald Trump, a human whirlwind of political destruction here, who killed his candidate’s blue state chances of beating a Navy veteran with a genuine and impressive record of public service.

After running three times, Ciattarelli didn’t look ready for a fourth shot, as frazzled Republicans, bothered by Sherrill’s elephant gun-sized shot in the arm to her party, observed the crushing and intrusive impact of Trump and his policies on the fast-developing landscape and tried to figure out where to go from here with time ticking down to 2026 and beyond.