EAST ORANGE - Donald Trump won Passaic last year, where the Department of Justice wants to

monitor voting. If they presided over a corrupt process in Passaic, a Democratic county on paper, Trump would have lost, so runs the argument for why the DOJ's designs look ham-handed at best. But while some Democratic voters tonight high-fived one another, feeling very motivated with less than two weeks until Election Day, other elections watchers here see something more sinister afoot.

Some Patersonians remember when Steve Rothman made the mistake of challenging Bill Pascrell's vote by mail ballots in their 2012 Democratic Primary.

Suddenly, Rothman had a galvanized electorate on his hands, infuriated by even the suggestion of voter disenfranchisement, and awakened by a letter penned on their behalf by none other than the late U.S. Rep. John Lewis.

Diehard Patersonian state Senator Benjie Wimberly (D-35) remembers.

He was in the street, in the rain, on the eve of the election, protesting.

The next day, Paterson voters swamped the polling places.

By way of context here, from CBS tonight:

"The [federal] department announced Friday that it is planning to monitor polling sites in Passaic County, New Jersey, and five counties in southern and central California: Los Angeles, Orange, Kern, Riverside and Fresno. The goal, according to the DOJ, is "to ensure transparency, ballot security, and compliance with federal law."

"Transparency at the polls translates into faith in the electoral process, and this Department of Justice is committed to upholding the highest standards of election integrity," Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement.

New Jersey Attorney General Matt Platkin called the move "highly inappropriate" and said the department "has not even attempted to identify a legitimate basis for its actions."

Platkin earlier today announced measures the Department of Law and Public Safety (LPS) will take during the 2025 general election "to help ensure a fair and smooth-running election, to protect the right to vote, and to assist voters, election officials, and law enforcement in resolving any voting-related legal matters."

Saturday, October 25, 2025 marks the start of early in-person voting. Divisions within LPS will play key roles in ensuring free and fair elections in the State of New Jersey, Platkin said.

Since 2022, the Voter Protection Initiative has worked with community stakeholders and partners to identify and address issues affecting voting access. The Voter Protection Initiative focuses on remedying any voting rights or civil rights violations that may arise during early voting and on Election Day, including under the New Jersey Civil Rights Act and the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination.

“The success of our democracy depends on elections that remain free and fair,” said Platkin. “Once again, we are prepared to ensure that all eligible New Jerseyans are able to cast their ballots without harassment, discrimination, or intimidation. Those seeking to disrupt the voting process will be held accountable.”

There are those who think Trump's Justice Department could be the prime disrupter, given the very unorthodox deployment here of the DOJ, and Trump's shaky relationship with the law, to put it mildly.

There are other facets to this, too.

"Federal government overreach is concerning and given the election deniers who have supported the current administration, I would be concerned that this is a cover for a stop-the-steal strategy regarding the gubernatorial campaign," said elections lawyer Raj Parikh.

The DOJ made its announcement after receiving an Oct. 20 letter addressed to Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon by attorney Jason N. Sena of Archer & Greiner, P.C.

From The Paterson Daily Voice:

Writing on behalf of the New Jersey Republican State Committee, Sena asked the Civil Rights Division to dispatch federal monitors to the Passaic County Board of Elections for the upcoming election.

Sena cited what he described as a “long and sordid history of VBM fraud with multiple indictments” involving vote-by-mail (VBM) ballots in recent elections and said the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office had been “incapable of enforcing the law and protecting the integrity of elections in Passaic County.”

Sena requested that federal monitors oversee “the receipt and processing of vote-by-mail ballots in the Nov. 4 General Election” and ensure “around-the-clock access” to the Board of Elections.

The letter implies some wrongdoing by the Board of Elections, but the sordid history in question, in fact, relates to individuals manipulating the system, not the Board of Elections.

In any event, Senator Wimberly said he's ready.

"I think it works to our advantage," said the senator. "They're grasping at straws."

Other Democrats, like Platkin, viewed the development with genuine concern.

"There's no showing," said attorney Joe Hayden. "In my 50 years of observing [state] elections, it's always the Attorney General's Office monitoring elections. You don't bring the feds in for this."

They have no real jurisdiction here, without implementation of the special provisions of the Voting Rights Act (see bottom), which sources describe as more than passingly ridiculous.

Or terrifying.

Given Trump's unprecedented abuse of power and indifference to the rule of law, his Homeland Security Department's reliance on masked, armed guards to aggressively prosecute alleged illegal immigration (Trumps Hispanic approval at 27 percent, a 20-point drop since last September), and the President's suggestion to a roomful of generals that the government use America's cities as military training grounds, New Jerseyans tonight became more urgently aware of Trump's designs on the Nov. 4th election.

His critics say Trump wants to employ intimidation tactics wherever he can, militarizing the atmosphere so Americans become anesthetized to the presence of soldiers in the vicinity of polling places, or the DOJ squashing the jurisdiction of a state AG's Office.

Whatever the longer-term designs, and however insidious the implications, more immediately, African American voters here in particular see a fight coming. And as Newark Mayor Ras Baraka said earlier this week, he and his allies know how to fight.

So does Wimberly.

So does East Orange Mayor Ted Green, who tonight joined Democratic State Party Chairman LeRoy Jones and Democratic nominee for Governor Mikie Sherrill at a GOTV rally south of Paterson.

"I remember my grandmother used to say to me, 'Grandson, freedom is not free,'" Green remembered. "She said it as a southern woman coming from North Carolina, who really saw racism at its worst, came here with an eighth-grade education and saw her way, in the City of East Orange, to do the right thing for the people."

Sherrill later told the crowd of senior citizens, "We just had Jim Clyburn in from South Carolina. He told me that when he grew up in South Carolina, he couldn't find work, and he spent summers in Paterson [where he had a job].

"New Jersey - we're a little bit more on the leading edge," the congresswoman told the crowd.

Jersey has its own complex history, seldom brimming with sweetness and light.

But to those like Green with family roots in the South, they didn't come North to have their sacred voting rights tampered with by those who draw prodigious rightward political power from the South.

Receiving a rousing ovation here this evening, Sherrill prepared for a weekend of GOTV rallies, early voting rallies, to be precise, including one in - where else - Paterson, the county seat of Passaic County, and, in case there was any doubt.

For (THE FULL!) speeches in East Orange tonight by Congresswoman Sherrill and Democratic State Party Chairman LeRoy Jones, PLEASE SEE BELOW:

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