Democrat Mikie Sherrill and Republican Jack Ciattarelli clashed Sunday over their responses to political violence and options to the rising price of residing in the first normal election debate of New Jersey’s 2025 gubernatorial race.
President Donald Trump’s second-term agenda loomed giant in a state he misplaced final 12 months by six factors. The candidates sparred over vitality insurance policies, well being care cuts, tax modifications and vaccines, reflecting the points animating voters in the off-year election.
The contest presents a key take a look at for each events ten months into the second Trump administration. Republicans in New Jersey have made positive aspects in current election cycles whilst Democrats have held serve at the statewide stage.
Political violence and Charlie Kirk
On the day of the public memorial service for Charlie Kirk, fears of escalating political violence emerged as an early flashpoint. Ciattarelli and Sherrill each expressed security issues whereas declaring their dedication to free speech.
“This is something I think about all the time, and everyone in elected office now faces this threat to themselves, but worse, to their families, and so we’re all very concerned about it,” Sherrill mentioned.
Ciattarelli mentioned that “I think it’s the responsibility of any public official and candidate for office to engage in rhetoric that doesn’t divide us,” including that “I do think we need to take down the temperature a whole lot.”
Ciattarelli hit Sherrill for her criticism of the conservative activist.
“My opponent on Friday went down to Washington, voted yes on a resolution to celebrate Charlie Kirk’s life but then, within minutes, sent out a statement that basically condemned him. I think that was wrong,” Ciattarelli mentioned.
Sherrill responded, “That’s a neat trick to say you don’t want to divide people and then in your answer bring up something that’s very divisive.”
“Here’s the thing: I care deeply. I care deeply about this country. I stand against political violence,” she continued. “The videos that came out about, after Charlie Kirk’s shooting, were horrific, and I feel horrible because my kids have seen them, and so I can’t even imagine how the Kirk family feels. And that should never happen to anyone because they speak out.”
Affordability, vitality and wind farms
New Jersey is amongst the states which were hit hardest by skyrocketing electricity bills. Both candidates known as out surging prices in their opening statements.
The GOP candidate blamed the outgoing administration of Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy, focusing his criticism on offshore wind farms whereas calling for an “all of the above” method to vitality manufacturing to assist offset rising demand.
“Anybody who’s from New Jersey would know that the Jersey Shore is sacrosanct, here at the state, nobody wants wind farms off our Jersey Shore,” Ciattarelli mentioned. “What I’ve said all along is I’ll reopen and repurpose the plants, we’ll expand our nuclear footprint in South Jersey, we will accelerate solar on rooftops, our warehouses, and we’re pulling out of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, that carbon tax initiative has been a failure.”
Sherrill criticized the Trump administration’s vitality insurance policies, in explicit funding cuts for renewable vitality, and known as out grid operators, saying that “everybody at the table is at fault, and they keep dumping the costs onto the ratepayer here in New Jersey.”
“Let’s face it, some of our utility companies have made over a billion dollars in profits, and yet our ratepayers are constantly suffering,” Sherrill mentioned. She additionally pointed to power-hungry information facilities inserting surging calls for on the interstate grid, a difficulty more likely to worsen with the rising adoption of synthetic intelligence.
Sweeping coverage laws handed by Republicans in Congress over the summer season was a key level of rivalry.
“All he does is say that Trump’s right. It’s okay to drive up your tariffs. It’s okay to have the ‘One Big, Beautiful Bill,’ which drives up your health care and utility costs,” Sherrill mentioned.
Ciattarelli, in the meantime, rallied to the landmark laws’s protection, praising Trump’s signature coverage achievement and noting its expanded deduction for state and native taxes, a key concern in New Jersey, in addition to different tax provisions in the invoice like new deductions for suggestions and time beyond regulation.
“They’re good for all New Jerseyans,” he mentioned. “She voted no, my opponent, did on that bill.”
Vaccines and trans participation in youth sports activities
The candidates had been requested about vaccine coverage amid Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s push to review guidance on when and the way vaccines are administered.
“New Jersey parents should be very worried. We just had back to school, so many of the parents know there’s a lot going around,” Sherrill mentioned. “These are eminently curable diseases, and we are allowing children to get sick and, yes, die because we are not appropriately following medical research vaccine protocol.”
Ciattarelli additionally endorsed vaccines, saying that “the rise in things like measles, mumps, whooping cough and the like are very, very concerning.” He mentioned that communities throughout the state have “got to get above the threshold for herd immunity.”
He then pivoted to criticizing Sherrill for the second time over insurance policies over trans participation in youth sports activities, a frequent attack line Republicans have used nationally. “I just wish my opponent showed the same concern when it came to biological males participating in female sports,” he remarked.
Sherrill fired again, saying that “Jack Ciattarelli will tell anybody whatever they want to hear. And I think we just saw that tonight.”
“He hasn’t actually stood up for vaccines,” she went on. “He hasn’t stood against RFK. He hasn’t mentioned anything about firing the head of the CDC. He doesn’t mention anything about how Trump’s appointee gets most of his medical information on TikTok and reels. This is not somebody who’s going to keep our kids healthy.”