Well, this is going to be a regular series: I will provide lists of potential candidates for both of the states holding gubernatorial elections in 2013, New Jersey and Virginia, as well as all of the 36 states that are holding gubernatorial elections in 2014. I'm going to feature New Jersey, one of two states holding its gubernatorial elections in 2013, in this diary.
Chris Christie, a Republican, is the incumbent governor, and is eligible to run for a second term, although, given the fact that he has been touted as both a potential 2012 Republican vice-presidential nominee and a potential 2016 GOP presidential candidate, he may not do so in order to run for President or even resign three years into his first term in order to assume the office Vice President if a Romney-Christie GOP ticket wins the 2012 presidential election. (By the way, I'm NOT voting for Romney under any circumstances, and whether or not Christie is his running mate won't impact my decision) If Christie resigns, Kim Guadagno, also a Republican, who concurrently holds the offices of Lieutenant Governor and Secretary of State, would become governor in that situation.
List of Potential Candidates - Republicans
Chris Christie, Governor
Kim Guadagno, Lieutenant Governor and Secretary of State
Steve Lonegan, former mayor of Bogota
John Runyan, U.S. Representative, NJ-3
My thoughts: If Christie does not run for a second term, Republicans don't exactly have a deep bench to draw from. I'm sure there's other Republicans other than the ones that I've listed that would consider running for Governor if Christie doesn't run for a second term or Guadagno succeeds Christie and does not run for a full term.
List of Potential Candidates - Democrats
Cory Booker - Mayor of Newark
Richard Codey - Former Governor
Rob Andrews - U.S. Representative, NJ-1
Frank Pallone - U.S. Representative, NJ-6
Lisa Jackson - Director of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Sheila Oliver - Speaker of the State General Assembly, LD-34
Lou Greenwald - Democratic Leader of the State General Assembly, LD-6
Joe Cryan - Former Democratic Leader of the State General Assembly
Stephen Sweeney - President of the State Senate, LD-3
Loretta Weinberg - Democratic Leader of the State Senate, LD-37
Barbara Buono - State Senator, LD-18
Chris Bollwage - Mayor of Elizabeth
My thoughts: Frank Pallone would be my first recommendation, as he is a very liberal Democrat in a state where we can probably get away with running a hard-line liberal. Booker was regarded as a rising star within the Democratic Party both in New Jersey and nationally until he claimed that Mitt Romney's record at Bain Capital wasn't fair game for President Obama on Meet the Press, so he probably won't make it out of a Democratic primary unless he's unopposed, and I don't know much about Sweeney, although legislative leaders seem to have quite a bit of political pull in New Jersey.
I am not aware of any third-party or independent candidates that might file to run, although I can't envision a scenario in which one or more such candidates play anything more than a spoiler role.
The latest polling that I've seen of the NJ-Gov race consists of Christie-Booker, Christie-Pallone, and Christie-Sweeney hypothetical matchups conducted by PPP, and dates to July of last year, so this is nearly one year-old data, but it showed Booker d. Christie 47-43, Christie and Pallone tied 43-43, and Christie d. Sweeney 42-40. At first glance, these polls don't appear to be of much use, given the fact that they're nearly one year old, but there is a common theme of Christie polling at 42 or 43 percent in hypothetical matchups between Christie and a named Democrat in July of 2011. I'm not sure whether or not Christie's popularity has increased or decreased or how much it has either increased or decreased since July of last year.
Comments are welcome, as always.
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