>> Major funding for Reporters Roundtable is provided by R.w.j Barnabas health, let's be healthy together.

New Jersey business magazine, the magazine of the business Association, reporting to executive and legislative leaders in all 21 counties of the Garden State since 1954, and by politicos New Jersey playbook, a topical newsletter on Garden State politics, online at Politico.com.

♪ >> The line is fine if you can get the line.

Otherwise, not so much.

Hi, everybody.

It is Reporters Roundtable.

I am David Cruz.

Walking the line with us today, our panel, a South Jersey reporter for WHYY, Brent Johnson, politics reporter, and Matt Friedman, reporter for Politico and author of the New Jersey playbook.

We will hear from the panel in a bit but we begin with a look at the power of the party line, which is in the news of late because, A, Tammy Murphy is running for Senate and already has the party line in the state's biggest counties, and, B, a new analysis this week shows with the party line has meant to incumbents and other favorite candidates over the last 20 years.

The author of that analysis is professor Rubin, who joins us now.

Welcome.

Good to see you again.

>> Thank you.

Good to see you, too.

David: Your study is an analysis.

Tell us what you have covered and it covers 20 years, yeah?

Guest: It looks like 20 years of state legislative races and congressional races in the U.S. House and Senate to try to understand the impact of County line.

David: So did you just look at Democrats, or did you just look at Republicans, or is it the major parties?

Guest: It is both parties.

It is not really a partisan issue.

It plays for both Democrats and Republicans.

David: So what did you find?

What did the study tell you?

Did it surprise you?

Guest: It did not surprise me because I had picked up some of this before, but I think the magnitude was a little surprising.

What I found on the legislative side is that even in going back 20 years, there are very few candidates who have one off the line -- won off the line, specifically about incumbents, or lost on the line.

And on the U.S. Congress side, the House and Senate, there are also very few chances who have lost off the line or won off the line, but more strikingly there, just being able to quantify the line in terms of individual basis, I looked at candidates, I looked at races where they were split endorsements.

For example, in the congressional district, one County in that district would endorse candidate A and a different county would endorse candidate B, so in one county, candidate A would be on the line, and in the other, candidate B on the line, and I looked at how each candidate did, when they were on the line versus when their opponent was to understand the magnitude of the impact of the line.

What I found is that there were 25 basis like that in the last 20 years for the U.S. House and Senate.

And in those 45 races, the range in terms of how people did was either 13 percentage points, the least difference of being on the line and 79 percentage points was the greatest difference, which was incredible.

The average is 38 percentage points.

In all five cases of being on the line is a huge advantage.

David: And the net effect of that we can see, and a lot of people are talking about it.

We should also say that this is something that is in the middle of litigation right now.

Many groups are challenging the idea of the party line, but we should say that it has been most significant over this past week.

One, because we have been discussing your.

Also because the governor's wife has decided that she wants to run for U.S. Senate, and within days of her announcement, she got the endorsement of the five largest Democratic committees in the state, which you said the last election represented how much of the primary vote?

Guest: If you look at the last open statewide race, which was the 2017 governor's race where there was no incumbents, the five counties accounted for 49% of the total Democratic vote.

So if you are a County chair, Democratic County Party Chair, and you can decide who is going to get the county line, which they have the legal ability to do, you are essentially allowing those five people of getting an incredible advantage to a candidate.

An insurmountable one sometimes.

David: That is the criticism being waged now because the first lady's husband is obviously the governor and the leader of the party, and the theory is that or the suggestion is that he can influence party leaders to endorse her and give her a great advantage.

And we should also say that this is an only in Jersey thing.

We are the only state that does this.

Guest: Yes.

I looked in 2020 at every other state, and the District of Columbia, in terms of primary ballots, and almost all other states use what is known as an office block ballot, where you list the candidates beneath the office they are seeking.

A couple of states have a slightly different structure, but nobody has a structure like ours.

Nobody allowed this kind of waiting on the ballot to try to influence the vote.

Certainly nothing with empty spaces, empty columns or rows, like New Jersey does.

There is none of that.

David: This is a ballot where if you are not with the organization line, you are way the heck over there with lots of spaces between your name and the name of your opponent.

The other thing about this, too, is that the whole question of, is it the party line or is it the organization that provides the most impact?

Because it is one thing to be on the party line, but if that party line does not give you money or boots on the ground, it is not an advantage.

We were talking to Michael Rasmussen about this during the week.

He said, you cannot really tell which it is.

Do you agree?

Guest: Not really.

I do agree that those other factors play into it, so it is not just the ballot, but I think that is is primarily the ballot.

We can thing about that in terms of how this works in other states.

We are not the only state that endorses candidates.

We are not the only state that provides funding to those candidates were provides boots on the ground.

We are the only state with that on the primary ballot.

You don't see this kind of advantage for endorsements from any other state.

We can also thing about it in New Jersey in terms of what happens in those counties who do not have a County line, and we don't see that kind of -- it is not as if the boots on the ground and the money is enough to match what you are seeing in county line that counts.

David: Part of the suggestion on the part of some is that this is somehow undemocratic, but the arguments on the other side of that is, well, party chairman and chairpersons and committee members, they are elected in primaries.

So the argument is that this is elected representation, no?

Guest: So, the county committee, which you are referring to, in theory, -- they are certainly elected at the precinct level by each party.

And then in theory, they are supposed to come together at a convention to nominate, certainly statewide candidates, you might have a municipal committee that nominates counsel people and mayors, but that is not really how it works in a lot of states.

The chair really makes the decision.

Even in those counties where there is a convention and the chair has an incredible amount of power to sway with the committee decides.

Ultimately, has the legal power to overrule that decision.

And we see that repeatedly.

In fact, in the Senate race, the fact that some of these county chairs are endorsed, even though they have a history of having a convention, their County party bylaws stipulate that the endorsement should happen through a convention, yet, they are endorsed in a couple of days of announcing candidacy.

Even if they have a convention, is that really an open-ended process?

And then shoot a couple hundred committee people be making this kind of decision and then putting that weight on the ballot?

They could still indoors.

I don't think anyone is objecting to the party being able to endorse.

I think the issue is should that endorsement translate into a ballot that is so biased that you are almost guaranteed somebody a victory?

Because then the voters are irrelevant.

David: Interesting conversation.

Professor, good to see you again.

Thank you.

Guest: Thank you so much for having me.

David: All right, panel, welcome to December.

Brent, you heard the professor, incumbents and favored candidates never lose.

Is it that simple?

>> It does seem to be the case, another example of the so-called New Jersey machine politics and how a lot of people think things are based on the party.

The data does not lie.

The county and party lines are very influential, and I think there is going to be a new spotlight put on this throughout the Senate race.

It is an esoteric issue to a lot of layman New Jersiens but I think you'll hear more about this as it goes on.

David: Matt versus Kim.

Is it over already or can Andy Kim book the line system?

>> No, I think this will be the best shot we have seen in a while for somebody able to walk the line because Andy Kim already has a name, brand, and he can raise -- I was going to swear -- type of money.

He can raise a lot of money.

He can raise a ton of money.

But I think what is interesting and what I think the professor alluded to us, you know, this fact that the erratically, these people, the committee members, are elected -- theoretically, these people, the committee members are elected and they select the chair.

But if somebody wants to enter politics and has fresh blood, you are starting with a high bar for entry because you have essentially over the last century allowed these political machines to shake these, to put these committee members.

They have all kinds of inducements to get people on their side with jobs and stuff like that that they can hand out , so if there is someone who does not have that kind of already existing political organization behind them, it is very hard for them to get involved if they are not playing ball with the machine.

It is like an advantage that accumulates over time.

It is not as simple as anyone can do this.

All you need to do is get your own precinct level committee members without the benefit of years and years of this machine behind you and all the jobs that come with it and all the people you can get on the ground because they have jobs and let's be honest here, we all know that you are not allowed, legally, to make one thing to require people to act politically in exchange for their jobs, but let's be honest, it happens all the time.

Yeah, it is not a fair system.

It is not like anyone can just be elected.

It starts with a political machine that has an automatic advantage.

That will be interesting because there is much more excitement around Andy Kim than Tammy Murphy.

And even all these chairs backing them, you talked about a lot of people on this to our same, yeah, I guess I will go with Tammy Murphy.

No one is really excited and outside of Murphy world, it has been hard for me to talk to people who do not feel a little bit icky about this whole thing.

David: I was going to use that word.

Yeah.

In addition to the line, Murphy has a kind of incumbency going for her.

And she has been out there promoting maternal health.

From the office of the First Lady, which raised objections about using state resources to campaign.

People got a point there, no?

>> No.

And I have been thinking about this ever since she announced her candidacy for U.S. Senate.

She is effectively an office holder, even though she was not really elected.

She is the First Lady of the Garden State by virtue of the fact she is married to the governor.

There are some consequences you cannot help, they are consequences at the end of the day.

She is going to have a platform and take a because, maternal health, and there will be times were she is accompanying Governor Murphy wherever he goes, especially if it is a big event.

So there is that consequence, but now you have to walk that line.

You have to be careful as far as issue using state resources to campaign?

Or is she using state resources to promote the cause and the platform that she is championing as the First Lady of New Jersey?

And that is going to be an interesting -- that is going to be an interesting dilemma.

I would also offer -- since the esteemed author of the playbook County took my thunder -- [LAUGHTER] But think about this.

This will be a really good test for the line.

You had somebody who -- well, let's clear this out the way.

The county is done at this point.

With that said, do we get somebody who was going to have a statewide name recognition who seems to have the instant endorsements of at least four or five organizations?

Are you going to have someone who basically had to campaign in a new district last year, and can that person scale it up so he could get more of a statewide recognition?

David: The first lady says this is her issue, has been for years, and she is going to keep using the First Lady's bully pulpit to promote it.

Do you think the pressure is going to build and may be forcing her to scale that back?

-- force her to scale that back?

>> In the first week, there were two or three events related to maternal health, and I guess they could be coincidences but that raised eyebrows.

Then there were radio ads that launched just before she declared her campaign.

So I think that is what brought extra attention to it.

Technically, she is not elected, so she does not have the power of the incumbency, but she still does because she is the first lady.

It is kind of unprecedented, this whole thing, and it is a lot to grasp as you are writing and learning about it.

>> I will push back against that.

David: Go ahead, Matt.

Was that Matt?

>> I'm sorry.

[LAUGHTER] >> No, I would push back against that only because we had a situation about 20 years ago in Missouri where the person represented actually died in a plane crash, and they appointed the wife to finish out the term or serve at least one term in the Senate, and she wound up losing.

This is kind of unprecedented, but in a lot of ways, it is not.

It is definitely a first for New Jersey.

>>>> I wanted to add one thing.

I looked into this a bit because it was right after that radio ad came out, which was a big mistake, and I think the Murphy people admitted that was a big mistake.

She started doing this events and I asked, OK, this does not look great, but show me every other event she has done like long before, in the last year, how many maternal health events has she done?

Honestly, we in the press did not cover most of them because there's not a lot of news in these things if we are being honest.

And it was over a dozen I think, so it was not like this was unprecedented.

In that sense.

But, yes, she does have to be careful now.

And then there is the point of, what?

Should she abandon her because now that she is a candidate?

My thought is, no, but I don't know?

Maybe she could handed over to someone else to take the lead on that and then keep the politics, politics.

But should she abandon it?

No, but may be be a little more sensitive about the use of state resources now that she is a candidate and one who has gotten where she is, you know, by default.

David: Yeah, there is even a question as to whether or not she is the best person to be promoting this issue.

But that is probably a separate segment on that.

Let me stick with you, Matt.

Shocking news out of South Jersey.

It seems the so-called phantom candidates down there allegedly put up the siphon Republican votes were funded by packs associated with South Jersey Democrats -- PAC's associated with South Jersey Democrats.

>> There is a 99% chance that that did happen, maybe 99.99% chance.

David: Does this threaten democracy or is this more esoteric than the line?

>> I think this is a dirty trick , whether it is completely legal or whatever, I don't know.

It is very hard to prove these people had fraud in their hearts , that that was their intention to do that, even if it is pretty obvious looking at it on just a conversational level.

You can trace the donations from George Norcross, his old Super PAC, to another Super PAC, to this shady, shady organization that disclosed to actually funded it 20 days after the election.

You can see it, it is like within days of each other.

So, money is fungible.

You cannot prove that was exactly George Norcross' money but you can say, wow, that was a hell of a coincidence.

I don't know if legally, you know, if it is troublesome.

If you look at the way the law is set up when it comes to expenditure committees, I have a lot of questions about the exposure.

But I don't think we should just say, yeah, politics as usual.

They are running fake candidates, which is a hallmark of the South Jersey Democrats.

They have been doing it for over a decade.

No, that is trying to confuse voters, and that is not what we should be doing.

And people should be called out for doing dirty tricks like that.

It is not good for democracy, and these people are, you know, they already have these massive advantages that come with incumbency, that come with the political machine.

They already manipulate the ballot lines to favor their candidates and they use, you know, in primary elections, they have often used these ghost candidates to do that, to push real candidates way off to the side or you know, it is despicable.

It is not good campaign practice.

Nobody should be patting them on the backs for it, nobody should say, all fair in love and war.

It is not war.

This is democracy.

It is a problem.

Even if it did not wind up affecting the election this year, someday, it will, and it probably has before.

And I think it should be -- just, it is about practice.

David: Let's talk a little bit about the lame-duck session.

Running out of time here.

There is a lot that can be done.

But it usually does not get done.

Brenda, what can we expect out of lame-duck this year?

-- Brent, what can we expect out of lame-duck this year?

>> We saw a lot of things go down, and this week in general, there was a ibll advanced -- bill to ban smoking at casinos, and it got delayed because there was talk about possible amendments and sponsors dropping off the list, and then there is also Governor Murphy's liquor license.

He wants to reform New Jersey's archaic liquor license system.

But that is -- it is unclear whether that is going to pass in lame-duck rate some of these things might not happen or get pushed in accession.

As always in New Jersey, there is a lot that could happen in the coming weeks and a lot that might not.

I am also going to write a song called "Fraud in their Hearts."

[LAUGHTER] David: I am tempted to use a >>->> -- quack-quack pun.

Save me.

Anything to report out of the lame-duck session?

>> I would be surprised if anything of substance or anything major gets reported out of session.

Quite honestly, I would be really -- to keep it family-friendly -- upset if the legislature does anything reforming corporate, and I am also speaking as SMBJ president, and I have covered the last couple of years, sometimes more transparency is required.

In fact, I need to double check this, as of this year, New Jersey State police have not updated their crimes steps on their website since 2020, so there is a lot of work that needs to be done toward transparency, and this bill is not going to do anything.

In fact, it will probably reverse the clock.

David: All right, time for our only in Jersey moments, headlines and notes that are quintessentially Jersey.

Brent, you got one first.

>> We say one of the things when you start journalism in New Jersey is that there is always a New Jersey connection.

Someone is always from New Jersey and something happens in New Jersey.

Donald Trump has a new doctor that basically gave him another giant, wonderful, clean bill of health, and he happens to be from North town.

We did research on him.

Could not find much about him.

He did not want an interview.

Of course, the doctor has to be from New Jersey.

There are a lot of people in Trump land with connections to Trump, but that was the latest.

David: I am sure he is the greatest doctor ever.

Mine comes from Hudson, Essex, Camden, and Middlesex County.

Really around the state.

Tis the season for the great turkey giveaways.

Politicians and others distributing holiday birds to folks in need.

I posted during the holiday that I think these are becoming terribly performative.

It is likely.

It is exploitive.

In many cases, it really serves to highlight the lack of help that poor and working-class people get the rest of the year.

When I was a kid, our family got this kind of help during the holidays, too.

We were grateful, but we never had to traverse a dozen TV cameras to get it.

I mean, distribute the turkeys to those in need, for sure, but maybe spare them having to do the poverty Perp walk for your political benefit.

And that is roundtable for this week.

Matt, Kenny, Brent, good to see you all.

Thank you to Julia Rubin.

You can follow the conversation on Twitter and find more content, including full episodes, when you scan the QR code on your screen.

I am David Cruz, from all the crew here at Gateway Center, thank you for watching.

We will see you next week.

>> Major funding for Reporters roundtable with David Cruz is provided by RWJBarnabas Health, let's be healthy together.

Rowan University, educating New Jersey leaders, partnering with New Jersey businesses, transforming your jerseys future.

Promotional support provided by the New Jersey business magazine, reporting to executive and legislative leaders in all 21 counties of the Garden State since 1954, and by politicos New Jersey playbook, topical newsletter on Garden State politics, online at Politico.com.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪