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[INSPRATIONAL MUSIC] - Hi everyone, Steve Adubato.

More importantly, we are honored to welcome Lieutenant Governor of the great state of New Jersey, Tahesha Way.

Now, Lieutenant Governor, thank you for joining us.

- Thanks for having me, Steve.

- You got it.

Explain to folks exactly what your role is as lieutenant governor.

But also, you're the Secretary of State?

- Yes, yes.

As lieutenant governor, of course, I work alongside our governor, Phil Murphy, second in command, and I'm here to further his agenda of stronger and fairer New Jersey.

Whenever he is unavailable, like by way of example, out of the state on business, that's when I will become acting governor.

But you did mention my cabinet position that I still hold since 2018 as New Jersey Secretary of State, serving as the Chief Election Officer among other portfolios, which buttress, if you will, our state's culture, arts, history, and business outreach.

- Let's talk about your role as Secretary of State, making sure the elections in the state are done the right way, et cetera, et cetera.

The graphic will come up.

It says 2024: Democracy in Danger, and I'll tell you why.

The question of election integrity and people trusting the results of elections matters.

When 70 to 80% of Republicans polled multiple polls believed that the 2020 election was not legitimate and that Joe Biden was not elected legitimately, and Donald Trump was, the election was stolen from him.

What the heck message does that send about people's faith in elections A and B?

Give people a reason to have, Ds, Rs, Independents, have more faith in elections, please.

- Well, that's an important question because election security for me and my team here in New Jersey is always top of mind.

And I can even think back through the pandemic, you mentioned 2020.

And I can honestly say that that was one of the most secure elections in our history.

So the way we approach election security is with the belief that we want our voters to have confidence in our electoral process.

We want that public trust.

And in doing so, that is why we have different approaches, if you will.

The first will always require us having a collaborative team approach, and that is extensive security training and workshops for our county and local election officers.

In fact, in 2019, we actually hosted a statewide tabletop exercise on election preparedness.

Steve, we had 14 out of state delegations.

We had our federal folk there and of course our own county and local election workers in which we just doubled down on election preparedness, emergency situations, just because you wanna make sure that there's integrity for our voters that they witness and see this and get educated upon this.

And that's why in 2024 next year we're actually going to host another statewide tabletop exercise.

Now, other partnerships that we have on a daily basis is with our state New Jersey Office of Homeland Security that shores up all of the infrastructure, if you will, from a cyber point.

We also partner with the state police, with the state attorney general's office.

And in fact, our Homeland Security and Preparedness office in my division of elections, we just established the election security task force, which includes all of these different layers of governmental partners and even some non-governmental organizations.

Just making certain that we remain proactive instead of reactive.

That we identify and mitigate any threats to our elections.

- I'm sorry for interrupting.

Does that also include the concerns about artificial intelligence influencing, impacting, affecting, infecting election results?

- Well, what I do know is on a national level, the Department of Homeland Security, they have a division called CISA.

Not the singer but the CISA.

- And it's an acronym for what?

- Yes, and they're really the ones who are in charge of overseeing the cyber threats nationally.

And they partner with our local, our state homeland security.

And of course everyone, these various, how can I say, enforcement and legal and just cyber homeland preparedness entities are laser focused on the AI too.

- Before I let you go, people wanna know who our lieutenant governor is by way of background.

Tell us about your family real quick.

- Okay, well, my husband and I, proud Passaic County residents.

He was a running back for the New York football Giants.

We have four daughters ranging from the ages of 26 to nine.

And our nine year old, along with our dog, our Maltese, they run the house and I think they run it well.

I was born in the Bronx, so while we're in the suburbs, I'm still a city girl.

- Right.

- And I am just so humbled and blessed to be part of Governor Murphy's administration.

- Real quick, I'm gonna take that back.

I do have a follow up real quick 'cause I know you're on a tight schedule.

We're doing a series called Reimagine Childcare, importance of childcare.

How high a priority for you, quality, affordable, accessible childcare?

- Oh, most definitely.

I am so, again, thankful to be part of an administration which understands the need for affordable and quality childcare.

This of course, is personal to me as a mom of four kids.

But recently, as we saw the governor announce 51.9 million in federal grant funding to expand 30 preschools.

Then I think it was last month, I had the privilege of announcing pre-K expansion in Cherry Hill with the additional 14,000 seats in the 195 districts as a whole.

So that's a good thing to be part of this because our kids are our future and we understand that the preschool years are the formative years and we wanna make sure that they excel on all fronts.

- Lieutenant Governor, we thank you for joining us.

Won't be the last time.

We look forward to having you again and best to you and your family.

- Likewise, thanks again for having me.

- You got it.

Stay with us, we'll be right back.

(grand music) - [Announcer] To watch more State of Affairs with Steve Adubato, find us online and follow us on social media.

- We're now joined by Julie Roginsky, Democratic Strategist and Principal at BARO Strategies, and Jeanette Hoffman, Republican Strategist, President, Marathon Public Affairs.

Good to see you.

- Great to see you guys.

- Both of you.

- Great to see you guys.

- Okay, let's do this.

Julie, the most significant - - Yeah.

- lesson taken from the November 7th legislative election, you said the Republicans would've won if they focused on affordability, taxes, economic issues, but they didn't, is that it?

- Well, also, they need to figure out how to do vote by mail, but, look, (Jeanette and Steve laughing) this was theirs for the taking.

Look, for the taking, and the thing is, Democrats can talk about a whole host of issues, as long as they talk about affordability a little bit.

Republicans have to, they must focus on affordability every single cycle in the last, I mean, in my memory.

Democrats have lost because Republicans have laser-focused on affordability, and for some reason, Republicans decided not to do that this time, they went off on a whole tangent about parental rights, and other social issues.

That never works for Republicans in New Jersey, and so that's why they lost.

- Jeanette, why did your team lose seats?

- Well, I think we were a little bit overconfident going into the 2023 election, because we did so well in 2021.

We picked up seven seats and we lost them.

(Jeanette laughing) We know about that.

But, you know, we Republicans do so well on taxes and affordability and the economy, it was almost like, "Yeah, we got that," and we started talking about parental rights, because, you know, who doesn't care about parental rights?

That should have been a secondary issue, right, because not everybody who votes in a low turnout year is a parent, seniors vote.

They don't necessarily care about that, it's important, but also Republicans have to get it down, vote by mail, early voting.

Democrats have done a great job in low turnout elections of getting Democrats who vote in presidential years and gubernatorial years to also vote in off-years, by just doing the mail-in ballots, doing the vote by mail.

Republicans haven't gotten that down, and if they don't get it down, they're gonna lose every low turnout election, so we gotta get that down.

- Julie, talk about the issue of abortion, how it played out?

We had so many Republican legislators on, and John DiMaio, State Assemblyman, Head of the Minority Party in the lower house, and he said, "Steve, why are you even asking me that?

It's a non-issue.

We didn't have the votes for it anyway," but then he said, "I said, but if you won the majority in both houses, you would you want to change the law in New Jersey so that women could not have an abortion in the ninth month?

He said, "Yeah, of course, we don't have the votes."

Meaning, was abortion an issue?

And if so, how did it play out in the election?

- Well, I'll tell you where it really was an issue, down in district 3, which was probably the, not probably, definitely the biggest Republican... - Southern part of the state.

- Southern part of the state, Ed Durr, state senator who beat Steve Sweeney two years ago.

That election was largely about abortion.

- Ed Durr, the so-called trucker who beat Sweeney, lost his seat to John Burzichelli in the Senate.

Why, like without getting too inside, how's that related to abortion?

- Well, because that race was all about abortion, because Democrats made that race all about abortion.

The day that Ed Durr said on Facebook, well before he got elected, that women, you know, "They don't want an abortion, they should keep their legs closed."

You should have seen the reaction in focus groups, even among Republican men, when Ed Durr, when that quote was read.

Ed Durr liked a post where he said, you know, "Women, if they get an abortion, should be spayed or neutered like dogs, right?"

That becomes about abortion and the problem is that not only does that become about abortion, but it tags other Republicans with that moniker, because none of them came out, I mean, for the large part, none of them came out against him.

I get there's this whole brotherhood in the state senate.

You can't go after fellow senators, but they should have.

They should have.

And by not doing that, they really allowed Democrats to paint, not just Ed Durr, but the rest of them with the Ed Durr brush.

- Why not just say, "Listen, we don't agree with him on that, we thought he was wrong."

Like, where's the brother, sister?

What's that all about?

Why not just say, "This is where I think?"

- I don't know, Steve, it was unfortunate.

I'm a woman, I'm a Republican.

I can't support that, I can't get behind that.

You know, but he basically said, "Women have a choice.

They can keep their legs closed."

It was disgusting.

He was primaried.

Unfortunately, the woman who primaried him lost in the Republican primary.

This was a seat that Joe Biden lost by 16 points.

It should have been Republican seat.

I mean, it's really unfortunate that Republicans couldn't get their act together in district 3.

And this was basically a preventable loss by Republicans in that seat.

- From your perspective, Julie, when I asked the question of every Republican legislator member of Congress, "Was the 2020 election won legitimately by Joe Biden?"

I get different answers.

70 to 80% of Republicans argue that the election was stolen.

Does that have anything to do with every election moving forward in terms of election integrity, democracy in danger, you'll see the graphic up with the...

Larger question is, how much of that a problem is that for Republicans who just don't say, "Yeah, we trust the election."

- It's a problem for all of us.

Because what it does is it allows authoritarianism to be on the rise.

Look at the stuff that's been coming out of the former president's mouth over the last month or so.

I mean, more and more fascistic kind of, I mean, literally, fascistic kind of rhetoric, very reminiscent of what Mussolini and Hitler said.

I mean, his spokesman said, "Anybody who accuses him of being a fascist will be ground into the ground like vermin," I mean... - That was language used by Hitler.

- Yeah, I mean, this is like straight out of "Mein Kampf."

This is insane.

And so I say that because this is a problem for all of us.

I don't care if you're a Republican or a Democrat, if you believe in democracy and you believe in the rule of law, this kind of rhetoric is unhelpful.

And the fact that there is a large swath, and this is not Jeanette, so please, I'm not painting everybody with this, but there's a large swath of the Republican party that not only endorses this, but despite the fact that they know better, they actually won't say a word against it.

And by allowing it to proliferate, by allowing Donald Trump to become the nominee, which I suspect, unless something major happens, he will be.

By lining up behind him, they're effectively endorsing this kind of rhetoric and the end to democracy.

That's a problem not just for Republicans, it's a problem for the country.

It's a problem for the world.

And, it's a tragedy actually.

- Jeanette, where is the place for moderate Republicans who don't buy into any of this crap, this garbage, excuse me, we're on public television.

I shouldn't have said that, go ahead.

(Jeanette laughing) - Well, I think there's a place for moderate Republicans, especially in New Jersey.

Listen, I always say, New Jersey's not a red state, it's not a blue state, it's a purple state.

We like our Republicans moderate, we don't like extremists, we don't like extremist Democrats either.

So, we talk about what's gonna happen in 2025, who's gonna be the next governor?

I think there is a place for moderate Republicans.

Unfortunately, we do have this whole thing called a primary.

And it's hard for moderate Republicans to win a primary for the exact reason that Julie talked about, because there was this whole party that's beholden to the Trump, to the extremists, to people who are election deniers.

So it's very hard for someone like Jack Ciattarelli or Jon Bramnick to run in a primary and say that, you know, "The 2020 election was not stolen.

It was legitimate, and Joe Biden won."

So it's gonna be a very difficult road in the next couple of years, I'm afraid.

- And for the Democrats, Julie, Joe Biden, 86 on the back end of a second term, if he wins, vast majority of Democrats and those in the nation, say "Uh-uh, can't do the job."

Is this the best the Democrats can do?

- Listen, I am maybe in the minority of Democrats.

I think Joe Biden's been the most successful first-term president that we've had, at least in my lifetime.

I mean, look at all... - Well, what about a second term, cognitively and otherwise?

- If he could keep it up, I'm all for it.

The problem is - If... - you have a Republican running against him who thinks Barack Obama's in the White House right now.

I would put up anybody's mental health against Donald Trump's.

So, I'd love to have that debate.

- Well, the problem is - - Jeanette.

- 70, 71% of Americans in battleground states, according to the New York Times/Siena poll, think Joe Biden doesn't have the cognitive abilities and he's too old, and it's gonna be a problem for Joe Biden running for the next term.

So, you know, listen, as a Republican, I would like to see Joe Biden run.

I, you know... - How about for the nation, Jeanette?

How about for the nation?

- Yeah, I think it's a problem.

I don't, you know, I don't like Bidenomics.

I don't think the economy's great.

I think inflation's too high.

I think mortgage rates are too high.

I don't like what I'm seeing in the stock market right now.

I'd like to see an alternative to Joe Biden.

I'd like to see an alternative to Donald Trump.

I think Nikki Haley would be a great candidate for president.

Her poll numbers are nowhere near what Donald Trump's are in the Republican primary right now.

That being said, I think it's a long road now until the, you know, the presidential election.

So I'm a little bit optimistic, but it's a long road ahead.

- I will just say this.

Record unemployment... - Two seconds, go ahead.

- Record low unemployment and there's no growth in inflation in the last month.

So I think the economy is actually doing really well.

Problem is, problem is that Democrats have a messaging problem, as I've said all along, and they need to get a handle on it and be able to communicate better about the accomplishments of this administration.

To Jeanette, to Julie, I wanna thank you for joining us.

We appreciate it.

- Thanks, Steve.

- Good stuff, stay with us, we'll be right back.

(grand music) - [Announcer] To watch more State of Affairs with Steve Adubato, find us online and follow us on social media.

- We're now joined by Assemblyman John DiMaio, who's the assembly minority leader.

Good to see you, Assemblyman.

- Good to see you too, Steve.

- We're taping this on the back end of November 2023, Republicans lost several seats in the senate, more seats in the assembly, heavy focus on a variety of so-called culture war issues.

How much did quote "the abortion issue" hurt Republicans in this legislative election, their position on abortion?

- Well, you know, Steve, it wasn't an issue for us, but apparently that's some way to motivate their voters or somehow scare them to vote.

- "Their" meaning?

"Their" meaning?

- The Democrat voters, because obviously it must have worked to some degree.

Listen, we called it a non-issue, frankly, because there's a 1982 supreme court ruling that, a New Jersey Supreme Court ruling, that says that anyone could do what they want with their body, including an abortion.

So it's not really an issue in New Jersey, but they were effective in making it an issue.

- But, Assemblyman, isn't it true that if Republicans had gained control of the Assembly and/or the Senate there are some of your colleagues, you may be one of them who said, "You know what?

We don't like the current law in New Jersey that a woman can have an abortion in the ninth month.

We want to change that."

Do I have that wrong?

- Well, listen, I have my own beliefs, but I also pretty good at math.

I can say that there would not be adequate Republican votes unless the Democrats had something in mind that they were gonna provide votes to put it all together.

- But you wanted to do that.

- I never said I wanted to do it.

- Would you wanna change the New Jersey law that currently allows for a woman to have an abortion in the ninth month?

If you were in control, if the Republicans had control of both houses, if you were able to get it on the ballot, excuse me, on the docket to vote on, would you want to change the current New Jersey law regarding a woman's right to an abortion?

- It's impractical, but let me say this, would I like to see fully developed babies?

Of course.

But there are limits.

There would be exceptions, frankly.

I mean, the health of the mom would be number one, rape, incest, maybe, you know, others.

The reality is it is pretty rough to think about a full-term baby being taken out of the womb and destroyed very late in pregnancy.

And I think there's a lot of people, including pro-choice people, I think that they took advantage of this issue.

It's difficult for us to enumerate it during a campaign, apparently, because it wasn't in mind because it wasn't an attainable goal.

It still isn't.

And even something changed, the state supreme court ruling from 1982 would still uphold it.

So therefore, what's for us to do unless they want to get together to somehow do some constitutional amendment on the issue.

And that would take Democratic votes to do.

- Sure.

Let me ask you this, Assemblyman, every time you've joined us, you're always upfront, you never duck any question.

So this is an interesting one because it's not a state issue per se, but it's a legitimate issue.

We do a series called "Democracy in Danger."

The graphic will come up.

I've asked virtually every Republican who's been on, I'm gonna ask you again, questioning the results of an election, the peaceful transition of power in the presidency or the governorship or whatever, 'cause there's a governorship election in 2025, and the legislature is up, many seats in the legislature.

Do you believe that Joe Biden legitimately won the 2020 election and that Donald Trump, the leader of Republican Party, lost?

- I believe that the election results reflected the people's votes, so yes.

- So this quote, "stop the steal" and that the election was stolen, you don't buy into?

- I can't see how that many votes were stolen.

It just doesn't make sense.

Again, I'm pretty good at math.

- Yeah, you are.

- The reality is, if I win, I win.

If I lose, I have less votes unless it's very close and there's something that, mistakes made.

But that's a lot of mistakes.

- But Assemblyman, this is a symbolic and an important issue as well related to democracy, related to who people are and what they believe in.

In a recent... As we do this program, Chris Christie's still in the presidential race, we don't know what's gonna happen moving forward, but in an early Republican debate for the presidency, every candidate was asked if Donald Trump were in court and convicted of a crime, would you still support him?

Everyone but Chris Christie said they absolutely would.

Would you?

- You know, as a personal opinion, you know, the reality is that would be difficult to do.

- So you would, you're good at math.

You're also good at saying what you believe.

Would you support Donald Trump to be the nominee of your party if he were convicted in one of these four or five cases going on right now?

- I honestly can't tell you at this point in time, but, you know, the reality is that's a bad situation to be in, so we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.

- Got it.

Let's come back home.

Talk about the Orsted deal.

Orsted pulls out, wind energy, the governor's Clean Energy plan.

Huge question mark as to what's gonna happen moving forward.

What is the significance, from your view, Assemblyman, of Orsted pulling out of the wind energy program in New Jersey and in other states across the nation for the Murphy Clean Energy Plan?

- Well, first of all, the governor's energy master plan is far too aggressive.

You know, it's kind of like they do jump feet first into some issues without really thinking them through and getting a longer, broader view of a lot of things, including spending increases, they come back and cut taxes later, after they raise them to try, I don't know what that act is, we shouldn't be doing in the first place.

This is an impractical plan, what he's talking about.

I think Orsted pulling out for whatever reason that it was a business decision, it's just a symptom of the overall problem.

And the problem is, this is a rush process.

This is not gonna happen in 12 years.

God, the lines along the roads in front of your house, the gauge of that wiring is not heavy enough to carry the additional load of electric if you're gonna fully electrify all the houses in New Jersey.

So there's so many other issues that need to happen before these things, like alternative and more development of electric.

You know, there's other methods too.

Nuclear is out there.

It's been safe in South Jersey since the mid-70s, for God's sake.

So they need to step back, think this through, and come up with more deliberate, long-term over several decades.

It's not gonna happen in 12 years.

- Assemblyman, make it clear for us what your point of view is on so-called quote, "parental rights" as it relates to children in the fourth, fifth, sixth grade.

What parents can know, must know, and what should be kept from parents in what kind of cases?

Complex question, I know.

Please.

- Nothing should be kept from parents.

I mean, this governor operates under a presumption that all parents are somehow gonna abuse their children if they come to them or find out that they're going through a difficult emotional time or dealing with a question about anything in their lives.

So for the governor to think that all parents are gonna somehow beat their child or do something... - But the governor never said that.

He said...

I believe the policy is if school officials believe that the child is at risk, who may be talking about a potential gender change, then they're less likely to want to talk to the parents.

Not that every parent would do that.

Is that... - Well, first... (speech overlapping) But, he in general terms, he has said that I'm not outing kids to their parents and putting them in a bad situation.

And that's his quote.

And I've heard that quote many times before.

The reality is, listen, there's no one better to nurture a child.

I know how I would react to this.

Listen, I would help my child.

I would get therapy.

I would get my child to be an adult, and then if they choose, eyes wide open, as a mature adult, passed all of the emotional things we all went through, we all grew up, we all went through those times when hormones were wild and ideas, you know, who knows?

You know, but we survived it.

- But parents should know everything.

- But I don't like the idea of government stepping in, Steve and taking control of my child's body.

I mean, it's just not right.

- You made yourself very clear.

State Assemblyman John DiMaio, who is the minority leader in the Senate, excuse me, in the Assembly.

Assemblyman, thank you so much for joining us.

We appreciate it.

- Thanks, Steve.

- I'm Steve Adubato.

More importantly, that's the assemblyman.

We'll see you next time.

- [Narrator] State of Affairs with Steve Adubato Is a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

Funding has been provided by RWJBarnabas Health.

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