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♪ David: A new FDU poll finds there are front runners in the governor's race.

Sort of.

Hey, everybody.

It is "Reporters Roundtable."

I'm David Cruise.

Our panel is with us, including a health care writer for NJ Spotlight News.

A reporter from the Associated Press and a reporter from Politico and author of "the New Jersey playbook."

Let's discuss this FDU poll out this week with the Executive Director of the FDU poll, who joins us now.

Good to see you again.

Dan: Thank you for having me.

David: Two holes out this week.

Dan: three polls actually.

We just put one out about issues besides the governor's race.

David: On the governor race polls, what were you measuring exactly?

Dan: We were measuring name recognition and favorability, and that is controversial because most of the time people are looking for a vote of all, who will people actually vote for?

I don't feel comfortable putting those numbers out right now.

We have not had a competitive primary election statewide like this in New Jersey, in decades.

We have had this competition, so we don't have a good way to build up a likely voter model.

I know there are campaigns out there that think they can do it, but we know that turnout will be higher for the primaries, but we really have no idea that there will be 20% or 40%.

If that turnout is low, that means those -- I we have no idea what it will look like.

David: So you are trying to figure out name recognition and favorability at this point whatever many months away from the primary?

Dan: Yeah, three months out from the primary.

The argument is that name recognition is a good measure of how good a job candidate has done and getting their name out to the people who might vote for them.

So we know the name recognition among the voters of your party, we have a good idea of what the ceiling is of your approval among that party.

If you then take a look at favorability and how many people like the party or dislike the party, that lets you know have you actually done a good job in selling yourself to that?

There is a wide various on how well they have done that with the Republican and Democratic side.

David: An interesting poll.

Let's talk Democrats first, six candidates on that side.

I saw a headline that said the polls showed three candidates who were separating themselves from the rest of the pack, the mayor of Newark, New Jersey city Mayor, and Representative McEachin are old.

Is that accurate?

-- Mikey Cheryl.

Is that accurate?

Dan: You could make the case that Scott Gottheimer could be in that group, as well.

But if you look at favorability-favorability, it is really above everyone else in that pack, and is surprising.

Some people are surprised at who was up there.

It is surprising that Steve is doing as well as he is.

He seems to be challenging the left wing of the Democratic Party, and they are doing it from different angles.

Ras Baraka is pushing policy positions and Steve is pushing antidemocratic establishment, running against the party, especially parts that are upset about last year with the attempted nomination of Tammy Murphy.

David: So Ras Baraka's showing didn't surprise you?

Dan: We knew he would do well among progressive voters.

People are surprised by how popular he has been among progressive voters.

In the Democratic Party, like the Republican Party, the energy party is on the extremes of the party right now.

Progressives are where the energy of the Democratic Party is.

A lot of the candidates are trying to be more centrist, and there is a hunger for of her aggressive and liberal policy position.

David: Anything here surprising?

Dan: I'm not terribly surprised by Ras Baraka's high name recognition.

He's Mayor of the largest city in the state for a long time, but his unfavorable's are a little troubling.

He's in the league right now, but he has unfavorable's 15% among his own voters, and that is damaging if you go into a general election.

People know who you are, and not liking you.

And there is still a lot of time.

These candidates, some of them still really have not gone up with their as yet, so there are three months to try to convince voters.

The problem is so people are so focused on politics, I'm not sure how much they will be able to get.

David: What about the rest of the field on the Democratic side ?

Anybody show anything?

Dan: We have got Sean Spiller and actually have a suspicion that that is hurting him a little bit, so he ran an experiment where have the response is for the Democratic mayor of Don -- of Montclair, and it is six points worse on unfavorable and has higher name recognition, so it seems like some voters, especially for moderate centrist voters are turned off, and we also have Stephen there, and he is by far the most experienced candidate in the race.

He should be cleaning up in South Jersey, and it is just the work outlook for him.

He has made too many deals of the year, and a lot of his unfavorable numbers are almost as high as his favorable numbers among most groups.

And then we have Scott Gottheimer, expecting to challenge the centrist Lane.

His numbers are not there yet.

Is not favorable's are much lower than the top three, but he also has resources and could turn that around.

David: Lots of resources all over the place.

Sean Spiller has got some money.

Dan: Absolutely.

David: On the GOP side, there was in front?

Dan: The GOP race is a lot more low-key right now.

Jack cheerily has twice the name recognition and favorability of any of the other candidates.

The only really sign that this could be a problem for him as PA is unfavorable among -- problem for him as he is unfavorable among MAGA voters, and among them, he is having high unfavorable's, with the idea that he is not sufficiently pro-Trump.

Although he has high name recognition, which you would expect after running a radio show for so long, his numbers of people who say, I know who he is, but that opinion is much higher.

About 4% of people say I know about him but I have no idea if I like him or not, so that gives a lot of room to grow, but he needs to get out there with ads and mailers and all that if you would like to challenge Jack.

I'm not sure if they just are not covering the Republican race as much, but this is an expensive place to get your name out there.

David: What did we learn about John Bramnick if anything?

Dan: He should really be taking of the centrist Lane in the Republican Party.

Number one, his name recognition is still really low.

He is down there in terms of name recognition, which is unfair, that people just don't know who he is.

He's not tied into the far right media environment the same way we saw other candidates might be.

In addition, his favorability among the MAGA voters is not great.

If the party was turned to nominate more centrist, he would be a leading contender but he has to make the case.

It is also not clear if there are enough centrist voters left in the Republican Party or the primary electorate to push them over the finish line.

David: Big mountain to climb.

Tell me about this third poll.

Busy week.

Dan: We actually pulled on some issues.

So we polled about the governor said he would like a cell phone ban in schools.

We asked about that, and essentially it is tightly split.

Voters like a cell phone ban by a five point margin.

What's interesting about that it is based on age per young voters say, no way, don't ban them, and older voters say, get them out of here.

We also asked about limits on advertising of gambling.

Every other ad is for a gambling site when you watch TV in New Jersey.

Especially the problems you have with gambling addiction for young people especially, it seems echo reasonable thing to do.

And more than 70% of voters for New Jersey say we should limit ads for gambling, especially if they might be targeting children.

David: Interesting stuff.

The Executive Director director of the FDU poll, thank you.

Good to see you again.

Dan: I pleasure.

David: Dan: -- my pleasure.

David: Matt, you had an item on this FDU poll in the playbook this week.

What is your take on this?

Matt: The Democrats not surprising.

If you have seen the convention so far, you can see that Ras Baraka really has an appeal to the Democratic base.

You can see that Mikey Cheryl is holding a lead but certainly not a super solid one.

And not in a weak position either.

And it is somewhat surprising that Philip has broken out of the pack, which is not totally surprising because he has taken the left lane of the primary.

Steve Sweeney not surprising pretty with Senate President for 12 years.

He is close to Chris Christie, and if you read his proposals, they are a little serious and wonky, which is interesting for the one guy, but on the Republican side, I'm a little surprised by first of all you talk about John Bramlett, he is not hated, mainly because nobody knows who he is, despite him being in the legislature forever.

And I think it is interesting that you could have a radio show for 10 years and still people don't know a lot about you, which shows you how much those powerful media like the radio's, just like a lot of other media used to be.

I think what this shows on the Republican side is Chatterley's in the lead because he has name recognition.

Trump could have the primary with this.

David: Is it wrong to compare Mikey Cheryl's campaign to the Murphy campaign of last year?

The Senate campaign.

Matt: Yeah, I would not go that far because the Tammy Murphy thing was so -- everyone was sick of the whole line thing, Bob Menendez was like, he was kept by the political bosses after his last horrible mistrial, which was still like this is not just a guy, but you had the entire regime coalesced around him, and people were like, why should we listen to and why are you forcing Tammy Murphy on this?

It is not comparable because she does not inspire the same kind of really, I mean, just the left could not stand Tammy Murphy.

They could not stand the presumption that was felt forced upon them.

I think a lot of people that I hear from are frustrated with her for not having nuclear message a lot.

This is a joke, she might as well have not said anything at all on Norcross, like Ras Baraka and other candidates.

But it is not a Tammy Murphy situation.

David: Dan Casino said he was surprised at how well Philip did .

He was the first one in the ring.

Does it look like it is pain for him?

Mike: You can get in the field and iron out the message in your speech, you know what it is like to get a sense of the questions you get from the media.

You get a sense of where activists and the party are, so all of that I would think is learning and figuring out the dynamics of the race.

And you have the field to yourself for a while.

Clearly I think what we saw from Steve Fulop was by doing that, it would give him a runway and time before people got in.

I think you could make the case that there is a connection between getting an early and the favorables in this poll.

David: And it helps that he is a substantive candidate putting out a lot of position papers and stuff like that.

It is all he got out early to do anything after that.

He got the college Dems endorsement, does that matter?

Mike: I cannot say, but the one thing, I mean, the endorsements, at a certain point, the endorsements or something to point to.

There are people, a coalescing of support on my sides, whether they make a big difference or not.

It is a certain kind of showing.

David: We have seen position papers on housing, the economy, transportation.

We have educators, pilots, and speechwriters running.

No one from health care.

Is anyone emerging as a health care candidate?

Because that issue hits home with a lot of people.

Lilo: I had to do a little digging because nobody jumps out, and I know the Democratic side to be clear.

John Bramlett -- branding has fought against insurance companies to improve care.

Steve Sweeney has done a lot around health insurance.

You know, Mikey Cheryl and Josh Gottheimer are taking positions on things like IVF and reproductive health, but I think, you know, Ras Baraka has historically spoken up for underserved populations when it comes to health care and access to care.

He has been a firm voice in support of University Hospital.

He has now been some work around trying to address hospital pricing and the cost of care.

I mean, you know, to be fair I have not ran all of the position papers, but I would say that I am encouraged that people are thinking about things from this policy standpoint, whether that is enough, whether that is >> bait -- whether that is click bait or sexy enough to drive voters to the polls, I suspect maybe not as much as I would like, but it is nice to see some folks digging in a little bit.

David: The speech, the knot state of the Union address to joint session of Congress -- the not state of the Union address to joint session of Congress.

The state Republican chairman was on "Chat Box" and said 76% of those who watched this speech loved it.

Did you watch, and what was your impression?

Mike: I actually do not watch, but I heard more about the interruption from Democratic Representative Al Green of Texas, who is escorted out of the chamber by the Sergeant in arms, pointing his cane at the president.

He said afterwards that the president talked about having a mandate, and he would not sign a mandate for cutting Medicaid.

The other thing I saw reaction to was what you saw now, which is the Democrats holding the paddleboard signs, and what I read was pretty sharp criticism of the sign.

People were saying that it may Democrats look like they did not have much to argue with just these little signs.

Lilo: I do not watch the speech either, but -- I watched the feedback on social media.

But I would say I was just amazed at how much the focus has become a Medicaid.

Some would argue, you know, it is terrifying for a lot of people because we are talking about budget cuts largely, but it is also kind of exciting as someone who covers this that the focus is for once on this really critical lifeline program that New Jersey pays for 60% of nursing home care, almost 40% of births, I mean, this is a big, important program, nearly one third of New Jersey's budget.

It is a huge amount of federal dollars.

It kind of reminds me of when the Affordable Care Act was in play.

And it was like all of a sudden health care was a headline.

I like to think something good becomes of this, this focus, but that is sort of probably a Pollyanna-ish approach at this point.

David: Your sense from what you heard of the speech, is it your sense that Medicaid is more or less likely to get the axe or get a chopping?

Lilo: There is an inflection point right now because you have all kinds of Republicans, including Jeff Andrew and others from New Jersey who have said we are not going to cut Medicaid.

And that we have a report from the Congressional budget office, nonpartisan analysis, that says in a nutshell, you cannot do these cuts that President Trump is asking for.

You cannot find this money without cutting it and without cutting it significantly.

So, you know, how those two sides -- what becomes of this debate is going to be interesting because, you know, everybody who says we will do it through waste, fraud and abuse, there are plenty of studies that show there is some waste, fraud, and abuse, and there are probably red crumbs leading to it thanks to all the studies, but it is not going to add up to that much.

It does not save like, what we're talking about here are things like do adults in New Jersey get dental care?

Do we kickoff all adults who don't have kids?

Does everybody who earns over 200% of the poverty line, which in New Jersey is a joke just not have access to health care?

Those are the kinds of decisions we would be forced to make a New Jersey if this is affected.

It is a big deal.

It is a big deal.

David: Matt, you also said Trump gives a great speech.

You watch, and what was your impression?

Matt: None of us watch the speech?

Here's the deal, I finish my work right around when the speech was starting, I don't want to for can watch a two hour speech after I was working 12 hours.

Lilo: Amen to that.

Matt: Of course, I caught the reaction, and the news out of the speech was really how Democrats don't have an important message, and the Al Green thing.

David: Nothing stuck with you.

Matt: No, but when you say 78% of the people who watched approved of it, well, you kind of have a self-selected group there.

David: For sure.

Matt: With the Trump stuff, tell yourself too closely with this man at your own peril.

We have had multiple instances now where he has clearly dropped to the polls, but when he's not on the ballot, the backlash to him overpowers the support.

David: So the governor signed the ballot design build to the satisfaction of most Democratic lawmakers, but to the consternation of the rest of the political nonprofit industrial complex, what is the big objection there?

Matt: Well, it is more of a suspicion that the Democrats are trying to create this situation where certain clerks can form something assembling a line through the office block system.

They will never get to what it was with the idea of numbering balance.

Vote one a, two B, stuff like that, putting the names on the ballot.

And there clearly is an effort by democratic machines here to give themselves as much of an advantage as they think they can within it, and it is kind of like, do you really need numbering?

I think the complaint is, why can I just have office ballots, why do you need anything else?

It is pretty simple.

You don't need these little sheets.

That is their position on this.

David: And the argument that that clarifies things from voters is a bit of a joke.

Matt: I don't know if it will be successful.

Just put the names in the box.

That's all you need to do.

David: Running out of time, this month marks five years since COVID hit New Jersey.

So many things have changed, both on the practical level, but also in the culture.

Reflections from any of you question mark -- for many of you?

Lilo: I have a story coming on Monday about this.

In a nutshell, we have taken steps as a state in particular to understand pandemic response and do better next time.

I will not go into details, but there are some plans and there is a task force, but, overwhelmingly, the response was we have not done enough we have not solved the workforce crisis, which became a huge issue in public health and stuff like caregiving, nursing homes, elsewhere, hospitals.

And we have not funded a public health.

When you combine that with the situation of federal government where we have a vaccine skeptic running health system and a lack of cutting funds for these types of services -- David: Let me stop you there health care rider -- health care writer.

Mike, you will have the last word as we run out of time.

Mike: One thing I thought about where the lasting and your euro effects on the budgets from COVID.

There was the effect on money, there was the loan the government took out, New Jersey was flushed for a few years.

And now the economy seems confused at the moment, the change over at the White House seems to be the complaint, and New Jersey's budget is a little tighter.

They talk about raising about $1 million through various fees and tax increases.

We are still sort of living with the fallen the effects of COVID on the budget it seems like.

David: And Matt moved to Arizona.

That is roundtable for this week.

Good to see you all.

Thank you.

Thank you to Dan Cassino for joining us.

Find out what the rest of the new steam is up to by subscribing to the NJ Spotlight News YouTube channel.

For all the crew here at Gateway Center in downtown, I am David Cruz.

thank you for watching.

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 New jersey's future.

♪