New Jersey
Tammy Murphy is the Senate frontrunner. Now, NJ needs these questions answered | Kelly
4-minute read
NJ First Lady Tammy Murphy speaks at rally in Montclair
A rally was held outside of the Montclair Planned Parenthood on Tuesday in protest of draft of Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade.
Amy Newman, NorthJersey.com
A much needed political freshness ripples through the recent announcement of the new U.S. Senate candidacy of Tammy Murphy, the wife of New Jersey’s Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy.
Tammy Murphy has never held office before. She’s a rookie. She’s not just another political hack who was forced to labor in the backrooms of party politics, laughing at all the bad jokes, eating all the slices of cold pizza and putting up with the bloated egos would-be power brokers. Hence, the freshness.
She’s 58, a former Goldman Sachs banker who happens to be chair of the women’s professional soccer team, NJ/Ny Gotham FC. If elected, she says she wants to focus on issues involving women and children.
But another, very different and, frankly, disturbing feeling about this quixotic candidacy needs to be addressed, too. This is a sense of cynical entitlement that also frames Tammy Murphy’s entrance into elective politics.
She’s rich, the wife of a very wealthy governor who made his own entrance into elective politics largely because he happened to have a hefty checkbook, bolstered by his own success on Wall Street.
With her husband as governor, Tammy Murphy hung around the Statehouse in Trenton for several years and was even given an office there. Now that she wants a big prize — a U.S. Senate seat, no less — a major reason Democrats are taking her seriously is that she has a massive bank account and that her husband is the governor.
This circle game of rich people buying elective office ought to be deeply worrisome for any democracy that wants to remain open to newcomers. But New Jersey’s Democrats barely whimper in public about this seemingly upsetting trend. No one asks how a rookie with no money but plenty of good ideas can get ahead in politics. The first question for any up-and-coming political figure is this: How much money can you raise?
In New Jersey politics, money talks. No one really seems to mind.
What about Bob?
This brings us to the incumbent and indicted U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez, the veteran Democrat that Tammy Murphy wants to replace. You can hardly blame Menendez, a veteran of numerous political wars, for now voicing his own concerns about Tammy Murphy.
Menendez’s term ends next year. He’s also facing (again) a series of federal corruption charges that he conspired to use his senatorial influence to collect hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of cash and gifts for doling out favors. One of the federal charges accuses Menendez of acting as a “foreign agent” on behalf of Egypt and even passing along sensitive information Egyptian officials.
That’s not a good political brand for Menendez. To say that he is politically vulnerable right now is an understatement.
Certainly, Menendez has much explaining to do if he wants to remain in office. His federal trial is scheduled to begin next May 6, a month before the Democratic primary. The debates before that primary — if debates take place — will surely be must-see TV in New Jersey, not to mention for the national Democratic party which is deeply worried about retaining its majority in Senate.
Here in New Jersey, voters are already running from Menendez as if he has been afflicted with a deadly, contagious virus. In September, soon after federal prosecutors announced that Menendez had been indicted, a poll conducted by a Democratic political action committee found that his approval rating had slipped to just 8% with nearly three of every four respondents saying they disapproved of him.
That’s not good news if you are planning to run for re-election in the coming year — with a primary less than seven months away. But what angers Menendez now is how Gov. Phil Murphy reacted to the news that New Jersey’s senior senator was facing serious charges.
Investigation: This cast of characters has been linked to the Sen. Menendez investigation
The ink of the federal indictment was barely dry before Gov. Phil Murphy called on Menendez to resign. That’s unusual. Party loyalists tend to stick together. And for a Democratic governor to step into the spotlight and call on a longtime Democratic senator to quit is major news.
Soon after Murphy made his move, a stream of Democratic party officials — including many New Jersey county bosses — said Menendez should step down.
And then a creepy rumor surfaced — that Tammy Murphy was thinking of running for Menendez’s senate seat.
Was Gov. Murphy influenced?
Was Murphy’s quick call for Menendez to resign influenced by his wife’s desire to run for office?
The governor did not say. But now that Tammy Murphy has officially announced her senate candidacy, it’s worth returning to that issue and asking if her husband was trying to use his influence weeks ago to essentially clear the field and urge the state county Democratic bosses to turn their backs on Menendez.
Certainly that’s the question Menendez raised soon after Tammy Murphy officially jumped into the senate race.
“When Phil Murphy rushed to judgement and called on me to resign, it was clear he had a personal, vested interest in doing so at the expense of core democratic principles — the presumption of innocence and due process,” Menendez said in a statement. With his words dripping with contempt, Memendez added that the Murphys “believe they have to answer to nobody.”
Menendez is the equivalent of a wounded duck right now. He can’t fly. And flapping his political wings seems futile and pathetic. But Menendez has a point about Phil and Tammy Murphy.
Yes, the allegations against Menendez are troublesome — deeply so. So is Menendez’s seemingly clueless habit of accepting freebies from people who ask favors of him. This was the problem that brought down another talented U.S. senator, Robert Torricelli. You would think Menendez, a smart guy, would learn from history.
But when it comes to being charged with a crime, Menendez, like anyone, is innocent until proven guilty. In fairness, that much needs to be said.
Most of Menendez’s fellow Democrats in the U.S. Senate have called on him to resign. Menendez gave up his chairmanship of the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee. As he stubbornly clings his Senate seat amid the disturbing allegation that he conspired with Egyptian officials, his Senate colleagues have asked him to stay away classified briefings that American intelligence officials routinely offer to Senators.
But Gov. Phil Murphy’s involvement in this political soap opera is an entirely different matter. Simply put: if the governor takes the unusual step of calling on a U.S. Senator to resign, the governor’s hands ought to be clean.
Gov. Phil Murphy may turn out to be right in turning his back on Menendez. But if Murphy’s motivation was to boost his wife’s candidacy, his hands are dirty.
New Jersey needs to know Tammy Murphy
Meanwhile, Tammy Murphy says she wants to devote her efforts to helping women and children if she wins a Senate seat. That’s laudable. Having a woman’s voice from New Jersey in the Senate and speaking on behalf of kids and women would certainly be a plus.
But New Jersey barely knows Tammy Murphy. It’s not as if she served in a variety of other elected offices. In fact, for many years, she was a registered Republican. And, while her husband clearly positioned himself as a major Democratic fund raiser as early as 2006, the New York Times found election records indicating that Tammy continued to vote in Republican primaries as late as 2014.
This embarrassing revelation has already prompted the pugilistic Menendez to label Tammy Murphy as a “card-carrying Republican for years.”
The message from Menendez was clear: Welcome to the circus, Tammy. The lions will soon emerge from their cages. So will the tigers and monkeys — and the clowns.
Yes, Tammy Murphy’s candidacy seems fresh. It’s hardly unprecedented to have a new, inexperienced face in New Jersey politics. Remember Bill Bradley? He left his New York Knicks basketball career for another storied career in the U.S. Senate.
In some ways, even Phil Murphy was yet another untested candidate when he ran for governor. He had been the American ambassador to Germany and had performed well as the Democratic National Committee’s finance chairman. But policy? In Trenton? Murphy’s resume was thin.
The same can be said of Tammy Murphy.
She may turn out to be another Bill Bradley, a newcomer with little political experience who became a respected voice in the U.S. Senate. But her candidacy right now is tainted.
She needs to face that. So does her husband.
Mike Kelly is an award-winning columnist for NorthJersey.com, part of the USA TODAY Network, as well as the author of three critically acclaimed nonfiction books and a podcast and documentary film producer. To get unlimited access to his insightful thoughts on how we live life in the Northeast, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.
Email: kellym@northjersey.com
New Jersey
A Modest Theory About Those Drones Over New Jersey
The welter of stories about unidentified drones over New York and New Jersey multiply, as do the myriad speculations. Thus far the narratives fall into three categories: private drones, those deployed by hostile foreign actors, those belonging to US authorities on a shadowy unacknowledged mission. The media has taken up the cause and the story has gone mainstream, with baffled officials furnishing no unified explanation – and President elect Trump weighing in. This installment of the column will add one more theory to the growing noise, but a theory grounded in full context, covering all the known facts and hopefully all the more plausible for that albeit.
To begin with, let us dismiss the private drone scenario quickly. Any private entity causing such panic would soon admit it and apologize for fear of being found out. The authorities via satellite would know whence they came, track them and reveal the facts. Next, the foreign actor theory – again, as Donald Trump says, the military or intelligence people would know. They might stay silent about it for fear of provoking a confrontation with a foreign power. The US is, sadly, prone to such deliberate passivity, the latest example being the Havana Syndrome findings by Congress which rejected the intelligence community’s previous report that the Syndrome doesn’t exist and no foreign power is responsible. The recent ad hoc Congressional Committee officially found that the Havana Syndrome is real and a foreign state is likely behind it.
So, back to the drones: do the authorities know that a foreign power is responsible for the drone outbreak but won’t say so? Timing is everything in such events. The Biden White House, as we have seen with aid spikes to Ukraine and granting permission to hit inside Russia, is not shy of adding last minute foreign policy complications to the incoming administration. Were it a hostile power, we would know all about who unleashed the drones. Which leaves the third and last category, that the drone phenomenon was a government initiative which authorities do not wish to acknowledge, a stealth operation that went public inadvertently. As this column is focused on geostrategic affairs, the possible explanation falls into its bailiwick.
Nobody has quite understood why the US and Germany refused, until recently, to allow Ukraine to use allied weapons to strike inside Russia (Germany still refuses). All manner of theories have swirled but nothing coherent obtained, other than an abiding fear of Russian retaliation. Yet Washington gave the go-ahead for Ukraine to use American weapons across its border in recent months, especially after Trump’s electoral victory. Did the Russian threat to retaliate against the US diminish? Did the US suddenly get safer? And why did it take so long to grant permission? The truth is, any sort of highly visible and attributable strike against the US was never a risk because Moscow would have suffered devastating retaliation. But an anonymous catastrophe in a major US city would work. A kind of secret Samson Option, or hidden nuclear device in Germany or America should Russian soil be bombed by allied weapons. The great efficacy of such a threat lies not in its use but entirely in the threat, the ambiguity. And the restraint or doubt it induces.
Nor should the threat be too visible or public. Anything that detonates massively raises an outcry, puts pressure on the authorities to find a return address, a clear culprit. No foreign power would risk such a big provocation that it would be identifiable and cause retaliation. Witness 9/11. One has to conclude, therefore, that the real version of such a threat would be scary rather than hugely destructive. The device would need to be constructed discreetly and stowed or delivered equally discreetly. And no foreign state actor would take responsibility. So, a small radiation device fits the bill. And this is precisely what New Jersey officials have been saying about the drone activity, namely that it’s our side looking for a small medical isotope gone missing, one that was aboard a container ship and went missing. But a federal agency has just denied the US was flying drones in search of nuclear radiation. All of which is standard procedure for stifling panic.
Finally, there’s this: the foreign actors would not deliver a direct threat. They would retain deniability, as in the Havana Syndrome. If, indeed, it’s a radiation device, nobody knows who was behind it, though the technical sophistication suggests only rival superpowers qualify as suspects. Which brings us back to the Russian dark ops and the inexplicable restraint of the Biden White House over helping Ukraine.
New Jersey
What about tariffs? What North Jersey shoppers can expect from retail in 2025
1-minute read
New Jersey is synonymous with retail.
With shopping malls throughout the state, including the largest mall in New Jersey located in Paramus, there are endless options to find what you need.
And with one of the largest ports on the East Coast, New Jersey is not only home to retail, but also to a robust shipping industry.
Expect changes in both those areas in 2025 ― and be on the lookout for changes in the costs of goods if President-elect Trump enacts his proposed tariff program.
- Port workers and the association representing marine terminals have until Jan. 15 to reach a deal on a new master contract, with automation being a main sticking point. The union representing the port workers has promised to go on strike if a deal is not met, potentially increasing prices on store shelves and upending supply chains.
- Developers at Garden State Plaza and Bergen Town Center in Paramus are in the process of constructing thousands of new apartments. At the Garden State Plaza complex there will be retail, dining, outdoor markets and a 1-acre town green, with an early-2025 groundbreaking expected.
- President Donald Trump has vowed to enact 25% tariffs on goods coming from Mexico and Canada, and 10% tariffs on goods coming from China. New Jersey manufacturers have sped up imports and stockpiled raw materials in anticipation of the increased costs from imports.
New Jersey
New Jersey Devils Prospect Update: Your 2024 Devils All-Prospect Team
The Rules
Before we begin, a quick breakdown of the rules. I select a lineup of players with an eye of putting the best projected lineup together of players as they are realistically projected to be in their prime. Players who are older will benefit from a higher degree of certainty, but younger prospects will be given consideration of their realistic (i.e. not ideal) projections so as not to load a lineup full of AHLers, who are further along in their development.
For this exercise, I will not differentiate between left and right wing or right and left defense, nor will I consider “handedness” of any of the prospects. Players who have made the full-time jump to the NHL are ineligible. Lastly, the age cutoff is 23, so players such as Nolan Foote, who turned 24 last month, are also ineligible. Let’s get started.
Top Line
Center Matyas Melovsky; Wingers Lenni Hameenaho and Arseni Gritsyuk
The Devils prospect pool is notoriously short of center depth. However, Matyas Melovsky has had a breakout season as a 20-year-old playing for Baie-Comeau Drakkar of the QMJHL. The first Devils prospect in any league to reach thirty points this season, Melovsky, who plays both wing and center, is more of a playmaker than a natural goal scorer. The center is well built for the NHL game at 6’1’’, 190 pounds and uses his strength to body opponents, earning high marks from many scouts for his defensive game. If properly developed, Melovsky could blossom into a versatile bottom 6 forward at the NHL level some day.
For this exercise, Melovsky will be dishing the puck to the top two offensive prospects in the Devils system on the top scoring line, while providing some much-needed two-way play at center. Russian winger Arseni Gritsyuk would provide zone entries and some dazzle to the line, while Finnish Forward Lenni Hameenaho would work his magic around the net. Gritsyuk and Hameenaho are both in the midst of strong seasons in their respective top leagues. It would not be surprising to see this entire line playing in North America for the Devils organization next season.
2nd Line
Center Adam Beckman; Wingers Cam Squires and Herman Traff
Adam Beckman is a bit of a cheat as the player acquired by the Devils for Graeme Clarke over the summer has been playing right wing on Utica’s second line. However, Beckman can play center and the center depth is bad enough for me to slot him here. Whatever problems Utica has had this season, and there have been many, Adam Beckman has not been one of them, scoring sixteen points in eighteen games. This makes his lack of a call-up to the big club during the myriad of injuries so far this season rather surprising. At 23-years-old, Beckman is becoming close to a finished product as he awaits another opportunity to play in the NHL.
On the All-Prospect Team, the AHL veteran will center two younger players on this line. After a rough start and a couple of suspensions, Cam Squires has caught fire for the Cape Breton Eagles and is the only Devils prospect not named Matyas Melovsky to be averaging over a point per game. Power forward Herman Traff has been a steady presence in the SHL playing amongst men as a 18-year-old in his D+1 (Traff turns 19 on December 31st), tallying seven points in nineteen contests and earning a spot on Team Sweden in the World Juniors. Cam Squires has already signed his ELC with the Devils and should join the Comets next season as Utica’s season is likely to end before Cape Breton’s. Traff will likely continue to develop in the SHL next season.
3rd Line
Center Samu Salminen; Wingers Josh Filmon and Chase Stillman
Coming into this season, this line would have looked really good on paper. Samu Salminen, another forward who plays center and wing, centers this line by default, given the aforementioned lack of center depth. The power forward has been streaky this year after transferring to the University of Denver from the goal-anemic UConn. With six goals and six assists in eighteen contests, this will likely be Salminen’s best offensive season. Whether it be enough to earn him a contract with the Devils this summer is anybody’s guess.
Much has been written about wingers Josh Filmon and Chase Stillman this season. Filmon has already been demoted to Adirondack of the ECHL, where he has, at times, toiled on the fourth line. At the time this article was written, Stillman is still hanging onto a fourth line spot for the Utica Comets, but has struggled and I speculated last week whether a short stint in the lower league may help spark him a bit. It is way too soon to give up on Filmon or Stillman, but to say that this has been a challenging year for the duo would be a bit of an understatement.
4th Line
Center Max Graham; Wingers Kasper Pikkarainen and Cole Brown
The fourth line of the All-Prospect team is intriguing. Max Graham is another center, who also plays wing. That’s zero natural centers in the system for those keeping track. After being selected as an overager in last year’s NHL entry draft, Graham, who is known for his leadership and his fisticuffs, has broken out offensively in the WHL with 24 points in 26 games. Graham’s pathway to the NHL would be that of a physical two-way grinder, who kills penalties (something he would need to learn) and sticks up for his teammates, but at 6’3’’ doesn’t quite have the size to be a true heavyweight in the NHL.
The two wingers on the fourth line are big question marks. Kasper Pikkarainen was chosen in the 3rd round by the Devils this summer and then proceeded to get injured in his first game for the Red Deer Rebels of the WHL and has not played since. As such, Pikkarainen’s progress is impossible to evaluate and one will have to wait until the winger returns to game action to see how the injury impacted his development. Pikkarainen’s selection here is purely based on his status from the draft. Cole Brown is a winger for the Brantford Bulldogs, who is on pace for 60 points, a full 21 points more than last season. More impressively, this pace has been a result of a late surge after a very slow start. As with Salminen, it is still up in the air as to whether this will be enough for the Devils to offer Brown a contract, but the winger has certainly earned that consideration.
Defensive Pairings
Anton Silayev, Simon Nemec
Seamus Casey, Daniil Orlov
Topias Vilen, Ethan Edwards
The first three selections for the Devils defense were rather straightforward. Not much needs to be written to justify the inclusion of Anton Silayev, the 6’7’’ Russian blueliner who has suited up for 32 games for Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod of the KHL this season and tallied seven assists as an 18-year-old. Likewise, #2 overall pick Simon Nemec broke into the NHL last season and has been the odd man out with the stellar play of Jonathan Kovacevic. Nemec has not exactly lit up the AHL since his demotion, but his focus has been on becoming a steadier presence in the backend. The offense for the Comets from the blueline has been left up to Seamus Casey, the third easy selection for defense on this team. Casey has proven capable of playing in the NHL already in a sheltered role and has carried his four points in his first eight NHL games to fourteen points in seventeen games since his demotion to the Comets.
The other three defensemen were a much tougher decision. One could argue Daniil Karpovich deserves consideration and I would agree. However, as Karpovich split nine games between the KHL and VHL this season before his injury and after a season in the more obscure Belarusan league, it is really difficult to pinpoint his progress. Likewise, Santeri Hatakka probably would have made this team if not for his injury this preseason. Fellow Comet Daniil Misyul, who played one game for the Devils this season, has aged out of consideration for this team. Defensive defensemen Charlie Leddy and Artyom Barabosha were also considered and Barabosha might have made the cut if not for splitting time between the KHL and VHL this year after seemingly earning a full promotion to the KHL last season.
I chose Russian defender Daniil Orlov, who seems to have the speed and transition skills to possibly play in the NHL one day should he ever stay healthy enough to fully develop and decide to come to North America. Topias Vilen and Ethan Edwards were also difficult selections. Ethan Edwards has a chance to be an Andy Greene-like defenseman should he reach his potential, but such players are very rare at the NHL level. Moreover, as a senor this season, it is unclear where Edwards will end up this summer. Former 5th rounder, Topias Vilen earned his ELC after showing tremendous promise with a breakout in the Liiga. After a demotion to the ECHL last season, Vilen picked up his game and finished strong with 29 points in 54 AHL games proving his newly-found offense could translate to North America. This season, Vilen has only played in fourteen contests for the Comets, totaling a goal and three assists, after returning from an upper body injury suffered during the preseason. Vilen is still only 21-years-old and defensemen develop later, so I would not worry too much about him yet. There is still a chance Vilen develops into a strong puck-moving defenseman in the NHL some day given his skill set.
Goaltenders
Jakub Malek
Nico Daws
At 22-years-old, Jakub Malek is the best goaltending prospect in the Devils system. Since the Devils drafted him in the fourth round (100th overall) in the 2021 NHL entry draft, Malek has dominated just about everywhere he has played. Currently, that somewhere is the Liiga, where the netminder has either been at the top or near the top all season in GAA (2.06) and SV% (.918). Malek also possesses the athleticism to be a starting goalie in the NHL should he reach his full potential. That is not just me saying that. The latest Dobber update on Malek says essentially the same thing. Of course, most players never reach their full potential and whether Malek will remains to be seen, but given the goaltender’s track record of consistency since his draft year, I would not bet against him. Even if Malek maxes out as a capable back up in the NHL, the netminder would earn the top spot here.
Devils fans are likely more familiar with Nico Daws, who has already played quite a few games for the Devils in recent seasons, mostly in call-ups. After the Devils traded Akira Schmid over the summer, Daws became the defacto third string goalie for the Devils. Daws has struggled this season for a bad Comets team with a 3-10-2 record, 3.18 GAA and .895 SV%, but has outperformed (at least in terms of SV%) his platoon-mate Isaac Poulter after losing out to Poulter last year. It is no secret that Daws has played on a lot of bad Devils teams and it is hard to say how much of Daws’s raw numbers have been diminished by that reality. Daws has the ability to steal games at times, even high profile games at the NHL level. Consistency has been the issue with Daws, something Malek has not struggled with. For that reason, Malek gets the nod as the starter of this hypothetical team.
Your Take
Tell us what you think. My best to all our readers and their families. May you enjoy all your end of year festivities.
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