Candidates and Elections
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- Written by: Jay Edgar
- Category: Candidates and Elections
In 2001, an appeals court ruled that New Jersey's practice of not allowing anyone to register to vote as anything other than Democrat, Republican, or Independent was unconstitutional. This was the result of a lawsuit brought by a coalition of political parties, including the NJ Libertarian Party.
Since then the number of registered libertarians has been steadily growing. The 2018 numbers show 11,040 registered Libertarians. This is a 32.9% growth from the prior year. This year we have grown once again to 8,309 registered Libertarians. We have 4.8 times as many registered libertarians now than we did 5 years ago,
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- Written by: Ken Kaplan
- Category: Candidates and Elections
It has been a very long time since anyone other than a Democrat or Republican was elected to Congress from New Jersey. In fact, it last happened 160 years ago! In 1858, Garnett B. Adrain, who had been elected in the 3rd District as a Democrat in 1856, ran as an Anti-Lecompton Democrat. Jetur R. Riggs ran with the same party identification and was elected in the 4th District. A major issue that year was the admission of Kansas territory to the union as a state. Congress needed to ratify the new constitution of the proposed state. One of the proposed constitutions, the Lecompton Constitution had these provisions in it concerning slavery:
ARTICLE VII.- SLAVERY.
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- Written by: Mike Guadagnino
- Category: Candidates and Elections
The NJ Libertarian Party Nominates Tosone for Congress in NJ-5
Congressional Candidate Jim Tosone with US Senate Candidate Murray Sabrin |
Township of Washington, NJ, March 27, 2017 – Jim Tosone received the Libertarian Party’s nomination at the New Jersey LP Convention on March 24th, as their candidate for House of Representatives in New Jersey’s 5th congressional district.
Tosone is a lifelong resident of New Jersey. His wife and he have lived in Township of Washington, Bergen County, for 30 years. They have one daughter.
Tosone had a thirty-year career at a Fortune 50 healthcare company as a Director of Business Technology. He now consults with leading organizations to help them enhance their innovation, collaboration, and communication skills. He holds undergraduate and graduate degrees in Mathematics and Technology Management from Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, NJ.
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- Written by: Webmaster
- Category: Candidates and Elections
This past weekend, three of our candidates sat down at the Liberty Cafe studios for an interview about their campaigns.
Michael Chazukow for West Milford Town Council
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- Written by: Patrick McKnight
- Category: Candidates and Elections
LIVINGSTON, NJ – The League of Women Voters held a debate for candidates for the State Assembly in the 27th district last Wednesday, September 30th. Libertarian candidates offered refreshing fact-based solutions to economic concerns such as job creation, state budgeting and state pensions.
The Republican candidate promised to reach across the aisle, work hard and renegotiate pensions without mentioning any specifics. The Democratic incumbents, Assemblyman John McKeon of West Orange and Assemblywoman Mila Jasey of South Orange, were absent.
“If you re-elect these people you know what to expect,” said Damien Caillault, one of the Libertarian candidates. “They will spend more, tax more, fund new projects, and in a few years, they’ll come back for more.”
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- Written by: Webmaster
- Category: Candidates and Elections
Press Release
Why your Libertarian vote on Tuesday, Nov. 4, is worth 100 times the other guy's vote
Political leverage! Libertarian Party candidates have it in 2014 — IF YOU VOTE Libertarian.
Why? Unlike the Democratic and Republican candidates, our Libertarian Party candidates for public office have one rock-solid issue — and a clear, powerful message.
Our rock-solid issue: To dramatically expand and advance individual liberty in America.
Our clear, powerful message: Vote for us, elect us, and we will do everything we can to dramatically roll back today's Big Government. To dramatically shrink the size, power, authority, responsibility, taxes, and spending of federal, state, and local Big Government.
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- Written by: Patrick McKnight
- Category: Candidates and Elections
New Jersey is slowly rejecting the two-party system. Voter participation and congressional approval ratings are both at record lows. Yet the courts have issued interpretations of election law that discriminate in favor of the two establishment political parties.
The establishment political parties are guaranteed the first two columns on every ballot. Meanwhile, the Libertarian Party (the third-largest and fastest-growing party) is “lucky” to receive the third column and is often relegated to the fifth or sixth column. This is unfair. All political parties should be treated equally under the law during the construction of the ballot.
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- Written by: Webmaster
- Category: Candidates and Elections
Libertarian congressional candidate Dorit Goikhman’s campaign team discovered unlawful practices in vendor admission to Marlboro Day. When the Marlboro Day staff was contacted about setting up a stand at the event, the township representative denied access on the grounds that political candidates could not attend the event, unless “you’re with the mayor.”
Several days prior, a representative from Goikhman’s campaign was told that political parties could attend Marlboro Day, but that individual candidates were barred. Such regulations violate the First Amendment of the Constitution, as all political entities should be allowed equal representation in public forums. Independent candidates, who are unaffiliated with a specific party, are automatically denied access by this requirement.
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- Written by: Webmaster
- Category: Candidates and Elections
For Immediate Release
Contact: NJLP State Chair Patrick McKnight 609-915-7200
Email:
July 31, 2014
Old Established Political Parties Have Lost
Their Preferential Ballot Position
For far too long the old established political parties have enjoyed preferential ballot placement. The two left-most columns have been reserved for the Democrats and Republicans. This year the Democrats and Republicans will be losing this discriminatory electoral advantage as a result of the failure of the old parties to maintain support with the public.
New Jersey law requires that to have a party column, a political party must “poll at any primary election for a general election of at least ten per centum (10%) of the votes cast in the State for members of the General Assembly at the next preceding general election.”
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- Written by: Charles Barr
- Category: Candidates and Elections
For Immediate Release:
Contact: Charles Barr, 732-470-9994
Email:
June 15, 2014
Hoboken, NJ – On Thursday June 19th, the Hudson County Republican Club Young Professionals will be hosting “The Great Debate: Libertarian versus Neo-Conservative.”
The debate will explore two influential groups within the American political discourse and their perspectives on a range of issues facing the nation.
The debate participants are Dorit Goikhman, the NJ Libertarian Party State Vice Chair and Libertarian candidate for NJ CD 6 and Joshua Sotomayor-Einstein, SaveJersey.com contributor and conservative essayist. Moderating the debate is Daniel Bono, active member of the Hudson County Republican Club and Hudson County Committeeman.
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- Written by: Jay Edgar
- Category: Candidates and Elections
I urge everyone to vote NO on Ballot Question #2.
Ballot question number 2 amends the State Constitution, increasing the minimum wage to $8.25 as of January 1, 2014 and enacts a yearly increase in the minimum wage based on the consumer price index.
Minimum wage laws do absolutely nothing to increase the wealth of poor people. Minimum wage laws reduce the employability of the young and the unskilled. No employer will hire someone at a loss. These laws block individuals from accepting a wage where they can increase their skills and build up a resume. This produces endemic poverty among those who are barred from entering the labor force at a wage commensurate with their skills. On the job training is an essential tool for those unable to afford post-secondary college to increase their employability and income. The bottom rungs of the economic ladder get cut off for many who are just entering the workforce. The harm that minimum wage laws cause is concentrated among the most vulnerable, the young, minorities, and the disabled.
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- Written by: Jay Edgar
- Category: Candidates and Elections
Ballot question number 1 will amend the NJ State Constitution to expand the exemption of those allowed to run games of chance to include veterans groups. Currently only senior citizen groups and approved casinos and racetracks are allowed to compete against the state by running gambling events.
This question gives another special interest an exception to engage in a consensual activity. Left out of the exception is for you or me. Workplace pools, bowling league games of chance, or wagers between friends remain illegal.
Government should not be engaging in favoritism among some groups and punishment of others for for engaging in consensual betting. Rather such activity should be completely unregulated by our state. The only role the government should have when it comes to gambling is preventing theft and fraud.
I will be voting for this ballot question – but only halfheartedly.
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- Written by: Patrick McKnight
- Category: Candidates and Elections
Patrick McKnight is a Libertarian Candidate for Assembly in the 16th District. See mcknight1776.com. |
The United States Constitution is a formal agreement between a free People and their chosen form of government. As such it is the most important type of binding legal contract. The wisdom of the Constitution is in the establishment of a limited government with clearly-articulated individual freedoms. The adoption of this system and the accompanying Bill of Rights represented a singular historical triumph for civilization, as for the first time a government was established in liberty and reason rather than in plunder and force. Our Constitution, though not perfect nor a panacea, remains the bulwark of our freedom and the source of our national greatness.
This contrast is written in the blood of Patriots who made the ultimate sacrifice so that their children could live in a free, solvent United States of America. Only the Libertarian Party realizes that freedom requires constant struggle because the nature of government is to always revert backwards into illegal tyranny.
Not so long ago the American people suffered under the unlimited power of a feudal monarch. Today the monarch has been replaced by federal bureaucracy but still we are not free. Lest we forget that in an empire the individual is nothing more than government-property with legal rights essentially equivalent to an animal or inanimate object. Likewise, in an empire there can be no justice because there is no rule of law, only the arbitrary whim of monarchs and despots. In an empire human beings exist only to be exploited, sacrificed in military adventures and oppressed politically. This is the essence of the imperial-feudalism our country was founded to oppose. In America We the People are the Constitutional Sovereigns and first branch of government.
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- Written by: Webmaster
- Category: Candidates and Elections
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
NEWS RELEASE from KENNETH KAPLAN, Libertarian Party Candidate for Governor
A long-time supporter of marriage equality, Kenneth Kaplan, Libertarian Party candidate for Governor, applauded the two Supreme Court decisions on that subject today. "This is a great day for Americans of all sexual orientations. It is a civil rights victory that we should all celebrate together!" He went on to say, "Chris Christie vetoed a bill that would have established marriage equality in New Jersey, and voters should remember that in November."
See Ken testifying before the New Jersey Civil Union Review Commission in 2008 in this video.
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- Written by: Patrick McKnight
- Category: Candidates and Elections
I am proud to be the Libertarian candidate for New Jersey Assembly in the 16th District. It is my honor and privilege to represent the cause of freedom here in the Crossroads of the American Revolution. I am not a career politician. I am a fourth-generation Skillman, New Jersey farmer. I graduated from Rutgers University with highest honors, a 3.96 GPA and degrees in Philosophy and Sociology. I have taught US History and Economics at Camden Academy Charter High School in Camden, NJ. My band has performed 80 shows, received airplay on over 200 radio stations and recorded four studio albums in Hillsborough. My 2012 Libertarian run for US House in the NJ-7th earned 4,078 votes.
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- Written by: Sean O'Connor
- Category: Candidates and Elections
Here in the United States of America, most of us take pride in following the laws passed by our politicians. Even laws we disagree with. There are certain cases when, out of protest against laws violating individual liberty, some people practice civil disobedience, but most of us are nonviolent and take that moral and legal standard as a given, most of us pay our taxes despite some of us disagreeing with how our tax dollars are spent and most of us adhere to regulations even despite some of us disagreeing with regulations imposed on us. In this sense, although many of us dislike the politicians- the ones who write and execute our laws- and although many of us do not respect them, we do respect the rule of law; we do respect the democratic process by which our politicians are either elected or subsequently appointed by those we elected; we do respect the fact that we are, for better or for worst, under their leadership.
We Americans are fortunate to live in a country where we can practice the religion of our choice, say whatever we want, own private property, keep a lot of our money, spend a lot of our money how we choose, vote for our politicians, persue our dreams, and generally, enjoy the luxury of feeling safe.
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- Written by: Jay Edgar
- Category: Candidates and Elections
On May 18th, Don DeZarn, joined a group of speakers and peaceful protesters at Independence Hall for the Smokedown Prohibition V event. This is a monthly event sponsored by Philadelphia National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (Philly NORML) and The Panic Hour. The event featured music, speakers, and 4:20 celebrations.
The police were peaceful at the four previous events, but they decided to initiate violence this time for unknown reasons. The gang members in blue rushed the stage and arrested six to ten individuals. They focused on the speakers and organizers. During the arrests the crowd chanted 'No Victim, No Crime!" In addition to Don, Adam Kokesh and N.A. Poe were also arrested. Don was charged and released. Adam and N.A. are still being held at the time of this writing. They have a hearing on Thursday and hopefully will get released then.
Don DeZarn is running for NJ State Assembly in the 14th District under the Libertarian banner.