https://twitter.com/i/status/1457493879003963398

Dear Commons Community,

Arizona Rep. Paul Gosar tweeted a menacing video (see above) on Sunday that included altered animation showing him striking President Joe Biden and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez with a sword.

In a tweet Monday night, Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., referred to Gosar as “a creepy member I work with” and said he “shared a fantasy video of him killing me.” She added that Gosar would face no consequences because Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy “cheers him on with excuses.” She also said that institutions “don’t protect” women of color.

A fellow House Democrat, Ted Lieu of California, referred to Gosar’s tweet as “sick behavior” and said in a tweet of his own: “In any workplace in America, if a coworker made an anime video killing another coworker, that person would be fired.”

Gosar, a Republican, posted the video with a note saying: “Any anime fans out there?”

The roughly 90-second video is an altered version of a Japanese anime series, interspersed with shots of border patrol officers and migrants at the southern U.S. border. During one roughly 10-second section of the video, animated characters whose faces have been replaced with Gosar and fellow Republican Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Lauren Boebert of Colorado are seen fighting other animated characters.

In one scene, Gosar’s character is seen striking the one made to look like Ocasio-Cortez in the neck with a sword.

Twitter later attached a warning to the tweet saying “it violated the Twitter Rules about hateful conduct. However, Twitter has determined that it may be in the public’s interest for the Tweet to remain accessible.”

Gosar is known as an ardent ally of former President Donald Trump. He was among the lawmakers whose phone or computer records a House panel investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection asked social media and telecommunications companies to preserve as they were potentially involved with efforts to “challenge, delay or interfere” with the certification or otherwise try to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

Gosar is a “sick creep.”  The fact that he was elected to the House of Representatives is an indication of what’s wrong in America and the Republican Party!!

Tony

Chris Christie

Dear Commons Community,

Chris Christie and other leading Republicans expressed confidence this weekend that they were well positioned to retake control of Congress next year and ultimately win back the White House in 2024.

Speaking at the Republican Jewish Coalition’s annual leadership meeting in Las Vegas, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz boasted that Democrats were “freaking out” after losing the Virginia governor’s race and nearly falling short in New Jersey. Ronna McDaniel, the chair of the Republican National Committee, called Tuesday’s strong showing “a tsunami” and a “precursor of really great things to come in 2022.”

But beneath the bravado coursing through the grand Palazzo ballroom at the Venetian Resort, the GOP was still navigating around the shadow of Donald Trump, the former president who plans to play a major role in next year’s midterms and may again run for the White House in 2024. For the first time since losing the 2020 election, he seemed relegated to the background as others encouraged the party to think about its future.

The Republican strength in Virginia and New Jersey last week was fueled by candidates who deliberately kept Trump at arm’s length and successfully turned out rural conservatives who make up the former president’s base, while also appealing to suburban voters who had abandoned the party in recent years. That could provide a model for GOP success in future elections.

But Chris Christie, the former New Jersey governor who may run for president again in 2024, warned that would only happen if GOP leaders, including Trump, focus on the future instead of re-litigating the past, including the former president’s lie that last year’s election was stolen. As reported by the Associated Press.

Republicans have “extraordinary opportunities over the next few years,” Christie said, but only if they offer voters “a plan for tomorrow, not a grievance about yesterday.”

“We can no longer talk about the past and the past elections, no matter where you stand on that issue — no matter where you stand — it is over. And every minute that we spend talking about 2020,” he said, was “wasting time.” The party needs to “take our eyes off the rearview mirror and start looking through the windshield again.”

In an interview after his speech, Christie said he believed Trump’s role in the party going forward was ″completely dependent upon the president’s own behavior.”

“If the president wants to talk about the future and spend most of his time talking about the future and what he sees next, then I’m sure that he’ll be a welcome voice in any kind of debate,” he said. “But if all we’re going to do is talk about grievance politics and put out statements saying either you reverse the 2020 election or Republicans shouldn’t vote in ’22 and ’24, I mean, that can’t be the leader of our party. It just can’t.” 

The RJC event, dubbed the “kosher cattle call” by its organizers, offered a chance for candidates mulling runs to woo some of the party’s biggest and most influential donors on stage and in private forums. Beyond Christie and Cruz, those appearing included former Vice President Mike Pence, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley. 

Candidates running for Congress and governor also worked the room, including retired football player Herschel Walker, who is running for Senate in Georgia, and New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, who was repeatedly urged to launch a campaign for Senate, which he is considering.

“We’re sort of the kosher nostra gatekeepers for whose running down the road. You have to come here first and show us your stuff,” said former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer, who serves on the group’s board of directors. “It’s really fun to watch potential future candidates strut their stuff, to see what they got. They’re going to improve, they’re going to have to change. It’s years away. But this is how candidates get better.” 

But first, some of the attendees stressed, came winning next year.

“A lot of people have come here to audition,” noted Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. “We have a very rich bench. We have a lot of energetic people. We have resumes that I think would make them qualified to lead this nation. But none of that matters to me until you get 2022 right.”

With that in mind, some of those eyeing presidential runs made sure to first emphasize the importance of next year’s elections. Pence was among those who received the loudest applause as he served as the headlining speaker on Saturday night, predicting the country was “just 12 months away from a great Republican comeback.”

“Right here and right now, from this point forward, we will all resolve to do our part to win back the House, the Senate, governorships across the country in 2022,” he said, offering no hits about plans for his own political future. “And we’re going to win back this country in 2024.” 

Others focused on culture war issues surrounding vaccination mandates and critical race theory, an academic framework that came to dominate the final weeks of the Virginia governor’s race. It centers on the idea that racism is systemic in the nation’s institutions and that they function to maintain the dominance of white people. In recent months, it has become a catch-all political buzzword for any teaching in schools about race and American history.

DeSantis, who proclaimed his state the “freest” in the country, railed against pandemic restrictions, including mandatory vaccinations, while South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, like others, accused the administration of turning its back on Israel.

“They’re not just trying to discredit Israel,” she said. “They’re not just trying to defund Israel. They’re not just trying to alienate Israel. They’re trying to delegitimize Israel. And they’re challenging Israel’s right to exist.”

And they stressed lessons learned from Tuesday, including the importance of focusing on issues that voters care about, including education.

“Virginia was won by parents. Virginia was won by moms — moms who were frustrated, who were outraged at the arrogance and the condescension of Democratic school boards and of a Democratic administration that looks down on them,” said Cruz.

“You just woke up a whole bunch of moms,” echoed McDaniel.

Sage advice to scuttle the Trump lies about the 2020 election and move forward as to what the GOP can do for the country in the years to come!

Tony

W. Kent Fuchs

Dear Commons Community,

W. Kent Fuchs, President of the University of Florida, announced on Friday that he will now allow professors who recently asked to serve as expert witnesses in litigation against the state to do so.

The reversal followed a week of turmoil on the campus spurred by administrators’ decisions to bar faculty members in political science and medicine from testifying against state agencies in litigation this year.  As reported by The Chronicle of Higher Education.

“Fuchs wrote in a letter on Friday that he had asked the campus’s conflict-of-interest office to reverse those decisions, “regardless of personal compensation, assuming the activity is on their own time without using university resources.”

A task force will review the conflict-of-interest policy — and how the university should respond if professors seek to testify against the state — and issue recommendations by November 29, the president wrote.

Fuchs had previously said political-science faculty members would be able to participate in litigation if they were not compensated for the activity. But a pediatrician at the university, Jeffrey L. Goldhagen, told The Chronicle that he would not have been paid for his testimony — advocating for mask mandates in schools — and his requests had been rejected nonetheless.

Goldhagen said that changing the outcome in his case would not erase other university steps that he characterized as politically motivated, including Florida’s refusal to enact a campus mask mandate and its hiring of Joseph Ladapo, a skeptic of mask and vaccination mandates, as a professor of medicine.

“This is not about a few faculty members,” Goldhagen said. “This is fundamentally about academic freedom, First Amendment rights, the sanctity of institutions in the state, and the sanctity of institutions in the country. If in fact that sanctity of academic institutions is violated, we’re in the process of dismantling a critical institution that has always been a bulwark of democracy.”

Lawyers representing three political-science professors whose requests to testify had been denied said they were evaluating their future options. “While the University of Florida reversed course and allowed our clients to testify in this particular case, the fact remains that the university curtailed their First Amendment rights and academic freedoms, and as long as the university’s policy remains, those rights and freedoms are at risk,” the lawyers said in a written statement.

Fuchs’s announcement followed fierce criticism of his administration from entities on and off campus. Florida’s accreditor said on Monday it would investigate the decision about the faculty testimony. The faculty union urged alumni to stop donating and peer campuses to downgrade their assessment of the university on surveys circulated by U.S. News & World Report for its college rankings.

Democrats in Florida’s congressional delegation had previously urged reversal, too. On Friday, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a Democrat, praised Fuchs for his change in policy. “The governor’s incessant hostility to facts and science, combined with nonstop bullying and threats directed at education leaders who just want to protect children, created this chilling climate of fear and suppression that, sadly, found its way onto one of the nation’s premier public university campuses,” she said in a written statement.

Hours after the university announced it would allow them to testify, the three political-science faculty members — Sharon Wright Austin, Michael McDonald, and Daniel A. Smith — filed a lawsuit against the university in federal court. “Despite reversing the immediate decision prohibiting the professors from testifying, the university has made no commitment to abandon its policy preventing academics from serving as expert witnesses when the university thinks that their speech may be adverse to the state and whatever political agenda politicians want to promote,” says a statement from the professors’ lawyers. “It is time for this matter to be rightfully adjudicated, not by press release, but in a court of law.”

A partial but significant victory for the three faculty and for the entire University of Florida!

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Maureen Dowd in her column this morning entitled, “Wokeness Derails the Democrats” takes aim at what wrong in last Tuesday’s elections.  Here is an excerpt.

“In Shakespeare, when characters want to fulfill their desires, they escape to what’s been called the Green World.

And that’s what Democrats promised voters: that they could leave behind the vitriol and aggravation of Donald Trump’s America and escape to an Arden that was cool, calm and reassuring.

Democrats violated that pledge. On the way to that verdant forest, we got led into a circular firing squad. Tight margins in Congress do not bring out the best in pols.

“We promised to change the rancor and division,” said one top Democrat. “So we offered something else: division and rancor.”

Many who were sick of Trump chaos and ineptitude are now sick of Biden chaos and ineptitude. Scranton Joe was supposed to be the sensible, steady one.

After all, as Democrats are keenly aware, Trump lost the 2020 race as much as Biden won it. Only 44,000 votes in Arizona, Wisconsin and Georgia saved Biden from an Electoral College tie.

And for a long time now, people have been watching the spectacle of Democrats grinding away at the sausage and fighting for their piece of the pie (to make a metaphoric meal). And it has not been a pretty picture.

The question raised by Tuesday’s debacle for Democrats is: Now that President Biden’s high poll ratings and good will are squandered, how do they turn the mishegoss into a winning message?

There’s some truth in what James Carville told Judy Woodruff: “What went wrong is this stupid wokeness. Don’t just look at Virginia and New Jersey. Look at Long Island, look at Buffalo, look at Minneapolis, even look at Seattle, Wash. I mean, this defund the police lunacy, this take Abraham Lincoln’s name off of schools.”

There’s also some truth in what Representative Abigail Spanberger, a moderate Virginia Democrat in a tough re-election battle, told The Times’s Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns about the president: “Nobody elected him to be F.D.R., they elected him to be normal and stop the chaos.”

Biden has pursued his two bills with Captain Ahab-like zeal; he pines to be F.D.R. and eclipse Barack Obama, who pushed him aside for Hillary.

Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi hail the bills as transformational. But what are you transforming into? The election cratering showed that such overweening efforts are putting off many voters who are still struggling just to get by, as they move beyond the degradation wrought by Trump and Covid.

While the Democrats wallow in a family food fight, Americans are still stressed and exhausted from the whole Covid ordeal, confronting high gas prices and stymied from getting the appliances and Christmas toys they want.

“I used to advise mayors, you can be as visionary as you want, but just make sure you take the garbage out and fill the potholes,’’ said David Axelrod, who oversaw messaging for Barack Obama.

Republicans have not lost their talent for coming up with boogeymen to scare white voters, and thanks to a dumb comment by Terry McAuliffe in a debate, they have succeeded in turning parents’ rights in schools into a wedge issue.

Some in the G.O.P. see Glenn Youngkin as a template for moving beyond Trump. The members of my family who voted for Trump are eager to see their party move back to a more palatable and recognizable form of conservatism.

We’ll see. So far, tiptoeing around Jabba the Trump has had limited utility. Despite everything, he still has great sway in the Republican Party.”

I tend to agree with Dowd although I don’t know if “wokeness” is the right word for her theme.  Merriam-Webster defines wokeness as “aware of and actively attentive to important facts and issues (especially issues of racial and social justice).”  It has been used derisively by some in the media especially by the Fox News crowd.  In my opinion, the Democrats are a house divided by factions that fueled by uncompromising ardor.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

The House passed the bipartisan infrastructure plan Friday night and President Biden said yesterday he will hold a signing ceremony when lawmakers return from a week’s recess.

The new law promises to reach almost every corner of the country. It’s a historic investment that the president has compared to the building of the transcontinental railroad and Interstate Highway System. The White House is projecting that the investments will add, on average, about 2 million jobs per year over the coming decade.

The bill cleared the House on a 228-206 vote, ending weeks of intraparty negotiations in which liberal Democrats insisted the legislation be tied to a larger, $1.75 trillion social spending bill — an effort to press more moderate Democrats to support both.

The Senate passed the legislation on a 69-30 vote in August after rare bipartisan negotiations, and the House kept that compromise intact. Thirteen House Republicans voted for the bill, giving Democrats more than enough votes to overcome a handful of defections from progressives.

Here’s a breakdown of some of the key provisions of the bill courtesy of the Associated Press.

ROADS AND BRIDGES

The bill would provide $110 billion to repair the nation’s aging highways, bridges and roads. According to the White House, 173,000 total miles or nearly 280,000 kilometers of America’s highways and major roads and 45,000 bridges are in poor condition. And the almost $40 billion for bridges is the single largest dedicated bridge investment since the construction of the national highway system, according to the Biden administration.

PUBLIC TRANSIT

The $39 billion for public transit in the legislation would expand transportation systems, improve accessibility for people with disabilities and provide dollars to state and local governments to buy zero-emission and low-emission buses. The Transportation Department estimates that the current repair backlog is more than 24,000 buses, 5,000 rail cars, 200 stations and thousands of miles of track and power systems.

PASSENGER AND FREIGHT RAIL

To reduce Amtrak’s maintenance backlog, which has worsened since Superstorm Sandy nine years ago, the bill would provide $66 billion to improve the rail service’s Northeast Corridor (457 miles, 735 km), as well as other routes. It’s less than the $80 billion Biden — who famously rode Amtrak from Delaware to Washington during his time in the Senate — originally asked for, but it would be the largest federal investment in passenger rail service since Amtrak was founded 50 years ago.

ELECTRIC VEHICLES

The bill would spend $7.5 billion for electric vehicle charging stations, which the administration says are critical to accelerating the use of electric vehicles to curb climate change. It would also provide $5 billion for the purchase of electric school buses and hybrids, reducing reliance on school buses that run on diesel fuel.

INTERNET ACCESS

The legislation’s $65 billion for broadband access would aim to improve internet services for rural areas, low-income families and tribal communities. Most of the money would be made available through grants to states.

MODERNIZING THE ELECTRIC GRID

To protect against the power outages that have become more frequent in recent years, the bill would spend $65 billion to improve the reliability and resiliency of the power grid. It would also boost carbon capture technologies and more environmentally friendly electricity sources like clean hydrogen.

AIRPORTS

The bill would spend $25 billion to improve runways, gates and taxiways at airports and to improve terminals. It would also improve aging air traffic control towers.

WATER AND WASTEWATER

The legislation would spend $55 billion on water and wastewater infrastructure. It has $15 billion to replace lead pipes and $10 billion to address water contamination from polyfluoroalkyl substances — chemicals that were used in the production of Teflon and have also been used in firefighting foam, water-repellent clothing and many other items.

PAYING FOR IT

The five-year spending package would be paid for by tapping $210 billion in unspent COVID-19 relief aid and $53 billion in unemployment insurance aid some states have halted, along with an array of smaller pots of money, like petroleum reserve sales and spectrum auctions for 5G services.

Lots of good things in this bill including the creation of jobs!

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Hundreds of mourners — including President Biden and former Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush — gathered at Washington National Cathedral yesterday to pay their respects to Gen. Colin Powell, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and secretary of state.  A military honor guard carried his casket into the funeral service at  Washington National Cathedral (see video above).

Powell died on Oct. 18 of complications from COVID-19. He was 84. Powell’s family said he had been vaccinated but that his immune system had been compromised by multiple myeloma, a blood cancer for which he had been undergoing treatment.

Madeleine Albright, who preceded Powell as secretary of state; Richard Armitage, who was Powell’s deputy secretary of state; and Powell’s son, Michael, delivered the eulogies.

“On policy, the general and I didn’t always reach the same conclusions,” Albright said. “And in fact he would later recount that one of my comments almost gave him an aneurysm. But over the past quarter century we also became very close friends.

“The reason is, that beneath that glossy exterior of warrior statesman was one of the gentlest and most decent people any of us will ever meet,” she continued. “As I grew to know him, I came to view Colin Powell as a figure who almost transcended time, for his virtues were Homeric: honesty, dignity, loyalty and an unshakable commitment to his calling and word.

“He was also guided by conscience that unlike many never slept,” Albright added. “He made pragmatism charismatic.”

Armitage recalled Powell’s “sense of humor, his insatiable curiosity and his comfort in his own skin.”

“This is a celebration of a life,” Armitage said.

“Colin Powell was a great leader because he was a great follower,” Michael Powell said as his sisters and mother, Alma, looked on. “He knew you could not ask your troops to do anything you were unwilling to do yourself.

“His zest for life was derived by his endless passion for people. He was genuinely interested in everyone he met,” Michael Powell continued. “He loved a hot dog vendor, a bank teller, a janitor and a student as much as any world leader.”

Biden, Obama and Bush sat in the front row with their spouses alongside former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Former President Bill Clinton, who was recently hospitalized with an infection, did not attend, nor did former President Donald Trump, who Powell had sharply criticized.

As mourners arrived, the United States Army Brass Quintet played instrumental versions of some of Powell’s favorite songs, including Bob Marley’s “Three Little Birds” and ABBA’s “Dancing Queen.”

A great man and a great American!

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Amid the clamor of a city of millions, New Yorkers have always been able to escape into a good book. 

“Even in the busiest of places, if you have a good book, you can retreat into solitude,” says writer and archival photographer, Anika Burgess. “And when you live in a city like New York, a book can be even more than a story at your fingertips. It can also be a respite, an escape, a sanctuary, a diversion and a travel companion.”

As part of its 125th anniversary celebration, The Times Book Review published photos of people sneaking some reading time around New York. You can see  the whole collection here.

Many of us can relate to these photos (see sample above and below).

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Dear Commons Community,

President Joe Biden announced yesterday that he will begin enforcing his mandate that private-sector workers be vaccinated against COVID-19 or be tested weekly starting Jan. 4, in a reprieve to companies struggling with labor shortages during the crucial U.S. holiday season. 

U.S. officials also said a requirement that federal contractors be vaccinated was moved back a month to the same date. Millions of workers in healthcare facilities and nursing homes participating in Medicare and Medicaid will need to get their shots by Jan. 4 as well.  As reported by Reuters.

Biden established the requirements to raise vaccination rates and get more people back to work. But in numerous meetings with companies and industry groups representing retailers, logistics companies, construction workers, executives asked the administration to delay the implementation deadline after the New Year, citing concerns about worker shortages. 

Employers will also not be required to provide or pay for tests and the rule offers medical and religious exemptions. 

Failure to comply with the mandate will result in an approximately $14,000 fine per violation with a scale that increases with several violations, senior administration officials said. They did not offer clarity on whether workers will be fired if they refuse to get the shot or tested. 

“It is important to understand that there are still so many workers who are not protected and remain at risk from being seriously ill or dying from COVID-19,” said a senior administration official. 

The administration officials spoke on condition of anonymity. 

Biden initially set a deadline for 70% of U.S. adults to get at least one shot by July 4, but the White House missed the deadline as it underestimated growing anti-vaccine sentiment in the country fueled by right-wing talk show hosts, anti-vaxxers, online disinformation campaigns and resistance from Republican lawmakers. 

Biden announced his mandate in September after his administration’s efforts reached a breaking-point as the country was struggling to control the virus spread. 

A large swath of the population was refusing to accept free vaccinations despite a major rollout and incentive campaign from the administration involving 42,000 pharmacies, dozens of mass vaccination sites, free rides and free beer. 

In many parts of the United States, it worked. Millions lined up for shots, and the vaccination rate increased nationwide with latest data showing 70% of U.S. adults have been fully vaccinated and 80% have received at least one shot. 

But an average of 1,100 Americans are still dying daily from COVID-19, according to the latest U.S. data, the vast majority of them unvaccinated. The coronavirus has killed more than 745,000 Americans. 

The mandate is likely to unleash a frenzied legal battle that will hinge on a rarely used law and questions over federal power and authority over healthcare. 

“The new emergency temporary standard is well within OSHA’s authority under the law…there is a well established legal precedent for OSHA’s authority,” a senior administration official said, explaining the legal authority of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to issue the rule. 

The mandate will apply to businesses with 100 or more employees and could affect roughly 84 million workers nationwide, the White House estimates. Goldman Sachs economists estimate that as few as 12 million people would be vaccinated as a result of the mandate. 

Along with Biden’s executive order that requires all federal workers and contractors be vaccinated, the rules cover 100 million people, about two-thirds of the U.S. workforce, the White House estimates. 

The rule for healthcare workers covers 17 million employees across 76,000 healthcare facilities even though a majority of them are already vaccinated, data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) shows. 

The administration estimates the rule will prevent over 250,000 hospitalizations and save thousands of lives during the six months after it is implemented. 

Tough love but better safe than sorry!

Tony

New Jersey Democratic Governor Phil Murphy

Dear Commons Community,

New Jersey Democratic Governor Phil Murphy narrowly won reelection yesterday, eking out a victory that spared Democrats the loss of a second gubernatorial seat.

He’s the state’s first Democratic governor to get a second straight term in 44 years, defeating Republican former Assembly member Jack Ciattarelli.

The Associated Press called the race Wednesday evening when a new batch of votes from Republican leaning Monmouth County increased Murphy’s lead and closed the door to a Ciattarelli comeback.

Ballots remaining to be counted included a significant number of votes from predominantly Democratic Essex County, along with mail-in votes spread across other counties. Murphy has won the mail-in vote by a wide margin even in Republican leaning counties like Monmouth.

Ciattarelli spokesperson Stami Williams disputed the call because of the close margin, calling it “irresponsible.”

Ciattarelli waged a formidable campaign in heavily Democratic New Jersey, his spending nearly equaling the governor’s and outpacing the GOP’s performance four years ago. But Murphy’s advantages, including 1 million more registered Democrats, proved too much for the Republican to overcome.

The victory gives Democrats a silver lining after GOP businessman Glenn Youngkin defeated Terry McAuliffe in Virginia’s gubernatorial race — exacerbating worries that President Joe Biden’s sagging approval ratings are hurting the party. This year’s elections were the first major tests of voter sentiment since Biden took office and pointed to a potentially painful year ahead for Democrats as they try to maintain thin majorities in Congress.

The closeness of the race has surprised experts, who watched public polls showing Murphy leading comfortably and looked to his party’s registration advantage.

“If you asked anybody several months ago within the state, I think anyone would have predicted a high double digit landslide for Murphy,” said Ashley Koning, director of the Eagleton Center for Public Interest Polling at Rutgers University.

Voters came out at much higher rates for Ciattarelli this year than they did for his GOP predecessor in 2017. While campaigning, he walked a line between standing up for the moderate stances he had in the Legislature — like supporting Roe v. Wade — and appealing to Republicans who embraced Trump, particularly on cultural issues that have captured attention across the country.

Ciattarelli, who stepped down as state Assembly member in 2018 to run for governor, founded a medical publishing company called Galen Publishing, and held local and county positions in Somerset.

Murphy’s win also ends the more than three-decade-old trend of the party opposite the president’s winning in New Jersey’s off-year governor’s race.

The 64-year-old governor said he was acutely aware of the political trends, calling them an “animating” force for his reelection effort that spurred him to run as if he were 10 points behind.

Murphy built his campaign around the progressive accomplishments he signed into law — like a phased-in $15 an hour minimum wage and paid sick leave along with taxes on the wealthy — and brought on Democratic allies, like progressive U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, to campaign for him.

With a Democrat-led Legislature, Murphy achieved most of the promises he made in his first run four years ago when he vied to succeed Republican Chris Christie. Taxpayer-financed community college and some pre-K, tighter gun laws, expanded voting access, recreational marijuana, more state aid for schools and a fully funded public pension — all promised and all delivered during the first term. A proposal for a public bank to finance projects went unfulfilled.

New Jersey does not have an automatic recount law, but the candidates are permitted to request one. The party that wants a recount must file a suit in State Superior Court in the counties where they want to contest tallies. That has to be done within 17 days of Election Day.

Congratulations to Governor Murphy but the Democrats have a lot to do before Election Day, 2022.

Tony