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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. In this election year for mayor of New York and governor of New Jersey, there will be primaries in both contests, as many of you already know, in June. There are multiple candidates competing on both sides of the Hudson. We're inviting all the major primary candidates from both parties in both races. We kick off our New Jersey candidate interviews now with State Senator Jon Bramnick of Westfield running in the Republican primary.

Remember, Governor Murphy is term-limited out after this year and both parties have robust fields of hopefuls. Part of the context is that Trump only lost in New Jersey this time by five points and Murphy only got reelected by three points in 2021 against Republican Jack Ciattarelli. Ciattarelli is running again. Of course, we will invite him on again, but so are seven other Republicans.

Jon Bramnick is 71 years old. He's been a state senator since 2022. He was in the assembly for 18 years before that and a Plainfield City Council member before that. He's also a lawyer and a sometimes stand-up comedian. We'll play a 20-second clip from one of his routines during this segment. Notably, in the context of the Republican primary, he's been an anti-Trump Republican. Senator, thanks for joining us. Happy New Year and welcome to WNYC today.

Senator Jon Bramnick: Thanks for having me, Brian. Appreciate it.

Brian Lehrer: I know everyone will want to know how you can win a Republican primary in 2025, being a critic of Trump, and we'll get to that. I want to center what directly affects people's lives more than centering political strategy. We always try to do that. What would you identify as the top three issues facing New Jerseyans that you would likely have to deal with as governor?

Senator Bramnick: Well, my constituents always talk about the cost of living in New Jersey that they have to move despite the fact their families here. The local government, myself with the help of Chris Christie, we cap local increase in spending by 2%. The state of New Jersey sometimes, over the last seven years, have increased their budget by 11%. I think you need a cap whether it be 2% or 3%. Because once you do that in a constitutional amendment, you have a reason to say no to all these. We call them "Christmas tree items" that every legislator's asking for from Governor Murphy. The first thing you have to do is you have to limit government spending. The other two, we have this--

Brian Lehrer: Let me ask you a quick follow-up on that question just to bring the listeners along. Are you talking about a 2% or 3% cap in local municipality, township, everything, government spending or in the rate that property taxes can go up?

Senator Bramnick: Well, you can't really control the property taxes. Right now, we have a cap on all local municipalities. They cannot raise their spending side by more than 2%. The state of New Jersey, of course, has no cap. That's one of the reasons property taxes go up because the state spends much more than it brings in. It would basically extend the cap from the local municipalities to the state as well.

Brian Lehrer: To the state government.

Senator Bramnick: Why the state should be able to spend what they want but the municipalities can't, there's always been a problem.

Brian Lehrer: What if inflation is going at 7% and the state isn't allowed to increase its spending by more than 2%?

Senator Bramnick: Well, that's the same thing we have at the local level. There would be an option for voters to increase the cap. That's what they do at the local level. Unless you put some sort of cap on it, there's no way that you're going to cause affordability to actually be available to the citizens. There will be in that bill, and I have that bill in the legislature, some exceptions to it, emergencies, et cetera. Clearly, the state of New Jersey has ignored completely the overspending by the state and its entities.

Brian Lehrer: Got it, so that's one of your top three issues that you'll likely face as governor. Continue to number two.

Senator Bramnick: Sure. Well, we have an overdevelopment problem. The state of Jersey, as through their Democratic legislature, said that each community has to build so many affordable housing units. Now, that should be done, but it shouldn't be done town by town. It should be region by region. Because when you say to a certain town like Westfield or Summit, you need 400 units. Well, first, you get litigation from that. Two, there may not be available open space.

Every mayor, Democrat and Republican, feels as if by assigning a certain number of units, ignores the infrastructure of the town and, basically, the quality of life in the town. My position would be go to south, north, and central regions and determine where to do affordable housing. As I said, that's been a bipartisan issue. Every time at the League of Municipalities as one of the leaders, when I was Assembly Republican leader, that was a constant criticism of mayors around the state, so number two-- Go ahead.

Brian Lehrer: No, go ahead. I'm sorry. I let you finish your thought. I'm sorry. Go ahead.

Senator Bramnick: Just on that, you can't just assign numbers. They do it in such a way which is not really related to the availability of space in these towns.

Brian Lehrer: Democrats might argue that that perpetuates segregation by income. Would you anticipate that argument? If so, what would you say to it?

Senator Bramnick: Well, first, you're always going to have some segregation by income in a capitalistic society. For example, there are going to be communities that the houses are more expensive than other houses. You're right. The Democrats, and I've sat on the housing committee during this debate, they reject the concept that you should be able to live wherever you want to live. I think that is not the policy that I would follow. You need affordable housing, but you can't do it in a way that wreaks havoc on communities and makes a suburban community subject to high-density housing, which is really the antithesis of why people have moved there.

Brian Lehrer: I guess the Democrats would argue, if you want to fight multi-generational poverty, history has shown that one of the most effective ways is by integrating people across income lines and not doing that is a bit of a surrender to that. How would you respond to that argument?

Senator Bramnick: Well, we might be able to address that issue by an economy that works for everybody and jobs that are high-paying jobs. To simply have this artificial numbers game, I don't think that's how you solve the problem you're raising. It's not by assigning numbers to a community. What's wrong with a region? You could bring a lot of people together in the south, the north, and the central regions of the state and provide affordable housing. It may, in essence, give everyone an opportunity to live in affordable housing that's close to transportation, close to schools, but we haven't even tried it.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, if you're just joining us, my guest, the first of our interviewees among the gubernatorial hopefuls in New Jersey in this election year with Governor Murphy being term-limited out, is Republican State Senator Jon Bramnick of Westfield. We invite your phone calls for him as he runs in the Republican primary. Yes, we will get to his long-standing anti-Trump position and if he can win a Republican primary with that history today. Democrats, Republicans, independents, anyone else from Jersey, you're welcome to call in with a candidate question, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, for Senator Bramnick from Westfield. We say Westfield, that's where your district office is. It's from Summit in the east out to Bernardsville. Would that be a way to start to describe your district?

Senator Bramnick: Yes, I have a Bernardsville and Summit. I have actually parts of four counties, meaning I have parts of Middlesex with The Nell and Middlesex. Morris County, I have parts of that with Long Hill Township and both of the Chathams. I actually touch on four counties. Parts of Somerset, which you mentioned, Bernardsville, Warren, Watchung. The way it was carved up as they do in gerrymandering today, I have parts of four counties. We have 7,000 more Democrats than Republicans. Harris won my district by 12 points and Biden won by 17 points. I won by seven.

Brian Lehrer: We've been going through your top three issues that you think you'd have to face as governor of New Jersey. We've done two of them. What's number three?

Senator Bramnick: The third one is a responsiveness and a courteous attitude of the people who work for the state. When you go on a website, trying to navigate that website, so what you have now, you walk into motor vehicles. You try to call labor. You try to call insurance division. It sometimes is a nightmare. I've tried to propose legislation, random use of volunteers to call these entities and make sure they're responsive. Because even myself, I do this randomly myself.

Government should be responsive and courteous. I walked into motor vehicles and you would have thought I was a criminal. To me, the minute they pick up that phone, as governor, I don't want that attitude. I want a can-do-will-solve-the-problem attitude. I'm going to make those calls once every couple of weeks and see who picks up the phone and how they treat people. Because right now, it's a nightmare. For a long period of time, you couldn't reach anybody. You go into this twilight zone within voicemail and you can't reach anybody.

I'm going to be all over that. When you walk in a motor vehicle, you should get a smile and, "Can I help you?" Not an attitude. It's the same thing with every entity in the state of New Jersey. Treat people with respect. Because right now, the bureaucracy is a mess. You try to go on the website. It should be user-friendly because most people's interaction with government has to do with a direct request to government for some sort of action. Today, it's a nightmare.

Brian Lehrer: You were talking before about putting spending increase cap of 2% or 3% or something like that on state government. Listener writes this question in a text message, "Could he explain the connection between affordability and the state overspending," because you did make that connection in theory. I guess this listener wants you to elaborate on it. "How does one affect the other," writes that listener.

Senator Bramnick: Well, because what happens is you're paying a state income tax. Many people are. We could reduce that state income tax if we had less spending. A perfect example is, in Florida, there's no state income tax. In New Jersey, we're the highest in the region. A lot of people leave. I've had many people say to me, "Hey, I'm going to Florida or I'm going to a state without a state income tax." That clearly is a direct relationship to affordability.

When they did the state income tax years ago, that was supposed to go to education. Well, the problem is, is that you saw the kind of Christmas tree items that have been given to Democratic legislators in their districts and $1 billion during the last session of the legislature last fiscal year. The bottom line is if there was some constitutional cap, they could go back to those legislators and say, "Hey, listen. I'm sorry, but we just can't do it." Then if you had less spending, you'd need less taxes. Pretty direct relationship.

Brian Lehrer: State Senator Jon Bramnick, the first of our candidate interviews in the New Jersey gubernatorial primary season, which has now begun. We're going to be interviewing, at least inviting, I think they'll all say yes, all the major candidates from the primary fields in both parties. Let's take a phone call. Debra in Morristown, you're on WNYC. Hello, Debra.

Debra: Hi, Brian. I love your show. Hello, Senator Bramnick, you probably don't remember me. We used to perform together at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center to benefit various nonprofits. I loved your humor. [chuckles]

Senator Bramnick: Thank you. I'll try to keep it clean and straightforward.

Brian Lehrer: We will play a clip later of Senator Bramnick as a stand-up comedian, which I guess he does on the side, but go ahead, Debra.

Debra: Yes, just a bit of a reality check. I am both a music teacher and still an attorney. I worked for Legal Services of New Jersey for years. There, we get a reality check about low-income housing. I would pose to you that while I completely understand your concerns about changing the quality of life that it is very important. We used to have colleagues that would bring this subject up with planning boards. You need to have housing for the people that support your beautiful restaurants, for the people that support the elderly living in your community, and for the teachers.

If we don't find that housing, we're going to suffer more and more because people who make that kind of living are living farther and farther away. The other thing I would note that I've observed is that a lot of towns are forgetting about quality of life and building private housing that is absolutely damaging to the town. I see a lot of restrictions. Still, municipalities and their land use powers have a lot of power to prevent affordable housing. I would just want to insert a reminder that affordable housing is vital to also keep the quality of life that we all want.

Brian Lehrer: Interesting. Debra, thank you very much. Before you respond, Senator, I'm going to take another call on the same topic, but with, I think, a different point of view. CJ in Parsippany, you're on WNYC. Hi, CJ.

CJ: Hey, Brian. Hi, Senator Bramnick, thanks for taking my call. Yes, thanks for following me up after her because my question involves the pilot programs that have been initiated in Parsippany for affordable housing and all these other things. My concern is that money is being taken from potential future school revenue. It does tie into the whole quality-of-life thing, which is me and my wife chose a town. We moved there. We worked to buy our said house. Now, we're worried that we might have to move because the school district might be in peril in a few years due to said pilot programs.

Then just to say something else about what Debra said, which is I'm now 36. I can't remember a time where anyone was able to live in said areas working said jobs. My wife is a teacher. We didn't live where she worked initially. My last point would be these so-called affordable housing units that are being built, they're not affordable. They're upwards of $2,000 a month for rent. I don't really know who's paying that in those types of jobs from a [unintelligible 00:17:01].

Brian Lehrer: CJ, thank you very much. I'll throw in one more in this set that represents, Senator, a number of text messages that are coming in. This listener puts it as, "Basically, the senator is still pushing the idea that rich people don't want middle-class people in their neighborhoods and affordable housing. They don't like mixing with them. They want their communities to be exclusive."

Senator Bramnick: [laughs]

Brian Lehrer: You're laughing, but we have a few texts like that. We had Debra and we had CJ. Go ahead and respond to the set.

Senator Bramnick: Okay. Well, let's say that it's the numbers game I especially don't like. What I said was to say this talent gets 400 units regardless of the impact on that community, that is not the way to determine how you build affordable housing because it does not reflect at all what the infrastructure does to that community. Let's talk about one of the questions that was raised.

There have been proposals that employees who work in the town or let's say that they should have priorities or a priority to live in that town with affordable housing. If you have a teacher or you have a police officer who lives in a town and the town's too expensive, there's been plenty of proposals to make some sense that those individuals who need the affordable housing should have some priority. That's been rejected numerous times by the majority party, by the Democrats.

The pilot program that was brought up, that is a good point. Taxes from a pilot program, whatever they may be, go to the municipality and not to the schools. That should be considered by the legislature. The schools should not be completely ignored if a pilot is actually determined to be necessary in the community. Consequently, that's a legitimate argument in terms of people being deeply concerned about pilots. I don't know if I covered all of it. Every possible issue regarding affordable housing was brought up, so I don't know if I've--

Brian Lehrer: Well, that's okay. We don't have to do everything all at once. In fact, we're hoping to have enough time between now and June to do a couple of rounds with the major candidates in the primaries for mayor of New York and governor of New Jersey. We have about five minutes left for today. Now, I'll ask about being a critic of Trump in a Republican primary. The Politico article, when you launched your campaign a year ago, it was last January, was Anti-Trump New Jersey State Senator Jon Bramnick Launches Bid for Governor. Do you accept that, that characterization of you as anti-Trump, Senator?

Senator Bramnick: Well, let me tell you the history here. The history is I didn't endorse Trump even when I was the Republican leader in that House. Chris Christie actually went down and endorsed him. I did not endorse him at any time. Now, of course, my opponents, half the time, they don't like him. The other half the time, they do like him. My feeling was this. You have to set an example for children, for the country.

The lack of humility by the President always struck me as something that was not in the best interest of the country. To me, I've always been a Republican supporter of the Bush family, the Reagans. I, even as a kid, worked for Richard Nixon in an elementary school. I was elected Republican leader for a decade by every Republican in the state, but I feel as if you have to be respectful to people.

You can be tough. You can be principled, but I believe you have to treat people with respect. I think that's really, really important. I just couldn't endorse him because I felt as if that type of image and attitude was not helpful to the Republican Party. I have to tell you something. Let me be clear. Donald Trump lost New Jersey by hundreds of thousands of votes. Jack Ciattarelli also lost by 90,000 votes.

If we're going to win as Republicans in this state, we have to be concerned about New Jersey. The Democrats and moderate Democrats and independents want to vote for a Republican. They want balance in Trenton, but they want me to pledge my allegiance to the people of the state of New Jersey, not to one man. I'm never going to pledge my allegiance to one man. I'm just not going to do it.

Brian Lehrer: Who did you vote for for president in November?

Senator Bramnick: Well, I didn't vote for either of the candidates. Let me be clear. I thought Kamala Harris was a terrible candidate. That's one of the reasons Donald Trump did so well in New Jersey. I thought she wasn't clear, she wasn't articulate. I just thought she did not represent the working-class people. I thought she's probably the worst candidate I've seen for president as long as I've been in elections.

She's really bad as a candidate. That's why Donald Trump did really well. This is not a Donald Trump state, the state of New Jersey. It's clearly a state that wants a Republican, wants balance, but they also want somebody who they feel they can trust. I can guarantee you that if I win this primary, I will win the general election because I want a district that Democrats win over and over again. I continue to win it because they go, "Bramnick tells the truth."

Brian Lehrer: That's an electability argument. That's interesting that we will throw to your opponents who are closer to Trump in the Republican primary. Do you think your criticism of Trump, though, pertains to state-level issues a governor would deal with or is it more national politics? If you're elected, the Trump policy debates won't mostly affect the state.

Senator Bramnick: Well, the SALT deductions, right? We were able in New Jersey--

Brian Lehrer: Everybody from both parties wants to deal with the SALT deductions, right?

Senator Bramnick: Yes, but it was Trump that took it away. There are substantive issues I have with some of the things that Donald Trump did. I respect the office of the presidency, but I don't think that he makes it easier for a New Jersey Republican to win a statewide election. I just have never been a fan. At least I've been consistent. When you speak to the other candidates, one said they didn't vote for him in 2016. I believe the other one said he's a failure. Now, all of a sudden, everybody's his best friend, right? I'm just being consistent in terms of how I feel. I think I'm the oldest of the candidates, meaning that I'm less likely to change my views for political purposes.

Brian Lehrer: To wrap it up, I said you do stand-up sometimes. Here for our listeners is a 20-second clip from an appearance you did in 2022 as recorded by Fox.

Senator Bramnick: I don't know if you saw the most recent polls about the New Jersey legislature. They weren't great. Only 11% of people in New Jersey thought we were doing a good job. That wasn't so bad until you read the rest of the poll. 14% of people in New Jersey thought they saw a UFO last week.

[laughter]

Brian Lehrer: You got your laugh. Was that a real number, the state legislature with an 11% approval rating?

Senator Bramnick: I have no idea.

Brian Lehrer: [laughs]

Senator Bramnick: It was improv comedy. I don't even know when I wrote it, so no clue whatsoever. If it makes people laugh and it's not harsh, I say it.

Brian Lehrer: That UFO line, it was funny in 2022 to that audience. Now, we've had the recent unidentified drone sightings in the state that many say are no laughing matter. It's gone from the news now as quickly as it appeared somehow. Do you think there's any real threat from those drones?

Senator Bramnick: Probably not and here's why. Every time one of the Congress people, United States Senate, or a governor had a classified briefing, they came out and said, "Everything's okay." My guess is not all of us have got classified briefings. The ones who did seem to be comfortable, so I'm assuming there's no threat. Because if there was a threat, I think these elected officials at the federal level or the governor would have told us.

Brian Lehrer: 30 seconds. You mentioned Ciattarelli lost to Murphy by 90,000 votes. It sounds like a lot when you put it that way, but it was only 3 percentage points and he's running again for the nomination. Why would you be better positioned to win or a better governor than Jack Ciattarelli?

Senator Bramnick: Well, first, you forgot the fact that it was 44 years since an incumbent Democrat who had served their four-year terms wasn't taken out by a Republican. He lost an election that, over the last half a century, a Republican candidate won. In terms of my experience, you're talking about Republican leader for 10 years, a senator, a local councilman, 20 years in the legislature, worked with every governor. I get along with every governor. I have watched every issue. I have sat in the room with the governor. I've negotiated changes. I've negotiated deals with the governor. My experience of 20 years in the legislature is far superior to any other candidate running, including Jack or Bill Spadea or Ed Durr. Not even close.

Brian Lehrer: Jon Bramnick running for the Republican gubernatorial nomination in New Jersey this year. The first interview in a set that we hope will include all the major candidates in both parties, primaries, as well as the primary candidates for mayor of New York this year in our very consequential election year in our local area. Senator Bramnick, thanks for this time. Thank you very much.

Senator Bramnick: Appreciate the opportunity.

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