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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC, and the news you might've missed with yesterday's impeachment drama, Governor Murphy gave his State of the State address on Tuesday and used his speech in part to tout New Jersey's response to the coronavirus pandemic and his record on jobs and weed, kicking off his reelection campaign. Yes, Governor Murphy is up for reelection this year, beginning with a primary in June. In an intriguing development on the Republican side this week, the New Jersey Republican Party chairman, Doug Steinhardt, a staunch supporter of President Trump, who was going to run for governor, abruptly dropped out of that race.

As we look ahead to the primaries in June and the general election in November and hear what else we should know from the State of the State, I'm joined now by Nancy Solomon, managing editor for New Jersey Public Radio and WNYC's New Jersey desk. Hey, Nancy. Always great to have you.

Nancy Solomon: Thanks, Brian. Good morning.

Brian: Let's start on the GOP side. Who is Doug Steinhardt, for people who don't know, and why did he drop out of the race?

Nancy: He is a lobbyist and he was the chair until recently of the State Republican Party, and he had announced his bid for the Republican primary for governor and doubled down on his support of Donald Trump and accused the other main rival, Jack Ciattarelli, a former assemblyman who had run in the primary last time around and had lost the GOP primary to Kim Guadagno. Steinhardt had doubled down on with his support of Trump and had also called out Ciattarelli for pretending to be a Trumpist but is trying to play it play both sides. Then abruptly this week, Steinhardt pulled out of the race following what had happened in Washington, saying that he had a professional opportunity that he needed to take care of.

Brian: A professional opportunity, and maybe he wants to spend more time with his family. Another person who won't be entering the race-- and it's interesting how the dynamics around Donald Trump are now affecting state politics in New Jersey. Another one who won't be entering the race is Republican assemblyman and minority leader, Jon Bramnick, who you asked if he'd run and he responded this way.

Jon Bramnick: No, no, I'm not going to run. I think it's possible that if this scenario had been the latter part of last year, as I traveled through the state, the support for the Trump wing of the Republican party was way too strong for me to overcome it. That's why you saw people like Jack Ciattarelli go to the Trump rally, and you saw so much pro-Trumpism because the base of the party still supported Trump. Now, whether that's changed or not, I haven't polled it, and it's too late right now for me to reenter the race.

Brian: Let's transition now to Governor Murphy, and in this context with a lot of Republicans shy about running to face him, despite frustrations that some progressives have expressed about Governor Murphy, you say in your reporting that his State of the State address seemed to be a wishlist of progressive causes. Explain.

Nancy: It was astounding, really. He ticked through 27, I counted, and I might've missed a few, 27 different accomplishments. It was a love letter to progressives. The reason why I found that surprising is that he had been showing signs over the last few months of starting to run to the center, as statewide candidates often do for election purposes, and so he had made some deals with the centrist and machine-backed leaders of the Democratic Party in the legislature, and progressives were furious and felt betrayed by some of the recent decisions he'd made on the corporate tax break program, on the redistricting commission.

These are all big, huge issues in the state. About a fracked gas terminal on the Delaware River, to take a gas that's fracked in Pennsylvania. On ballot-- well, ballot reform, he hasn't said anything about it. That an issue that's still bubbling under the surface. Progressives had been angered and then he comes out with this speech that is just-- I mean, it had everything in it. It had everything he's done, which is fair, it's right to say, he has been a progressive governor and he has actually gotten a lot done

Brian: Listeners, we can take your calls for Nancy Solomon, our New Jersey Public Radio managing editor. How about the State of the State, according to you Garden Staters, or how's Governor Murphy doing for you as he starts to run for reelection, Garden Staters? 646-435-7280, 646 435-7280, or tweet @BrianLehrer. Let's stay on that question of voting for a second, and ballot reform. Will voting look any different this year than it did last year or other years in the past? New Jersey was one of those states that sent actual ballots to every registered voter, so controversial to President Trump, but also to be fair, brand new to New Jersey, so did it work, and are they going to make this permanent?

Nancy: The experiment did work. There was the highest turnout numbers ever, and the results came in in a pretty decent amount of time, so it did work. I think what Murphy has said he wants to do, is post-pandemic he wants to bring back in-person voting and have it be an option to either vote by mail, so everyone gets a ballot. This is the distinction between absentee voting, where you request a ballot. This is where every single voter gets a ballot in the mail, and you can choose whether to mail it in or not. Then he said in his State of the State that he wants to move towards early voting, which of course New Yorkers are very familiar with.

I think what he wants to do is move towards early voting, which is obviously can be done by mail, but also in-person election day voting by machine and universal vote by mail, where everybody gets a ballot, and so that's where he's going. It's an expensive proposition because the voter polls need to be digitized, and they need an electronic system so that when someone goes to the polls, it can be quickly identified as a person who's already voted by mail. That's what held the state back from doing it this year, but they say they want to invest in that technology.

Brian: Is Governor Murphy going to get primaried?

Nancy: So far there's been no hint of it. I wondered after he had really frustrated both progressives and environmentalists with some of his recent decisions, but so far there's been really-- nobody has emerged. Listen, he's got 60% approval ratings. Patrick Murray of the Monmouth Polling Institute said if that holds, and we don't know that it will, but if that holds, he's reelected easily. You don't go down when you have 60% approval ratings.

The big question is if we get to a point at the end of the summer and as the election campaign really picks up in September, if we get to a point where the virus is in the view mirror but the economy in the dumps and we have 10% unemployment, which is what we have now, then that's a problem for Murphy. I don't think we'll see a primary challenge, but he could be facing a tough reelection fight against a Republican if that situation occurs, where we're no longer afraid of COVID but we're still struggling with the after-effects with the economy. Let's not forget John Corzine was facing 10% unemployment when he ran for reelection, and Chris Christie beat him.

Brian: Right. He wasn't supposed to lose at the beginning of that race, John Corzine. We talked earlier about the Republicans who were not going to run against Murphy, who is trying to run against Murphy?

Nancy: Jack Ciattarelli is the leading mainstream candidate, and he's a former assemblyman. I think he's considered a moderate Republican by most accounts, but he flirted with Trump supporters recently, showing up at some of their protests before the general election, and these were protests-- It was noted that people were waving Confederate flags, and here he is supporting this group at this protest. He hasn't wanted to answer questions about where he stands on all things Trump; what it's been like the last couple of months. The question has been, "Do you support that Joe Biden won the election?" Those kinds of questions, he has really shied away from and hidden from.

This is a problem that Republicans have every four years in New Jersey. It's a national issue, right? They need to run to the right to win the primary, and they need to swing back to the center to win the general. It's becoming increasingly more and more difficult given this divided ultra-conservative Republican party, the difference between Republicans and Democrats right now.

Brian: Ben in Hoboken, you're on WNYC with Nancy Solomon, our New Jersey Public Radio managing editor. Hi, Ben.

Ben: Hi. How are you?

Brian: Good.

Ben: Can you hear me?

Brian: I can hear you.

Ben: I just wanted to ask Ms. Solomon how she believes the current marijuana bill is going to play out now that it's been sitting on Governor Murphy's desk for over a week. Thanks.

Nancy: Good question.

Brian: Can you explain that? Because-

Nancy: Yes.

Brian: -I think a lot of people who may not be following this closely, including me, know that this passed in a referendum. We did a segment on the legislature, had come to an agreement on the details of how to roll out legal recreational cannabis. There's a bill and Governor Murphy hasn't signed it?

Nancy: Yes. The voters have approved it, but it requires legislative action to come up with laws and regulations of how this will happen. Initially, the governor had fought with the legislature over how the money that comes in on the sale of marijuana, the sales tax on it, and the excise tax, how that would be spent, and whether reparations to Black communities that had been harmed by the war on drugs would see some of that money. That was initially the fight that was going on.

Then they resolved that one. Then just as the bill was coming up for a vote, and it seemed that they had this compromise worked out, a few legislators from the Legislative Black Caucus raised the issue of what about what's going to happen in the criminal justice system for people under the age of 21 who it is not legal for them to possess marijuana? What if they're caught with it? We're going to have the same exact problem that we've had all along of young Black and brown kids being thrown in jail over marijuana. That's where things have broken down.

The legislature when that objection came up, they just kicked it back to the governor, like, "We're not going to make any more changes. You deal with this." They kicked it back to him, like, "Sign our original bill. We can't come up with a solution." They did that pretty quickly. Now he's working with them. He says he expects to have agreement soon. He's saying, "Of course, marijuana is not going to be legal for people under 21." That was very clear what voters voted on. They're trying to figure out how to make the criminal justice system now not be unduly unfair to kids of color.

Brian: Speaking of which, Kathy in Mendham, you're on WNYC with Nancy Solomon. Hi, Kathy.

Kathy: Hi, Brian. Hi, Ms. Solomon. I love Murphy. I think that his heart is typically in the right place and he's doing as much as he can. The fact that the county jails have entered into contracts with ICE, which I think are contracts with the devil, to hold people. I feel that that's criminal and immoral. You have to answer for that at the polls. I'm just wondering, does Ms. Solomon know what his action plan is for that?

Nancy: Well, I don't know what his action plan is. I agree with you that it is a political problem for him. As you probably understand, this is an issue that is controlled by the county commissions. Thankfully now, since we are after January 1st, 2021, we call them commissions and not freeholders. This is really up to them. There's a really interesting side story, which is really a central story to all of this, which is that the counties are a major seat of power in New Jersey, because every county commission is either one party or the other. It's the way counties are in New Jersey that either the Democrats or the Republicans pretty much have a lock on the county commission board.

The party committee makes endorsements and gives preferential treatment to candidates, which is called the county line, on the ballot. This gives them an enormous amount of power. I'm trying to make a link here. Maybe I didn't explain it as clearly. The link is from the party machine to the county commission, which makes the decision on the county jail. It operates the jail, it controls the jail's budget, it controls all the contracts. Then you've got a governor who is beholden to the county party machines to get his name placed in the preferential spot on the ballot. It's a very complicated twisted issue. I think Governor Murphy probably just wants to stay as far away from it as possible.

Brian: Hopefully, that answers your question. Judy in Long Branch, you're on WNYC. Hi, Judy.

Judy: Hi. How are you?

Brian: Good. Thank you.

Judy: I have a question about senior citizens and property taxes. When Governor Murphy, when he first ran, he had promised that all the seniors no senior would lose their home due to the high taxes. There was a property tax relief form, is called PTR. The way it works was at the age of 65, when you were 65 years old, whatever your property taxes were that year, they would be frozen and you would be paying your regular taxes upfront. Then you'd fill out a form that came to you every year and you would get the difference between the property taxes of what they were when you were 65 and what you had to pay out when you were-- like now I'm 73, mine doubles.

I would get that money back. I got that money back last year. It was almost $3,000. I'm wondering, is this coming back because it's gone? They took it away. Reason for it was COVID. Nobody has said anything about when or if it will be returning. As a 73, almost 74-year-old person, widow, who has a house, who's trying really hard to pay taxes, and lost all my jobs, so I had to go work at the shop as a cashier.

Brian: Wow. Because of property taxes?

Judy: Because of property taxes. I am serious when I tell you my taxes are almost $6,000 on a 1,000 square foot house.

Brian: Judy, I'm so glad you called because I think this issue, and Nancy, maybe you could confirm that that promise of Governor Murphy has been suspended now to freeze property taxes in some respect for senior citizens. There was a time when we talked about a gubernatorial election year in New Jersey. The first thing, and we could talk about it for hours and hours if we let the phone calls determine it, was always property taxes. Now, of course, we have little things like insurrection and pandemic, and property taxes have fallen off the radar. Listen to Judy's story. What's going on?

Nancy: Actually, I would ask the producer to get Judy's contact because I would like to get back to her. I am not entirely clear. There were a couple of different property tax rebate programs, and I just don't have the information at the top of my head to be able to reel it off accurately. I will say this, she's absolutely right. Property taxes are just horribly high, and it is a huge problem in the state. It has taken a back seat recently. I do think that this is one of the points of real political peril for Governor Murphy and that he will be facing a Republican candidate who's going to hammer him on the fact that property taxes are so high, and it still matters deeply to people because--

My property taxes are higher than my mortgage payment every month. It's crippling for anyone. It eats up all of your disposable income, if you can afford your property taxes. It is a huge problem, and I think it's the one area where-- It's a very hard problem to solve. I could give him a little bit of wiggle room there, but it has been a problem that he has not talked about it enough and he hasn't done enough about it. I believe those rebates are coming back, but I'd like to follow up and get back to you.

Brian: For a governor with a high approval rating, and 60% is considered high in politics, you've pointed to a few things where he's really not making the grade as far as a lot of people would be concerned. If he's not succeeding in controlling property taxes and people like Judy can get into the situation that she described, and to the previous caller, if the governor is just trying to stay away from this contracts with ICE business, there are definitely places where the image that he tries to project of a strong actor isn't really accurate.

Nancy: Yes. I think he's trying to deal with a situation in which it's a nearly impossible problem to solve because what we have is, we have such a high cost of living, and so how do you continue to raise the salaries of teachers who live in our communities and at the same time lower property taxes or raise the salaries of firefighters and police officers so they can afford to live in the communities they protect? It's a really difficult issue. It's the third rail of New Jersey politics, but Chris Christie didn't solve the problem. Tom Kean Senior, one of the most now popular governors in our recent history, didn't solve the problem.

I wouldn't want to paint him too much in a corner and say he has completely failed. I'll tell you what he says, which is, "Yes, our property taxes are high, but you get good value for your money. You live in a state with the best public education system in the country, with fantastic transportation sitting between lovely suburbs, sitting between two major cities." He will reel off what is great about New Jersey and say it's expensive and we pay for it.

Brian: We're just about out of time. I'm going to ask you one more thing that has to do with public safety. Right now, are you aware of any steps to secure the capitol in Trenton in the wake of the violence we saw in Washington last week and the FBI warning of potential attacks at capitols around the country in the coming days, state capitols?

Nancy: Governor Murphy was asked about it at his COVID briefing on Monday, and his message was, "Rest assured we're on it." He had his director of the State Homeland Security Department there, and they said they are increasing security at multiple state sites around New Jersey, and the capitol in Trenton will be secured. He made a call out to counter-protesters who may want to go to Trenton to counter the Trump supporters, and pleaded with them not to, to stay home, but of course, it's their First Amendment right to go. He was just saying it would be a lot better if you stayed home, and then we wouldn't have that problem to deal with, of possible clashes and violence.

I think they're definitely on it, and they're doing the typical thing of saying, "If you see something, say something." They want people to reach out to the state police or the Department of Homeland Security if you see anything suspicious, but they are fully aware and have people ready to go.

Brian: Nancy Solomon, New Jersey Public Radio managing editor. Thanks, Nancy.

Nancy: Thanks, Brian.

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