State Sen. Ellen Karcher’s call for the resignation of two fellow Democratic legislators is an election year gimmick, according to her Republican opponent, Assemblywoman Jennifer Beck.

Karcher’s statement today calling for the resignations of Sharpe James and Wayne Bryant comes five months after Beck first called on her to seek Bryant’s ouster, and four days after Democratic State Chairman Joseph Cryan gave her cover by urging the two indicted Senators to quit.

Since September, Beck has issued regular press releases pressuring Karcher and the Democratic leadership to take disciplinary action against scandal-plagued Senate colleagues. Even before Bryant was indicted in March, Beck had already made three bids for Bryant’s removal from the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee and to pressure him to step down.

The New Jersey Supreme Court announced today the censured Associate Justice Roberto Rivera-Soto for his role in a 2006 incident involving his son and a teammate on a high school football team.

The court agreed with a judicial conduct panel that Rivera-Soto "engaged in a course of conduct that created a risk that the prestige and power of his judicial office might influence and advance a private matter."