Curley huddles with lawyers in Monmouth on the last day a candidate can contest results

Not so fast, says John Curley of Middletown Township.

The GOP’s Monmouth County Freeholder candidate convenes with fellow party members and attorneys this morning to determine if he should contest the results of his close race with Democrat Amy Mallet.

“There has been so much that’s transpired in this election,” says Curley. “We’re going to get some hard evidence and based on that either proceed, or concede.”

Following the provisional ballot count yesterday at the Board of elections office, Mallet unofficially defeated Curley by 343 votes.

Although counting didn’t finish until after 6 p.m. Tuesday, Curley says he climbed into his car at 4:30 p.m. only to hear a radio news report announcing Mallet’s victory.

“I thought, ‘that’s interesting,’” Curley says.

Democrats interpret Tuesday’s results as an over the top win for Mallet, who led on the initial machine tallies by 18 votes.

“It was a good win,” says State Democratic Chairman Joseph Cryan. “Everyone knows you build on the county level up, and it’s a reflection of (Monmouth County Democratic Party Chairman) Vic Scudiery’s leadership. Vic has been supporting the Democratic Party his whole life, and he deserves this.”

Sources say he Democrats spent about $300,000 on trying to elect Mallet and her unsuccessful running mate, retired Hazlet police detective Glenn Mason.

When the initial vote tallies came in on Election Night, Republicans were puzzled by the disparity of votes between Mallet (135,688 or 25.30 percent) and Mason (127,699 or 23.81 percent), considering the pair ran in virtual lockstep.   

Monmouth County Democratic Party Director Michael Mangan chalks up Mallet’s out-performance of running mate Mason to two factors.

“Remember, she ran for the Legislature last year, and in the county race she did well in the 12th District, in those towns where people knew her,” Mangan says. “Another thing we found, too, was women voted for women. Both (GOP incumbent Freeholder Director) Lillian Burry and Amy both got more votes than the men.”