Sabrin becomes Senate race attack dog

When Murray Sabrin entered the Republican U.S. Senate primary in January, the conventional wisdom was that, as a member of the Ron Paul wing of the Republican Party, he would draw votes from State Sen. Joe Pennacchio’s conservative base to help the moderate Anne Evans Estabrook shore up her own support for the June primary.

Although it’s still early on in the process, the outcome so far has been the opposite.

Sabrin has turned out to be an attack dog, challenging Estabrook’s Republican credentials and leaving Pennacchio unscathed. That has helped Pennacchio rack up county committee endorsements after winning the hearts of the party’s rank and file at conventions, while some of Estabrook’s exploratory committee members have started wavering in their support.

“I know that in some circles they were probably doing cartwheels and high fives when Murray got into the race, but my focus wasn’t Murray. It’s just doing what I’m doing,” said Pennacchio.

Pennacchio has issued some press releases attacking Estabrook, most recently for her promise to donate $1.6 million to her campaign, and then splitting that in half to $800,000 for both the primary and general election. Had Estabrook donated $1.6 million to just her primary campaign, the “millionaire’s amendment” would have kicked in, allowing Pennacchio and Sabrin to increase the cap on their maximum donations from $2,300 to anywhere from $4,300 to $11,500 per donor.

But the bulk of criticism has come from Sabrin, beginning soon after the New Jersey Presidential primary. Last month, he issued a press release attacking three donations to Democrats that Estabrook had made, calling her a “Democratic wolf wrapping herself in Republican sheep clothing.” He then went on to repeat Pennacchio’s criticism, accusing Estabrook of violating Federal Election Commission laws.

Although Estabrook’s donations to Sen. Bob Menendez, Assemblywoman Linda Stender and the Democratic State Committee had already been reported, Sabrin’s attacks helped convince Warren County GOP Chairman Doug Steinhardt, a member of Estabrook’s exploratory committee, to back Pennacchio.

“Warren County is a pretty die-hard Republican County,” said Steinhardt. “And the problem was that when some of the revelations were made about some of the contributions that she had made, I got some backlash from some of my strongest county committee supporters.”

The most devastating attack of the primary race so far has come from Sabrin’s camp, with the video they circulated of Estabrook shuffling through her notes for 24 seconds in order to finish her answer on a gun rights question at a Republican event in Woodbridge. Since that video’s success in being promulgated in political circles (and turned into a Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee ad), Sabrin has offered five $1,000 prizes to anyone who can get footage of Estabrook answering similar questions.

Just today, Sabrin issued a press release calling on Estabrook to release the names of all of the lawyers, lobbyists and consultants that she has done any business with over the course of the last two years.

"Anne Estabrook is trying to buy the election and the Republican Party cannot allow her to get away with it,” said Sabrin in the release.

Both conservatives disavow any hint of a concerted effort to take out Estabrook, and Pennacchio confides that it would be an easier race for him without someone running on his right. Still, Sabrin has done much of the dirty work, allowing Pennacchio to keep his hands relatively clean. And none of Sabrin’s criticism has been aimed at Pennacchio.

“Some people say it’s a conspiracy. I ain’t that smart,” said Pennacchio. “…I find it hard to be critical of Murray and, in a lot of ways, he might find it hard to be critical of me. On a lot of the meat and potato issues we’re the same.”

Pennacchio has said repeatedly that, FEC reports aside, he doesn’t want to talk about any of the candidates but himself and the issues he’s running on.

Estabrook campaign manager Mark Duffy doesn’t buy it. On Friday, Estabrook pulled out of a taping of NJN’s “On the Record with Michael Aron,” citing her opponents’ “gutter” campaign tactics. Pennacchio, Duffy said, has brought the race down a notch by his FEC complaint and by questioning Estabrook’s conservative credentials. Duffy added that Sabrin is running the race the same way he ran his statewide races for Governor in 1997 (as a Libertarian) and U.S. Senate in 2000 (as a Republican).

“I think that Murray Sabrin is doing what Murray Sabrin does best: attacking the best Republican candidate to defeat the Democrats in November,” said Duffy. “If we had it Murray Sabrin’s way, we would have had Jim McGreevey four years sooner than we did.”

Duffy is unfazed by the string of losses Estabrook has suffered at GOP conventions, saying that the race is a “marathon, not a sprint.”

“Clearly our opponents want to take the race into the gutter. We’re not going to join them there. The reason why they’re attacking is because Anne is the frontrunner,” he said.

But a poll released yesterday by Rasmussen Reports could give Estabrook reason to worry. In a general election match up, Pennacchio trails incumbent Democrat Frank Lautenberg by eight points, ahead of Estabrook, who is down by 10 and Sabrin, by 15.

Sabrin said that he didn’t enter the race to be a spoiler for anyone, and wouldn’t say which of the two candidates he would prefer if he wasn’t in it. And although his campaign has been aggressive in its politicking, he said that he’d rather talk about the major issues facing the country than YouTube videos.

“I don’t know who I’m helping or hurting. All I know is that I’m presenting a message to the people of New Jersey that is resonating,” said Sabrin. “This could be the greatest financial crisis in our history, or the world’s history, and we’re discussion minutiae as far as I’m concerned.”

Monmouth University pollster Patrick Murray compared Sabrin’s role in the campaign so far to John Edwards during his last days in the Democratic primary. He spent most of his energy criticizing Hillary Clinton, hurting her but not helping his own campaign either.

“Edwards basically shot himself in the foot by giving Obama a clear shot to move forward, and I think that’s what Sabrin is doing right now,” he said. “Leaving Pennacchio alone and going after Estabrook is only going to hurt him and Estabrook, and Pennacchio comes out of this pretty clean.”

Murray said that, with the primary not until June and a low turnout expected then, it’s too early to tell just how much of an impact Sabrin will really have in the race. But Estabrook hasn’t been aggressive enough in responding to his attacks, and skipping out on televised appearances with the other candidates isn’t helping.

“When you want to avoid these conflicts, you’ve got to get in there and explain why you deserve their votes, and she’s not doing that,” he said.