Arthur Marchand

The race for Governor is a toss-up and Democrats are favored to retain control of the State Assembly, according to a new PolitickerNJ.com Battleground 2009 analysis of state and county campaigns.  This breakdown will include key municipal races in future weeks.

Despite a growing chorus of GOP leaders disgusted by racist remarks police said he made, embattled Republican candidate Lee Lucas today refused to back out of his District 3 Assembly race. 

"It's not even a consideration, and I hope I make their blood boil," Lucas told PolitickerNJ.com. "I'm messing with the Republican leadership. I'm not only not going anywhere, I'm having fun. I'm doing the irish jig."

On learning that he used the N-word in 2006, State Republican Party Chairman Jay Webber, Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce (R-Parsippany) and Gloucester County GOP Chairman Bill Fey all asked Lucas to immediately abort his run.

But the commercial cooking equipment repairman who defeated GOP establishment candidates Arthur Marchand and Gibbstown Mayor George Shivery in the June 2nd primary in this 2-1 Democratic district, said there's no way.

"I have a lot of supporters, I get a lot of phone calls of support - of course, they're all scared," Lucas said. "This is a mountainous wave of propaganda."

PITMAN – He could have been a contender.

Greenwich Township Mayor George Shivery and former Cumberland County surrogate Arthur Marchand were the establishment GOP’s pick for Assembly in the 3rd Legislative District – a place where state Republicans had at least made noise about competing.  But the two lost the primary in an upset to political newcomers Robert Villare and Lee Lucas.  Now a 2006 police report has surfaced that quotes Lucas using a racial slur towards neighbors, and his candidacy is considered sunk.  

“What bothers me the most is we had such a great chance to take one of the positions if not both of them, and Art and I could have won,” said Shivery.

GOP State Assembly candidates Robert Villare and Lee Lucas have never met or spoken, according to Brandon Glurk, Villare’s campaign coordinator.

“They are not currently, nor were they ever running together,” Glurk told PolitickerNJ.com.  “Unfortunately, the state GOP was too incompetent to elect one of their own.  Therefore, Lucas is on the Republican ticket with Chris Christie and Bob Villare, but that is not by choice.”

Gloucester County GOP Chairman Bill Fey and Assembly Majority Leader Alex DeCroce (R-Parsippany) have called on Lucas to drop out of the race following reports of racially insensitive remarks.  DeCroce has said he will not fund the Republican challengers in District 3, even though some GOP strategists had viewed the two Assembly seats as winnable.

Lucas has not been invited to a rally in Gloucester County on Monday featuring Christie and Republican National Chairman Michael Steele.

Republican State Assembly candidate Lee Lucas told neighbors "if you want to act like niggers, go back to Paulsboro," according to a 2006 Greenwich Township police report detailing a neighbor dispute.

"Yeah, I said that," a police officer says Lucas told him.  "It's my freedom of speech. I can say what I want while I'm on my property."

Newly-elected Gloucester County GOP Chairman Bill Fey and Assembly Majority Leader Alex DeCroce (R-Parsippany) have called on Lucas to drop out of the race amidst other allegations of racially insensitive remarks.  Don't expect Lucas to leave the race anytime soon. 

Sources say that Lucas was not invited to attend an event in Gloucester County on Monday that will feature GOP gubernatorial candidate Christopher Christie and Republican National Chairman Michael Steele.  Steele, who is African American, will likely be asked if he supports Lucas, the winner of the June 2 Republican primary.

Police were called when Lucas was shouting at three neighbors he accused of cutting down a tree at his Gibbstown home. 

Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce (R-Parsippany) is having a tough year playing the candidate recruitment game this year. 

At the start of the campaign season, only four districts were viewed as potentially competitive for the Republicans: District 1, a GOP-leaning district where Democrats hold two Assembly seats and will not have the benefit of coattails from popular State Sen. Jefferson Van Drew (D-Upper); District 3, where four-term Assemblyman Douglas Fisher gave up his seat to become state Secretary of Agriculture; District 14, which has elected Democratic and Republican legislators in each of the last four elections; and District 36, where two Democratic Assemblymen were re-elected by a relatively narrow margin two years ago and where the EnCap/Xanadu issues have taken a toll on local candidates.

But the GOP has not done well recruiting or nominating their strongest candidates.  Their top choice in the 36th district, East Rutherford Councilman Joel Brizzi, changed his mind about running and dropped out between his announcement and filing day.  Some Republicans think there might be more to the story, suggesting that State Sen. Paul Sarlo (D-Sanzari) might have helped alter the field.

The top GOP recruits in the 14th, Hamilton Councilwoman Kelly Yaede and former Cranbury Councilman Wayne Wittman, ended their campaigns just days before the GOP nominating conventions.  Republicans wound up with a primary between second choice candidates, and DeCroce had to spend money to nominate two political unknowns.

In District 3, Republicans worked to recruit Arthur Marchand, a top-tier challenger who had served as Cumberland County Surrogate, Freeholder and Prosecutor.  But Marchand and his running mate, East Greenwich Mayor George Shivery, lost the GOP primary by a razor thin margin.

Former Cumberland County Surrogate Arthur Marchand will not request a recount for the Republican state Assembly primary in the 3rd Legislative District, which he lost by a tiny margin.

"I think they know how to count the votes and it would be a fool's errand," said Marchand, who as of yesterday trailed rival Lee Lucas by 66 votes.

Marchand said that even if he beat Lucas - an unlikely scenario given the small number of provisional ballots cast in the district -- he would not want to run with Dr, Robert Villare, who was far and away the top vote getter.

"I'm supposed to run with a guy who says there are too many attorneys and career politicians in Trenton, and a guy who has a residency issue?" he said, referring to the fact that Villare only registered to vote in New Jersey in March and voted in Delaware as recently as November.

With the upset victory of Robert Villare and possibly his running mate, Lee Lucas, in the 3rd Legislative District's Republican primary for state Assembly, state Republicans have largely given up hope of competing there.

As of election night, the only clear victor was Robert Villare, a surgeon from West Deptford.  For the other Assembly seat, Lee Lucas, a commercial oven repairman who has run for freeholder and Greenwich council before, led Arthur Marchand, a former Cumberland County Prosecutor, Surrogate and Freeholder, by 66 votes.  Greenwich Township Mayor George Shivery trailed slightly behind.  So far, nobody has requested a recount, although candidates have 15 days to do so.  

"At this point, it is not likely we will commit any monetary resources," said Assembly Republican Victory Executive Director Mark Duffy.

The political arm of the Assembly Republicans recruited Marchand into the race.  He agreed, but only after extracting a promise that they would put a significant amount of money into the district.  But those same Republicans think that Villare and Lucas have liabilities that will weigh them down in a race against incumbent Democrats Celeste Riley (R-Bridgeton) and John Burzichelli (R-Paulsboro).

Two Assembly races, both GOP primaries, appear headed for a recount.  In District 3, Lee Lucas leads Arthur Marchand, a former Cumberland County Surrogate, Prosecutor and Freeholder, by 46 votes.  Marchand's running mate, East Greenwich Mayor George Shivery, ran 171 votes behind.  Dr. Robert Villare, a surgeon and first-time candidate, will be one of the two Republicans to face the Democratic incumbents, John Burzichelli (R-Paulsboro) and Celeste Riley (R-Bridgeton).  In District 23, Hunterdon County Freeholder Erik Peterson is 57 votes ahead of Edward Smith, who is Chief of Staff to Assemblyman Michael Doherty (R-Oxford).

Gloucester County Republican Chairwoman Loran Oglesby, who nominated herself to run for freeholder this year as a placeholder candidate, said that she may remain on the ballot if she wins the June primary - depending on the outcome of the party's leadership contest between her and opponent Bill Fey the week after the primary.

"We'll have to wait and see what happens on June 9, but Mr. Fey and his group made it extremely difficult to find another freeholder candidate," she said.  "The people we did speak with said they didn't want their names drubbed through web sites with personal attacks.

Oglesby, the two-term head of a beleaguered party that holds no county-wide offices or state legislative seats, faces a revolt led by Fey and former freeholder candidate Phyllis Scapellato.  Not only is Fey challenging Oglesby for the chairmanship on June 9, but his faction is running a full slate of candidates against the organization's partial slate.  Add to that gubernatorial candidate Steve Lonegan's team of candidates, and there are three slates competing for the chance to run a long-shot campaign against well-entrenched Democrats.

Oglesby is paired with Mullica Hill resident Stephen W. Austin for freeholder.  On Fey's team, running with the slogan "Gloucester County Republicans" are Scapellato and Larry Wallace, who both ran with the organization's backing last year.  Lonegan's slate has West Deptford resident Matthew Burns and Mantua resident Ron Brittin running for freeholder.

The state legislative races are another story.  In the 3rd District, there's a four-way primary race between Art Marchand, George Shivery, Lee Lucas and Robert Villare.  Marchand and Shivery are bracketed together and have the backing of Fey's faction.  Although many insiders consider Lucas and Villare the Oglesby-backed candidates, she never officially endorsed them.  In District 4, Fey-backed Domenick DiCicco is paired with the Camden GOP's Eugene E.T. Lawrence.  But Oglesby-backed Andrew Savicky, who is running alone, is taking them on in the primary.