Donald Payne

Two U.S. representatives from separate parties today issued statements explaining their votes on the state Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP).

GOP Rep. Rodney P. Frelinghuysen issued the following statement in explanation of his vote to sustain President George W. Bush's veto of SCHIP:

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Newark Mayor Cory Booker stopped short of giving the “If Frank Lautenberg runs, I’ll support him” line that other Democrats use, saying that he “hasn’t even thought” about who he will back in the 2008 race for U.S. Senate.

That raises an interesting scenario: with two independent polls showing more than six out of ten New Jerseyans -- and a majority of Democrats -- think the 83.667-year-old Lautenberg is too old to serve another six years in the Senate, could Lautenberg lose a Democratic primary?

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The Essex-Hudson tenth district congressional seat has elected just three people over the past 80 years: Fred Hartley, who served from 1929 to 1949, Peter Rodino from 1949 to 1989, and Donald Payne, who won the seat when Rodino retired in 1988.

But in the sixteen years prior to Hartley's election, the seat changed hands seven times.

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It was the perfect setting for an immigration related press conference: an old train terminal in Jersey City’s Liberty State Park, within view of the Statue of Liberty, where countless immigrants poured off ferries from nearby Ellis Island to board trains for points West.

It was here that Gov. Jon Corzine signed an executive order creating a new blue ribbon panel on immigration during a well-choreographed, well-attended event. But there was a less jubilant undertone as well -- it was clear that the Governor did not want the tension that characterized the recent Morristown anti-immigration rally to replicate across the state.

The panel will have 27 members – two state legislators chosen from the black and Hispanic caucus, seven commissioners from state agencies, and 18 members appointed by the Governor. It will be led by Public Advocate Ron Chen for a period of 15 months, with a mission to recommend how to integrate the state’s immigrant population – both legal and illegal – in matters ranging from civil rights, naturalization, healthcare, employment, job training, housing, education and language.

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The YouTube of Newark Mayor Cory Booker making a controversial comment at a Summit fund-raiser in May had been in web circulation for a couple of months, according to the mayor’s staff.

This week, the issue came to the attention of the Newark City Council, and after viewing the YouTube at City Hall after Wednesday's meeting, council members Donald Payne, Ron Rice, Jr., Dana Rone, Anibal Ramos and Luis Quintana condemned the mayor’s remarks. 

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The poetry of the mayor’s phrasing leaves young audiences whispering that Barack Obama has nothing on Cory Booker, but the gruffest old time Newarker-naysayers found - or dragged - some youthful allies here Wednesday to join their baleful chants about managerial mayhem in the city.

The fact that almost half of the children participating in Newark Works’ summer employment program didn’t receive their paychecks on time enabled the anti-Booker forces to fit another generation - and another rack of feathers into their war bonnets as they descended on City Hall to berate a likewise chagrined Newark City Council.

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They may not be the top fundraisers in the state, but don’t count Bill Pascrell or Rush Holt out of seeking Frank Lautenberg’s Senate seat if it ever opens up.

Both Congressmen were careful about the wording of their ambitions, stressing that they fully support Frank Lautenberg and that the idea of an open Senate seat is purely hypothetical. But neither would rule out seeking the seat if it does open up. Read More >

According to its critics, the Newark City Council over the past year has mostly marched to a single drummer - one that couldn’t be found, they say, in the Spirit of Newark Drum and Bugle Corps.

In what was hardly a blow the house down follow-up to last month’s mini Bastille storming of City Hall - but a telling political vignette nonetheless, residents took to the microphone at today’s council meeting to excoriate what they see as a governing body spellbound by Mayor Cory Booker. The council sat there and choked it down for the most part, before pledging to override the administration’s axing of the Spirit of Newark.

It was none other than State Sen. Ronald Rice, defeated by Booker in the mayoral election last year but reanimated with his district 28 primary re-election just last month, who led the charge for the council to take action to preserve the corps. The traveling group of some 100+ young musicians want to go to Pasadena to compete this year. They received $85,000 from the city in 2005, remained on life support with some state funding supplied by Assemblyman William Payne last year, and appeared to be going out on a long tuba note of gloom until Rice complained.

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New Jersey’s thirteen congressional districts could be redrawn for the 2008 general election, although that is not likely to happen.

The Congressional Redistricting Commission appointed in 2001 to reapportion districts after the 2000 census is currently inactive, but has not expired.  A majority of the members of the commission could conceivably call a special meeting and create a new map.

Experts say that because the New Jersey State Constitution is silent regarding the discontinuation of the commission, it is unclear as to legal authority of the mapmakers to meet after the plan is certified.  Since the New Jersey Supreme Court often grants authority even when the law is clear, some insiders believe the map could be redrawn.

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