Frank Pallone

RED BANK - After weathering a roomful of angry residents tonight who called him everything from "liar" to "socialist" to Speaker Nancy Pelosi "lackey" to illegal alien enabler, U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone (D-Long Branch) said he failed to hear an argument to change his mind about the need for a public healthcare option.

'No, I have to be honest, so much of it is misconceptions," Pallone told reporters as 250 residents who attended the first round of this town hall meeting filed out of the Red Bank Middle School auditorium to make way for another 250.

The congressman, who chaired the committee and helped craft the healthcare reform bill which made it through committee on the House side but which the Senate still has not considered, was ready for a third batch of residents at 10 p.m.

Hundreds more lined up outside the school wouldn't make the cut.

"This program is designed not to impact employer-provided healthcare - most people get healthcare through their employer," said Pallone. "It's desiged to address the problems of those who don't have insurance. ...I'm very proud of the bill."

Monmouth GOP Calls on Citizens to Speak Out Against Frank Pallone’s Bad Medicine for America

President Barack Obama submitted his first seven nominations for U.S. Attorneys on June 4.   The U.S. Senate confirmed five of the seven on August 7, but New Jersey's Paul Fishman was not one of them.  The five who were confirmed came from New York (Southern District), Alabama, Minnesota, New Hampshire and Vermont. 

Until the Senate confirms Fishman, which is unlikely to be any earlier than next month, Acting U.S. Attorney Ralph Marra will remain in the post he's held since Christopher Christie resigned on December 1, 2008 to seek the Republican nomination for Governor.  The Associated Press, citing two unnamed sources, reported earlier this week that the Department of Justice is investigating whether Marra made inappropriate public comments during a high profile announcement of public corruption cases that might have boosted the Christie campaign.

Representatives of New Jersey's two U.S. Senators, Frank Lautenberg (D-Cliffside Park) and Robert Menendez (D-Hoboken), continue to predict a smooth confirmation for Fishman, who jointly recommended his appointment to Obama in February.  But Lautenberg and Menendez have not been able to get the Democratic-controlled Senate to move forward on Fishman.  They have not said why.

U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone (D-Long Branch) says that GOP gubernatorial candidate Christopher Christie has promised state jobs to former federal prosecutors who worked for him and wants Christie to make a full disclosure of the "political overlap between his campaign and the law enforcement responsibilities of his former staff in the US Attorney's Office."

Pallone's statements come after a video of Christie suggesting that he would take a group of Assistant U.S. Attorneys with him to Trenton appeared on the Internet.

"The more we learn about Mr. Christie's penchant for mixing campaign politics with law enforcement the more evidence there is that he has broken the law multiple times," said Pallone. "Breaking the law is bad enough for any federal employee, but it is especially bad by those with the responsibility of enforcing the law impartially and responsibly."

Christie, speaking at an event sponsored by State Sen. Bill Baroni (R-Hamilton), told that audience that "we're going to ferret out waste and fraud and abuse in the government. I think you know I'll do that better than anybody."

I've got a group of assistant U.S. attorneys sitting down in Newark still doing their job. But let me tell you, they are watching the newspapers. And after we win this election, I'm going to take a whole group of them to Trenton with me and put them in every one of the departments because they saw a lot of waste and abuse being investigated while we were in the U.S. Attorney's office that didn't rise to the level of a crime," Christie said.  "So I told them, the good news is, when we get to Trenton we don't have to worry about beyond a reasonable doubt anymore."

Assemblyman Upendra Chivukula (D-Franklin Twp.) at Sunday's Indian Independence Day Parade.

The presence of GOP gubernatorial candidate Chris Christie's float at the Indian Independence Day Parade on Sunday came as a broadside to Democrats who didn't field a rival "Corzine" four-wheeler in what is generally a Democratic Party safe zone.

As reported over the weekend on PolitickerNJ.com, Sheriff Kim Guadagno, the Republican lieutenant governor candidate, stood front and center behind the parade's main banner before going back and climbing aboard Christie's campaign mobile, where she and her sons waved to the crowd.

A 19th District candidate float commanded by Peter Kothari likewise contributed to a sense of GOP dominance.

Assemblyman Upendra Chivukula (D-Franklin Twp.) objected, however, to the interpretation of the event as a Republican victory lap on  Democratic turf.

Freshman U.S. Rep. John Adler (D-Cherry Hill) continues to be a fundraising machine.  According to numbers compiled by the National Journal, Adler has the highest cash on hand of any freshman member of the House, with $869275 in his war chest.  Adler was elected with 51% in 2008, becoming the first Democrat to win his district since Thomas Ferrell in 1884.

New Jersey's thirteen incumbent Congressmen, ranked in order of their war chests:

U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone (D-Long Branch) is asking former U.S. Attorney Christopher Christie for a "clarification" of his testimony before the House Judiciary Commercial and Administrative Law Subcommittee in June.  Pallone is the co-sponsor of legislation to reform the process used to select federal monitors in deferred prosecution agreements.  Christie, who was New Jersey's federal prosecutor from 2002 to 2008, is now the Republican nominee for Governor.

Pallone wants Christie to address his role in setting legal fees for former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft's firm to monitor a DPA with Zimmer Holdings.  Christie had initially said that he was not involved, but e-mails show that had some involvement.

"I would like to offer you the opportunity to try to reconcile your remarks to the subcommittee about your selection of federal monitors," Pallone wrote in a letter to Christie today.

The full text of Pallone's letter:

He may have called it a ‘political circus’ immediately afterwards, but Republican gubernatorial nominee Chris Christie is still glad he testified at a hearing of the House Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law.  

"I am glad I had the opportunity to discuss in detail the good work the U.S. Attorney's office was able to accomplish reforming corrupt industries, protecting taxpayer dollars and ultimately, saving jobs,” said Christie in his post-testimony official statement. 

WASHINGTON – When Republican gubernatorial nominee Chris Christie exited the congressional committee room at 1:30 this afternoon, most of the press and spectators left with him.

The subsequent  lower-profile testimonies U.S. Reps. Bill Pascrell (D-Paterson) and Frank Pallone (D-Long Branch), whose pending legislation regulating the way deferred prosecution agreements are assigned was the ostensible reason for today’s hearing, did not attract the same attention.  

After a panel of experts and a Justice Department official dismissed the need for their legislation in earlier testimony, the two argued for it by exhibiting two sets of invoices. 

State Sen. Joseph Vitale (D-Woodbridge) and Assemblyman/Republican State Chairman Jay Webber (R-Morris Plains) will debate health care in Washington, DC tomorrow.

The two will engage on the issue at the House’s Subcommittee on Health legislative hearing tomorrow at 1pm.  The subcommittee is chaired by New Jersey Rep. Frank Pallone (D-Long Branch)., who invited the two legislators.

“We've done a lot to improve and enhance health care at the state level in New Jersey so a reasoned debate on the issue could be informative," said Pallone, a leader in Congress on health reform. "The states can only do so much but we can still learn from them as we pursue reforms to the nation's health system."