John Crowley

Andy Unanue will drop out of the U.S. Senate race before the filing deadline on Monday, according to sources familiar with the GOP campaign.  The millionaire Goya Foods heir entered the race on Easter Sunday and has captured organization lines in Atlantic, Camden, Cape May, Hudson, Mercer, Monmouth, and Ocean counties.  He returned from an extended trip to Colorado today.

Biotech millionaire John Crowley will enter the race for U.S. Senate before the April 7 filing deadline and is poised to receive some organization support in his bid for the GOP nomination.  Republican sources suggest that at least one candidate will defer to Crowley and drop out of the race next week.

Two of Joseph Pennacchio’s top staffers have left the campaign.  Yesterday was the last day for communications director Chris Pordon and Sean DiSomma, the political and field director.  Pennacchio’s campaign manager, Dan Gallic, says that the two operatives were only signed on through the convention. 

Republican presidential candidate John McCain, who weighed in on New Jersey politics on Wednesday when he called biotech millionaire John Crowley and asked him to run for the U.S. Senate, has cancelled his veterans event in Burlington County next week.

State Sen. Joe Pennacchio won Somerset County tonight, easily rolling over his only opponent, Andy Unanue, at the Somerset County convention.

Pennacchio won almost 80% of the vote, getting 247 votes to Unanue’s 51. 

Pennacchio already has the county line in Passaic, Bergen, Middlesex, Hunterdon and Salem Counties, along with hometown status in Morris County. 

Volunteers for possible U.S. Senate candidate John Crowley – directed by former Republican State Committee Executive Director Brian Nelson – were circulating nominating petitions tonight at the Somerset County GOP convention.   At the request of several Republican U.S. Senators, including presidential candidate John McCain and NRSC Chairman John Ensign, Crowley is reconsidering his decision not to run.

Sen. John Ensign (R-NV), the Chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, spoke to Andy Unanue today and told him that his first choice as the GOP Senate candidate is biotech millionaire John Crowley – but that Unanue is his second choice, according to a source close to Republican strategist.

From Colorado, Goya Foods millionaire Andy Unanue seems upset with John Crowley, who still hasn’t let him know if he’s in or out of the race for U.S. Senator.  Unanue told some Republican leaders today that now he is not likely to defer to Crowley. 

Senate candidate Murray Sabrin plans to attend the Somerset County Republican convention tonight, but he may not be allowed to participate.

Republican Chairman Dale Florio told Sabrin spokesman George Ajjan that Sabrin is welcome to take part, but only if he pledges not to run an alternate slate of freeholder candidates.

The convention will formally endorse a U.S. Senate candidate, along with a Congressional candidate in the seventh district -- which is expected to be the real contest of the evening.

“They could not commit to me that they would not run a slate of candidates, so I advised them that they would be unable to participate in our screening process,” said Florio.

Some Republican leaders, especially those who have expressed the greatest interest in John Crowley’s candidacy, are voicing some frustration this afternoon as they await a final decision of the biotech millionaire’s decision on a bid for the U.S. Senate.