Lionel Leach

Saturday street corner in Newark's Central Ward.

NEWARK - Stunned by an ongoing state investigation into the absentee ballot operations of the North Ward Democratic Organization and up against the reality of a Democratic incumbent governor who doesn't send pulses racing, Newark operatives are counting on the GOTV power of a ginned-up labor movement here - as elsewhere.

"What the union effort does is supplement what's there on the ground," said Assemblyman Thomas Giblin (D-Montclair), president of the Essex-West Hudson Central Labor Council.

"The resurgence of the Democratic Party in New Jersey is a direct consequence of the unpaid union effort, with different labor organizations carving up the city (Newark) and taking different assignments by ward to get a lot of mundane, nitty-gritty jobs done," Giblin added.

To date, the gubernatorial ground game has looked grim for Democrats in Newark, where party members outnumber Republicans, 64,822 to 3,413, but where a state Attorney General's Office investigation into state Sen. Teresa Ruiz's (D-Newark) 2007 senate campaign - run by the city's most powerful political operation - has so far resulted in five indictments and unnerved political street people.

Skies are clearing over Newark's Broad Street now after a brief rain and brief lull in the action, as Hillary Clinton's troops get ready for a last mobilization into the streets to corral after-work voters.

"They'll be going door to door and out to the train station," says Lionel Leach, Clinton's point of contact in the N.J. Teacher's Union building that was converted into Clinton campaign HQ a couple of weeks ago.

Lionel Leach’s comment is really bugging supporters of Newark Mayor Cory Booker.  In an interview with PolitickerNJ.com on Friday, Leach, who identified himself as a spokesman for Hillary Clinton’s campaign in Newark, said that one of the reasons Clinton has done so well gathering endorsements of Democratic officials is because they don’t like Booker.  "I think a lot more elected officials would have supported Barack Obama were it not for (Cory) Booker’s support of Obama,” Leach told PolitickerNJ.com’s Max Pizzaro.  Leach, a well-known Democratic operative, worked for U.S. Senator Robert Menendez until just recently.

Lionel Leach and Jackie Teel, working the phones in Clinton HQ in NewarkWhen Sen. Ronald Rice and North Ward Democratic Party boss Steve Adubato find themselves in the same political foxhole, something is either amiss, or it’s a presidential election year.

In certain company, the lead-up to Tuesday’s historic Democratic Primary contest looks like some incidental skirmish in Newark with here-today, gone-tomorrow alliances, played out as a backdrop to that more fervent chess war between local rivals angling for the real epic of some area city council and freeholder races later this year.

Lionel Leach, Rice’s former campaign field director, serves as spokesman for Sen. Hillary Clinton in her campaign’s week-and-a-half old Broad Street headquarters, even as North Ward Democratic Organization campaign firebrand Sen. M. Teresa Ruiz continues to steel the Latino vote for Clinton in rallies statewide. On the heels of his own family fight with Adubato, U.S. Rep. Donald Payne also intends to do some campaigning for Clinton this weekend.

Watch for a staff change in U.S. Senator Bob Menendez’s office: Lionel Leach is expected to step down as Menendez’s Director of Outreach to pursue other opportunities.