Michael Hsing

State Sen. Leonard Lance leads Assemblywoman Linda Stender by four points in the 7th District Congressional District, according to a Monmouth University poll released today.

Lance leads Stender 41% to 37% among registered voters, and 43% to 39% among likely voters. Both numbers are within the poll’s margin of error, however, and 14% of the district’s voters are undecided.

Former Republican Michael Hsing, who’s running as an independent, attracts about 2% of the vote. That’s far worse than he did in an internal Stender campaign poll, where he attracted 9% of voters.

Congressional candidate Michael HsingBridgewater Councilman Michael Hsing, a Republican-turned-independent to run for Congress in the 7th District, doesn’t see his role in the race as a spoiler for Republican Leonard Lance. Rather, he sees himself as a pinch hitter coming in to relieve Lance, who he doesn’t think can win.

“If I compare Stender and Lance, certainly I will support Lance. But I know Lance probably will not win. If I believed Lance would win, I would not challenge him,” said Hsing. “He doesn’t have fire in the belly, and I have at it.”

Michael Hsing, a Republican Councilman from Bridgewater, is running for Congress as an Independent in the 7th district
If Assemblywoman Linda Stender’s congressional campaign poll numbers are to be believed, then State Sen. Leonard Lance should be worried about Michael Hsing.

Hsing, a councilman from Bridgewater, pulled out of the Republican congressional primary to run as an independent after complaining that Somerset County’s GOP endorsement process was “rigged.”

Now the Stender poll shows her in a close race with Lance, leading him by just three points – 36-33%. That poll has the independent Hsing at 9% -- most of which would presumably belong to Lance otherwise.

Somerset County Republican Chairman Dale Florio, however, doesn’t believe that the poll is accurate.

“I don’t put any credibility into that number. That’s just not a real number,” he said.

Update: Lance campaign response now included.

The Bridgewater Courier-News recently got wind of an overlooked story.

Bridgewater Councilman Michael Hsing, who cast his lot in with many other candidates in the 7th District Republican congressional primary, is running in the general election as an independent. And as of the last Federal Election Commission filing, he had more cash-on-hand than the Republican nominee, State Sen. Leonard Lance (R-Flemington).

Hsing, who’s served on the Bridgewater council for seven years, failed to make a dent in the primary, and decided to forego the nominating convention of his home county of Somerset. Lance, now the Republican nominee, won. Back then, PolitickerNJ’s Max Pizarro reported on rumors swirling about an independent Hsing bid, since he refused to endorse any of the other candidates. At the time, Hsing said “that will be determined and disclosed later."

BRIDGEWATER - Citing his disagreement with the political process, Bridgewater Councilman Michael Hsing declined to participate in the Somerset County Republican Convention on Thursday night.

A candidate for Congress in the 7th District, Hsing wrote a letter to Somerset County GOP Chairman Dale Florio before the meeting and told him he would not be in attendance.

Senate Minority Leader Ton Kean, Jr. (R-Union), and Sen. Leonard Lance (R-Hunterdon).

State Sen. Leonard Lance won the Somerset County Republican convention tonight, an important victory in his quest for the Republican nomination to succeed Rep. Mike Ferguson in the seventh congressional district.

Lance beat Whitman nearly 2-1, winning 136 votes to her 74 in the second round of balloting.

Hundreds of Somerset Republican County Committee members packed the Elks Lodge in Bridgewater tonight to participate in the event, where they also voted on Senate and freeholder candidates. But the seventh district congressional race was the real contest of the night.

“There were six candidates from Somerset County and I was able to prevail,” said Lance. “I think it shows that the Republican Party in Somerset County recognizes that I will be the agent of change in Washington.”

BRIDGEWATER - The frontrunners like to call it a three-way race.State Sen. Leonard Lance (R-Hunterdon)

Sen. Leonard Lance (R-Hunterdon), Summit Councilwoman Kelly Hatfield and businesswoman Kate Whitman each won Hunterdon, Union and Middlesex respectively in their quest to be the Republican nominee in the 7th Congressional District.

Tonight’s Somerset County Republican Convention will likely thin the ranks of contenders and give one of the frontrunners a solid leg up on the rest of the nine-person field.

With only the Somerset convention remaining in a district that encompasses portions of four counties, the pressure to secure the endorsement of this county’s committee is on Whitman, who lives in Peapack-Gladstone.

After all, Lance won his home county of Hunterdon, and Hatfield won her home county of Union.

Assemblyman Jon Bramnick, Assemblyman Eric Munoz, Sen. Thomas Kean, and U.S. Rep. Mike Ferguson soak in one of the speeches.

WESTFIELD - The word going into that first round of voting at the Union County Republican Convention on Saturday was that former Summit Councilwoman Kelly Hatfield and Scotch Plains Mayor Martin Marks would require a second showdown.

"This is going to a runoff between the top two candidates," said John DeSimone, commissioner for the county Board of Elections as he waded into the crowd of delegates. And that’s exactly how it went down at Westfield High School, where Hatfield eventually prevailed over Marks with 60% of the vote in the Union County GOP’s pre-primary battle for the line in the 7th District Congressional race.

State Sen. Leonard Lance makes his case as one of his opponents, Warren Township Mayor Victor Sordillo, looks on.

FLEMINGTON - State Sen. Leonard Lance flattened the other 7th Congressional district primary candidates in his home county tonight at a meeting of the Hunterdon County Republicans, and specifically targeted Kate Whitman in his speech to the county committee.

In his most animated remarks so far on the campaign trail, the former minority leader vowed to fight the terrorists and fight the Taliban, and quoted Lincoln’s "America is still the world’s last best hope on earth."