Pete Biondi

Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce (R-Parsippany)

If Republicans fail to make significant gains in the legislature this year, the political fate of Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce (R-Parsippany) becomes a question mark, despite the avowed strength he has in his own caucus.

A coup launched by Assemblyman Pete Biondi (R-Hillsborough), the Republican conference leader, and Assemblyman Richard Merkt (R-Mendham Twp.) fizzled last month when Biondi, working in tandem with Merkt, couldn't scrape together sufficient support to threaten DeCroce.

But Assembly Republicans in conversation lay out the contests where they hope to win, and a list that has at various times included districts 14, 19, 36 and 22, now most emphatically begins with District 1, with the other theatres of endeavor offered more faintly in a hard luck economy where the GOP has failed to match the Democrats in fundraising.

Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce (R-Parsippany)

Not to be outdone by Democrats embroiled in a senate leadership battle, the lower-house Republican forces of Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce (R-Parsippany) and caucus adversary Assemblyman Pete Biondi (R-Hillsborough) spilled their own brand of backdoor drama into the open this week.

"We should be focused on the gubernatorial contest and getting Chris Christie elected," said Biondi, a sentiment expressed by none other than his GOP caucus rival, DeCroce ally Assembly Minority Whip Jon Bramnick (R-Westfield).

In the meantime, it's a cloakroom imbroglio, Republican style.

A critic of DeCroce, conference leader Biondi has tag-teamed with retiring Assemblyman Richard Merkt (R-Mendham Twp.) in an ongoing effort to dislodge DeCroce from a leadership job he's held since 2003. The two allies believe DeCroce has sleepwalked through his tenure, and it's time for a change.

"This is not a covert operation," said Biondi, who insists informal caucus polling proves discontent with the minority leader. "We need a message of smaller, smarter government, less taxes and no intrusion of government into our personal lives or personal property. ...We have not increased our caucus numbers since Alex has been there. We're stagnant."

Amplifying the attack, Merkt fired off a letter to DeCroce, dated today, which PolitickerNJ.com obtained.

From left to right: Steve Lonegan, Chris Christie, Brian D. Levine, Richard Merkt.

BRANCHBURG – The Lonegan forces tried to bill this event as “the Thrilla in Branchburg.”

But it proved no Ali-Frazier III this morning, and probably rated little better than the Republican gubernatorial primary of 1985 in terms of give and take, as four 2009 Republican candidates for governor assembled for the first time at a breakfast meeting sponsored by the Somerset County Federation of Republican Women at the Fox Hollow Golf Club.

Amid rumors that former Bogota Mayor Steve Lonegan planned to set a confrontational tone, former U.S. Attorney Chris Christie, the presumptive frontrunner, gave Lonegan and/or anyone else little room to generate drama.

After arriving moments before the event began, speedily working the room and delivering a five-minute set of remarks, Christie told the crowd of 150 people that he had to attend his son’s basketball game and hoped they understood.

**UPDATED

MINNEAPOLIS - Three more Republican county chairs today affirmed their support for Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce (R-Parsippany-Troy Hills), who announced this week that he intends to pursue another term next year as party leader.

Rick Wright, executive director of the Assembly Republicans, said the following chairs indicated they want the 72-year old DeCroce to remain as minority leader: Essex Chairman\Sen. Kevin O’Toole (R-Essex), Monmouth Chairman Joe Oxley, and Passaic Chairman\Assemblyman Scott Rumana (R-Wayne).

Somerset County Chairman Dale Florio told PolitickerNJ.com that he wants to talk to conference leader Assemblyman Pete Biondi (R-Somerville).

"Whatever Pete decides to do, I'm going to support him," says Florio.

MINNEAPOLIS - Atlantic County Republican Chairman Keith Davis today declared his support for GOP Minority Leader Alex DeCroce, who officially announced today that he plans to run again.

"It goes without saying that Alex is a strong leader who has created a brand identity for our party," said Davis. "He’s established a cohesiveness with (Senate Minority Leader) Kean in order to make inroads for our party.

"Now is not the time to be switching horses," he added of a possible challenge to DeCroce by Assembly Conference Leader Pete Biondi (R-Somerville). "I’m sorry, I don’t know Pete Biondi. I don’t recall him being very vocal during the budget crisis."

Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce at the breakfast meeting this morning.: Politicker photo 

MINNEAPOLIS - Last Friday, two veteran legislators sat in a Somerville restaurant and talked about the future of the Republican Party in New Jersey, and mutual efforts to gain the majority in a state that George Bush year-by-year drove farther into the arms of the Democratic Party.

With a political enemy out there that is bigger and better organized, Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce (R-Parsippany-Troy Hills) wanted to make sure the party stays focused on the Democrats, and puts down those internal uprisings that might distract the GOP from that objective.

He gave Assembly Conference Leader Pete Biondi (R-Somerville) a simple piece of news regarding his interest in a fourth, two-year term as minority leader.

"I’m running again," he told Biondi, and then asked if he could depend on Biondi’s support.

As he stood with futility against a bill he believes would ravage his 39th GOP Assemblyman Vince PolistinaLegislative District, Assemblyman John Rooney took little joy in noting a personal milestone.

For while 2008 marks the Bergen County Republican’s 25th anniversary as an assemblyman, it is also the low point of his legislative career.

"My towns got destroyed last night," said Rooney, a day after the majority Democrats passed a $32.9 billion budget, which includes 25% cuts in aid to all of the 28 municipalities in Rooney’s district, and eliminations of property tax rebates for residents in the $150,000 to $250,000 income range.

Monday also brought the Democrats’ successful if ignominious - by Rooney’s reckoning - passage of a bill requiring the construction of affordable housing in affluent towns.

Sen. Leonard LanceSen. Leonard Lance from Hunterdon County, the former state Senate Minority Leader, is expected to officially enter the 7th District Congressional race this week.

The GOP field in the 7th district so far includes Union County candidates Scotch Plains Mayor Martin Marks and former Summit Councilwoman Kelly Hatfield; and Kate Whitman, daughter of former Gov. Christie Todd Whitman, from Somerset County.

It is expected that Assemblyman Pete Biondi will not seek his party’s nomination, which could open up a run by Warren Mayor Victor Sordillo, who has sworn off running if Biondi gets in the race.

Whoever wins Republican support will face likely Democratic Party nominee Assemblywoman Linda Stender.

Republican attorney Tom Roughneen of Watchung, twice awarded the Bronze Star for his Army service in Iraq, is forming an exploratory committee to run for Congress in the 7th district.

"My Irish-immigrant, blue-collar parents raised their 5 children to appreciate the opportunities in America," said Roughneen in a letter to Republicans he sent out earlier this month. "For 10 years I served as a prosecutor and for twenty years I have served in the Army.

Manville Mayor Angelo Corradino lost his bid for re-election to a fifth termA bowling alley named Tenpin Lanes stands in the center of Manville, between a pair of Superfund sites that are the remnants of the town’s bulldozed factory era.

The alley for years has been a source of entertainment and relaxation for the hard luck blue collar work force here, and for Angelo Corradino, the borough’s longest serving mayor who straddled the transition Manville made from factories to shopping malls, and who earlier this month lost by 78 votes in his bid for a fifth term in office.

An old high school linebacker and longsuffering Jets and Mets fan who spent 19 years as an elected official in Manville, the past 16 of those as mayor, Corradino says rumors that he wanted to go full time with an annual salary of $95,000 sank his chances of re-election.