Phil Alagia

Terrance Bankston, an aide to Newark Mayor Cory Booker, says he'll run for Freeholder in 2008
The 25-year-old Constituent Services Director for the city of Newark has formed a committee to explore a potential bid for Essex County Freeholder At-Large.

Terrance Bankston, a native Newarker who ran Mayor Cory Booker’s south ward campaign operations for the 2006 election, says he offers youth, education and experience.

Donald Payne will have Joe DiVincenzo's backing in 2008 Essex County Executive Joseph DiVincenzo says he will back Donald Payne for re-election to an 11th term in Congress next year.

Some Democrats say that 74-year-old Payne could face a challenge in the 2008 primary after his refusal to support the Democratic nominee for State Senate in Newark's 29th district this year.

Payne supported his brother, Assemblyman William Payne, who ran unsuccessfully as an Independent candidate for Senate against the party choice, Teresa Ruiz. Ruiz works for DiVincenzo and has the backing of power broker Steve Adubato and Newark Mayor Cory Booker.

In the 29th district, independent state Senate candidates Assemblyman William Payne and At-Large Councilman Luis Quintana this afternoon were making the most of their ground games against the favorite, M. Teresa Ruiz, who enjoys the mammoth machinery of the North Ward Democratic Organization.

Ruiz and her team have the line up here in Newark in an overwhelmingly Democratic district, which they're hoping will prove a key difference-maker in putting down the Payne-Quintana insurrection.

Assemblyman Mims Hackett says he will resign his seat in the New Jersey State Assembly and will withdraw his bid for re-election to a fourth term.  His announcement comes two days after his arrest in bribery charges, and one day after state Democratic leaders asked him to step down.

He will remain as the Mayor of Orange.

Members of the Essex County Democratic Committee from the 27th district will meet to hold two contests: a special election convention to fill the remaining four months of Hackett's current Assembly term, and to nominate a new candidate to run in the November general election.  While they could pick separate candidates in each race, Democrats are expected to give their candidate the advantage of incumbency.

The arrests of two Democratic Assemblymen could impact the mid-term elections just two months away. Mims Hackett represents the 27th district, where there are enough suburban Essex voters to potentially create an opportunity for Republicans, despite the popularity of Senate President Richard Codey at the top of the ticket -- if Hackett remains a candidate for a fourth term.

The Republican candidate is Mark Meyerowitz, a 52-year-old financial advisor from West Orange and son of a Holocaust survivor, whose only political experience was volunteering for Ross Perot in 1992. The GOP did not nominate a second Assembly candidate, and incumbent John McKeon, the Mayor of West Orange, is considered a shoo-in for re-election anyway.

Congratulations to Phil Alagia, the Chief of Staff to the Essex County Executive, and #48 on the PoliticsNJ.com Power List.  His son, Philip Andrew Alagia, was born at 4:07 AM today.  He is 8 lbs 11 oz, and according to Alagia "mother and baby are doing great."

Assemblyman Wilfredo Caraballo has nailed down the endorsement of U.S. Rep. Donald Payne, and is using pictures of himself with Payne in campaign literature as he fights the power structure that spit him out after he bucked the bosses last year.

"He told me he didn’t believe he could sit on the sidelines, and he thought my record and my tenure made my re-election important," said Caraballo, speaker pro tempore in the Assembly. "He made it a very personal thing."

Essex County is the King of Democratic Counties. Just look at the '01 results, when it accounted for 40 percent of Jim McGreevey's statewide plurality:

Jim McGreevey (D) 129,406
Bret Schundler (R) 48,540

There's been some concern among Democrats that Newark Mayor Sharpe James may cause trouble for Corzine, although there are signs the two men have patched things up. Phil Alagia, the chief of staff to County Executive Joe DiVincenzo, sent the following dispatch from the field:

"Things are going great in Essex. We have nearly 2500 Corzine supporters on the street focusing on getting the Democratic vote out. Turnout seems to be strong. Very impressed from all the support we are getting from labor. Every part of the Democratic Party in Essex County has come to support Joe D. and (county Democratic chairman) Phil Thigpen to get the vote out for Jon Corzine."

If Richard Codey winds up in the United States Senate three months from now, the succession of Assemblyman John McKeon, the Mayor of West Orange and a staunch Codey man, is virtually automatic. That would mean a special election convention to fill McKeon's 27th district Assembly seat, and Essex Democrats say the potential candidates include Essex County Surrogate Joseph Brennan, former Maplewood Mayor Ellen Davenport, Livingston Councilmen (and Democratic fundraiser) Leland Peyser, former West Orange Councilman Kevin Keough, Phil Alagia, the Chief of Staff to the County Executive, Maplewood Mayor Fred Profeta, and Bob Davidson, a mental health advocate and a Codey favorite.