Richard Nixon

Republicans still talk about the Saturday Night Massacre and how a White House scandal so badly effected the political environment that the New Jersey GOP suffered their worst electoral defeats in state history. On October 20, 1973 -- seventeen days before the General Election -- with a second term Republican President engulfed in a major scandal -- Richard Nixon decided to fire Watergate Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox. He forced the resignations of his Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General when they refused to fire Cox. On Election Day, Republicans lost the Governor's race by 721,378 votes. They lost fourteen State Senate seats and 25 Assembly seats. Democrats picked up Freeholder seats in places like Morris, Somerset, Sussex and Monmouth counties.

If Douglas Forrester wins, he will become the third consecutive elected Governor of New Jersey to have started out as a government staffer. Christine Todd Whitman began her public career working for the Nixon administration in the U.S. Office of Economic Opportunity, and then at the Republican National Committee. James E. McGreevey worked on the Assembly Democratic staff and for the state Parole Board before running for the Legislature. Forrester worked on the Assembly Republican staff (when Tom Kean was Minority Leader) and as Assistant State Treasurer.

Other ex-staffers-turned-politicians: Bob Torricelli, who worked for Gov. Brendan Byrne and Vice President Walter Mondale before running for Congress; Congressman Rodney Frelinghuysen, who was an aide to then-Morris County Freeholder Dean Gallo (he later joined Gallo on the Freeholder Board and in the Assembly, and succeeded him in Congress; Congressman Bob Menendez, who worked for Union City Mayor/State Senator William Vincent Musto; former Congressman Bob Franks, who was Political Director on Ray Bateman's 1977 campaign for Governor; State Senator Nia Gill, who was an aide to longtime State Senator Wynona Lipman; State Senator Tom Kean, Jr., who worked in Franks' Washington congressional office; State Senator Joseph Kyrillos, who worked for the U.S. Secretary of Energy; Senate Minority Leader Leonard Lance, who was an Assistant Counsel to Gov. Kean; former State Senator Byron Baer, who was an aide to Assemblyman Arnold Brown in the 1960's; new state Labor Commissioner A.J. Sabath, who worked on the Senate Democratic staff; and South Jersey Democratic leader George Norcross III, who began his political career working in the district office of Assemblyman Ernest Schuck.

You can add other staffer-turned-politicans in the comments section.