Steve Ayscue

Mark Warren, a New Jersey Democratic political consultant, is the new Director of Candidate Services at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. Warren has worked for numerous New Jersey candidates and has close ties to South Jersey Democrats.  In 2002, he was the campaign manager for Joseph DiVincenzo in a hotly contested Democratic primary for Essex County Executive.  According to an e-mail from Warren, his department "provides support and guidance for the campaign programs of Democratic Congressional candidates, Red to Blue candidates, and Frontline Members" and works closely with campaigns "to ensure their finance teams are adequately staffed and fundraising goals are met."

"He's one of the best. Meticulous to detail.  Smart, loyal, and knows the drill," Democratic strategist Steve Ayscue told PolitickerNJ.com.  "I've always been a huge fan of his."

Our first list of New Jersey's Best Political Operatives, from March 2000:

Essex County Executive Joseph DiVincenzo: Politicker photo

NEWARK - Joseph DiVincenzo knows the joke is coming, and he fields it with a grin - the one broadcaster Steve Adubato, Jr., has delivered for years about how DiVincenzo tried out for more than a half dozen NFL teams and got cut by every one of them.

The fact that Brett Favre is now taking snaps for the Jets sets up Adubato’s new punch line.

"He’s even older than Joe D," Adubato cracks and the roomful of politicians at the Breakers laughs, and DiVincenzo a moment later stands at the microphone, giving a nod to Essex County Democratic Chairman Phil Thigpen, who’s out there in the audience somewhere.

"I’m with Phil Thigpen, not Steve Adubato," DiVincenzo says, a playful poke at his leader, the junior Adubato’s father, who tried to oust Thigpen as chairman earlier this year but ran into a public objection by DiVincenzo, who wanted Thigpen to remain as chair.

DiVincenzo prevailed.

Steve Adubato, Jr., presides over a meeting between Essex County Executive Joe DiVincenzo, center, and Sen. Joseph Kyrillos.: Politicker photo 

SPRING LAKE - They drove and were driven to the Irish Riviera from all corners of New Jersey, in cars with government plates on them and dark SUVs and sedans with tinted glass, sporting sunglasses and paunches covered with sports jackets, mostly Democrats and a handful of Republicans, converging on this mansion by the sea.

Congressmen and mayors and assembly people and state senators and opposition researchers and retainers.

Standing at the front of the Seashell Dining Room in the Breakers to greet them was Steve Adubato, wearing a Hawaiian shirt and welcoming smile - and casting an eye that invariably sharpens human activity into the lineaments of political theater.

"I believe in the luck of the Irish," said the executive director of Newark’s North Ward Center and head of the Democratic Party in the North Ward, facing a sun-filled room packed with rivals hunched over plates of eggs and bacon: Gov. Jon Corzine and Republican State Party Chairman Tom Wilson; former Assemblyman Wilfredo Caraballo, and Assemblyman Albert Coutinho and Assemblwoman Grace Spencer; Essex County Executive Joseph DiVincenzo and Assemblyman Thomas Giblin (D-Montclair).

In this poor man’s Olympiad of Jersey ethnic groups gathered under one roof, Adubato highlighted - as he does annually at this North Ward Center-sponsored breakfast - the Irish, who now number 141,379 registered voters in New Jersey, or 47,514 Democrats, 36,063 Republicans and 57,802 independents.

The big money Democratic Party fundraisers who backed Hillary Clinton in the primary but have now committed to supporting Barack Obama, accepted an invitation to fly out to Chicago Monday to sit down with Obama’s campaign manager.

There’s a Jersey connection there, as David Plouffe managed Bob Torricelli’s successful U.S. senate campaign in 1996.

Those members of the "Group" who plan to head to Obama’s Midwest base of operations for a three-hour confab include Zenon Christodoulou, Al DeCotiis, John Graham and William Harla.

"We were asked to come out by the campaign so that they could introduce us to all of the main people they want us to get to know in the head office," said Christodoulou.

William Maer, a lobbyist and Democratic political consultant, will be joining Gov. Jon Corzine's re-election campaign full-time, presumably to watch over operations in Bergen and Passaic counties.  Maer is a veteran of Bergen politics and has been a consultant and spokesman for the Bergen County Democratic Organization for the last seven years.

Maer is one of several veteran operatives that are expected to join the Corzine campaign now that Jamie Fox is coming aboard as an unpaid advisor.  Philip Alagia, the Chief of Staff to Essex County Executive Joseph DiVincenzo, will start this week as the campaign's political director.

Speculation that Democratic strategist Steven Ayscue will be joining the Corzine campaign is not accurate, Democratic sources say.  Ayscue, a top advisor to South Jersey Democratic leader George Norcross, was on the list of experienced operatives the Corzine campaign was looking to recruit.  But sources close to Ayscue say he did not receive an offer.

Republican 3rd District congressional candidate Chris Myers fired the latest salvo in a war of words with the progressive blog Blue Jersey today, accusing them of engaging in a coordinated effort with rival Democrat John Adler’s campaign to discredit Myers’s military service.

Myers held a press conference in Medford to denounce a Blue Jersey post that questioned whether he should continue to cite himself as a “combat veteran.”

“John Adler’s refusal to publicly and forcefully condemn these liberal bloggers and their vicious, dishonest attacks on me and other veterans is a disgrace,” said Myers in a statement. “John Adler could put an end to these outrageous attacks against me and the veteran’s community if he wanted to; instead chooses to sit by silently in the hopes of scoring cheap political points at my expense. He should be ashamed.”

Assembly Democratic Executive Director Bill Castner is short listed for Rob Andrews' House seatSixteen Democrats are under consideration for the first district congressional seat that Rob Andrews is vacating to run for the U.S. Senate, including Camille Andrews, the Congressman’s wife, according to a list sent out today by South Jersey Democratic leader George Norcross.

On the official Norcross short list:

Democratic strategist Steve Ayscue offered his analysis of the 2008 presidential election on Dr. Mazz's radio on Philadelphia's 1210 AM "The Big Talker." Click here to listen.