By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
Mercer County Democratic Chairwoman Liz Muoio would appear to have clear sailing to replace Assemblywoman Bonnie Watson Coleman in the Legislature, now that her main Democratic rival has dropped out of the race.
Mercer County Freeholder Samuel T. Frisby said Tuesday he was ending his short-lived bid for the Assembly seat that Ms. Watson Coleman is giving up to join Congress. In a statement, he said he was putting the interests of his party ahead of those of himself.
"After viewing the type of division that my candidacy was creating in my party, among people I call my friends, I came to the difficult decision that now is not the right time," he said. "It is more important to me at this time to be a party builder and not a party divider."
Mr. Frisby said he spoke with Ms. Muoio on Tuesday and that he is endorsing her. She could not be reached for comment.
Ms. Watson Coleman, a Trenton lawmaker since 1998, is scheduled to resign Jan. 5 and then be sworn in the next day as the first black woman from New Jersey to serve in the House of Representatives. She represents the 15th Legislative District that includes parts of Mercer and Hunterdon counties.
Democrats from both counties will convene Jan. 24 for a vacancy convention at the Mercer Oaks to pick a successor. The winner takes the Assembly seat, serves out the year left on the term and presumably has the inside track to win the seat in the upcoming election.
Mr. Frisby was in the race for a week. He announced his candidacy on Dec. 22, while Ms. Muoio announced hers on Dec. 7. At the time, the Muoio-Frisby contest set up a political battle between Mercer County Democrats. First-year Trenton Mayor Eric Jackson was for Mr. Frisby, County Executive Brian M. Hughes was for Ms. Muoio.
"The idea that this is a Hughes-Jackson fight over the soul of the 15th Legislative District couldn’t be further from the truth," Mr. Hughes said Monday. "I don’t see it as a big fight."
Mr. Frisby recently had raised that he was being denied becoming freeholder chairman for 2015 unless he ended his Assembly candidacy.
But in his statement, he said that he recently was accepted into an executive master’s leadership program at Springfield College in Massachusetts. He said he could not pass up that opportunity.
Ms. Muoio, 51, is a former Pennington Borough councilwoman and a Mercer County Freeholder. She has been party chairwoman since 2010 and works as the county director of economic development and sustainability under Mr. Hughes. The impending vacancy has been the source of political scuttlebutt within Democratic Party circles, but earlier in the week, Ms. Muoio dismissed the suggestion that the contest was a proxy for a power struggle between Mr. Hughes and Mayor Jackson.
Her political connections have come in handy, as she has the support of mayors across the district, including West Windsor Mayor Shing-Fu Hsueh. He said Monday that he feels her government experience would make her "a great assemblywoman."
Mr. Hughes called Mr. Frisby, the chief executive officer of the Trenton YMCA, a "good guy." Yet he said Mr. Frisby is only finishing up his first term and has not learned the ropes of being a freeholder.
Assuming she is appointed, Ms. Muoio will join a state Assembly in which Democrats hold a 48-32 majority against Republicans. She will be part of a 15th district delegation that includes state Sen. Shirley K. Turner and Assemblyman Reed Gusciora.

