By Gene Robbins, Managing Editor
Every four years, people wake up in order to vote for president.
After watching other states vote for six months, New Jerseyans get their chance Tuesday. In addition to indicating a presidential preference, they’ll decide party candidates for Congress, and county sheriff and one county freeholder.
Polls are open from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m.
On the local level, Hillsborough voters will decide the lineup for the fall race for one seat on the Township Committee. Frank DelCore will seek nomination for a fourth three-year term; for four of the nine years, he’s been mayor. He’s challenged by real estate businessman Thomas Hiller in what has been a quiet campaign.
Democrats have one candidate, Laurie Poppe, who ran last year, too.
Township Republicans will also elect one man and one woman from each election district to serve on the county party governing body.
For what it’s worth in the national picture, Democratic voters will get their chance to vote for either former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton or Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders.
Republicans will have the chance to ratify the apparent nominee, businessman Donald Trump, or vote for Ohio Gov. John Kasich or U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz.
Republicans have a three-way race for Congress in 7th District, covering portions of five counties including Hillsborough and Montgomery in Somerset County.
Rep. Lance, first elected in 2008, faces two challengers. One is David Larsen, a Tewksbury Township businessman who has run in the primary against Mr. Lance for the previous three cycles. Another is Craig Heard, who owns an outdoor advertising company, from Roxbury.
Democrats will nominate the one name on the ballot, Peter Jacob, a social worker by profession, the son of émigrés and a Union resident.
The two parties set their own rules in the state’s presidential primary election.
When Democrats check a box for either Clinton or Sanders, they’ll be voting for the three delegates and three alternates whose name appears in small print.
Republicans will check one of three candidates’ names in what essentially will be a beauty contest, and also be asked to mark a box with the 30 names of state at-large and district delegates and alternates to the convention who would vote for that candidate.
Mr. Trump’s slate is headed by Gov. Chris Christie and includes former governor Donald DiFrancesco, Somerset County Republican Chairman Albert Gaburo Jr. and former Hunterdon County chairman Henry Kuhl, and state senators Michael Doherty and Joseph Pennacchio.
Gov. Kasich’s team is headed by former Gov. Christie Todd Whitman, state Sen. Jennifer Beck and former Congressman Richard Zimmer. Sen. Cruz’s slate is led by former gubernatorial candidate Steve Lonegan and Assemblyman Michael Patrick Carroll.
Somerset County voters understand this is a presidential year and took steps to play a part, according to the county’s Board of Elections.
To vote Tuesday, residents must be registered in the party in which they intend to vote. First-time voters and people who deliberately have chosen to be “unaffiliated” can go to the polls and choose the party they want; however, from that point, they will be considered a member of that party, unless they file a form to revert back to unaffiliated.
Somerset County Board of Elections Administrator Jerry L. Midgette said there are more than 212,000 county residents registered and eligible to vote in this presidential primary election. That represents a 5 percent increase from four years ago.
Also, during the past five months leading up to the primary, the number of new registered voters is up substantially over the same period four years ago, he said.
For instance, new registered voters for the five-month period from January through May totaled 7,317. The total for the same period four years ago was 4,108.
In the 2008 heavily contested and historic Democratic presidential primary, there were 6,938 new registered voters during the same five-month period. “The substantial increase of new registered voters so far this year can be indicative of Somerset County residents feeling more motivated to cast their ballots during this year’s presidential election cycle,” Mr. Midgette said.
“A closer look at how these new registered voters chose to affiliate is also quite revealing,” he said. Of the 7,317 new registered voters thus far in 2016, 54 percent chose not to affiliate with a party.
Of those who chose to affiliate, 31 percent went with the Democratic Party and 15 percent with the Republican Party. Four years ago during this same period, 34 percent of newly registered voters chose to affiliate with the Democratic or Republican parties (20 percent Democratic and 14 percent Republican).
The increase in party affiliations during the 2016 period reveals that two-thirds of these newly registered voters chose to affiliate with the Democratic Party while one-third affiliated with the Republicans.
This January to May, 1,461 unaffiliated voters chose to align with the Democratic Party and 796 with the GOP.
