The gloves came off during the second NJ gubernatorial debate Wednesday night, with Jack Ciattarelli and Democratic Rep. Mikie Sherrill exchanging personal digs — with Sherrill trying to blame her Republican opponent for contributing to the opioid crisis and Ciattarelli targeting the Democrat’s Naval Academy record.
Sherrill came into the final debate of the campaign on the back foot after the race dramatically tightened — Ciattarelli cutting a 10-point polling lead for Sherrill down to 3.3 points. Some polls show the candidates neck-and-neck.
But she threw several jabs that at times drew a testy, off-message reaction from her GOP rival.
One such moment came as Sherrill abruptly pivoted from a question about New Jersey’s unemployment rate to assail Ciattarelli’s business.
“My opponent likes to talk a lot about being a businessman, but I think what New Jersey doesn’t know much about his business, how he made his millions by working with some of the worst offenders and saying that opioids were safe, putting out propaganda, publishing their propaganda,” she said.
“Tens of thousands of New Jerseyans died. And as if that wasn’t enough, then he was paid to develop an app so that people who were addicted could more easily get access to opioids.”
Sherrill was referring to controversy that emerged during Ciattarelli’s 2021 bid for governor about training materials his company published, which critics said included pharma industry talking points about opiates that were dangerously inaccurate.
One article stated, “The risk of opioid misuse is low among patients with chronic pain who do not have preexisting substance use disorders.”
The material, for which Ciattarelli’s firm was paid $12.2 million, was published as part of a deal with the University of Tennessee that was underwritten in part by key players in the pharmaceutical industry.
Sherrill tried to use the work by Ciattarelli’s former company to tie him to the opiate crisis.
Ciattarelli snapped back, “First of all, shame on you.”
“During the Biden administration, she had no problem whatsoever with tens of thousands of people crashing our border each and every day, not knowing what impact they had in our communities with regard to the fentanyl crisis,” he fired back.
Earlier in the debate, Ciattarelli landed a blow on one of Sherrill’s major campaign talking points — her assertion that she was declare a state of emergency to prevent more increases for utility rate payers in the state.
Sky-rocketing energy bills, and cost of living in general, have been major issues in the election.
“My opponent has put forth an illegitimate plan that isn’t feasible. Even the governor, a member of her own party, has said, ‘I don’t think you can do that,’” he said, referring to outgoing incumbent Gov. Phil Murphy.
“There are 77 incumbent Democratic legislators, 52 of which are on the ballot this year, and not one has endorsed her plan to get electricity rates down on day one,”
Ciattarelli said that to lower energy prices, which he notes are at an all-time high in the state, he would pull out of REGI – the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative – which he denounced as a “failure” that has cost NJ $300-$500 million a year.
National politics also occupied a huge chunk of the debate time.
The candidates, not surprisingly, were miles apart on how they think President Trump is doing so far in his second term, with Ciattarelli rating him an “A.”
“I think he’s right about everything he’s doing,” the Republican hopeful said, touting Trump’s securing of the southern border, reducing inflation and quadrupling the SALT deduction.
Sherrill, meanwhile, gave Trump an “F.”
Both candidates pointed fingers at each other when the subject of the partial government shutdown came up, which has been going on for a week with no end in sight.
“Right now, with the president, with the Senate and the House, all in GOP hands, the fact is, they’ve got to work to reopen government so workers can get back to work and we can continue to drive down health care costs,” Sherrill said.
Ciattarelli hit back with a jab about his opponent’s voting record during the previous administration.
“When there were shutdowns during the Biden era, she [Sherrill] voted every time for the continuing resolution to keep the government … open,” he said.
“This time around with Trump in the White House, she’s voted no on the resolutions to keep government open. I hope the shutdown ends within moments.”
Another tense exchange came when Ciattarelli demanded Sherrill disclose her disciplinary records from her time at the Naval Academy, which emerged as another hot-button issue in recent weeks as it was revealed she was banned from walking during her class’ 1994 commencement.
“Mikie said that she was the most transparent gubernatorial candidate of all time. She’s so transparent that [she won’t] approve the release of her disciplinary records at the Naval Academy, so we can know why it is, she was punished,” he said.
“She needs to come clean. I think people in New Jersey deserve an answer as to why she was punished at the Naval Academy.”
In response, Sherrill outright refused to release the records.
She also claimed that she had been targeted by the Trump administration, claiming her records were illegally released to Ciattarelli’s allies.
“I’m certainly not going to open up my classmates’ hundreds of records so he can rampage through them on a witch hunt. He should take responsibility,” she said.
“He should turn back those records which he still holds,” she sniped.