WASHINGTON — Saying he wanted to give voters “a choice and a voice in the process,” New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie scheduled an Oct. 16 special election to fill the seat vacated by the late Sen. Frank Lautenberg, a move that risks worsening strained relations with national Republican activists but which carries several political advantages for him at home.
Republican strategists in Washington had hoped Christie would skip a special election and appoint a strong candidate who would fill the seat until the regularly scheduled 2014 election. That would give the appointee the advantage of incumbency and would have given Republicans their best chance to hold the seat in a heavily Democratic state.
But Democrats were certain to go to court if Christie did not call an election this year, creating a battle as Christie runs for re-election. New Jersey law is ambiguous about how to fill vacancies in the state’s U.S. Senate seats.
Christie justified his decision as in the best interest of the state’s voters.
“I firmly believe that the decisions that need to be made in Washington are too great to be determined by an appointee for the next 18 months,” he said at a news conference in Trenton, N.J.
Christie said he would make a temporary appointment of a senator who would serve until the election is held Oct. 16, but that he had not yet decided on his pick. He indicated he would likely choose a fellow Republican to replace Lautenberg, a Democrat. The winner of the Oct. 16 election will serve until Lautenberg’s term expires in January 2015.
Newark Mayor Cory Booker is generally considered the most likely Senate candidate for Democrats.
An Oct. 16 election means that New Jersey voters will have to go to the polls twice within three weeks — the election for governor and state legislators takes place Nov. 6. Having a Senate election the same day as the gubernatorial election might have complicated Christie’s own re-election, in which he is otherwise heavily favored against a little-known opponent. Booker could have drawn more Democratic voters to the polls and the governor’s race will now remain at the top of statewide ballots in November.
Sheila Oliver, the Democratic speaker of the New Jersey assembly, said in a statement that she was “very disappointed the governor has chosen to be so transparently political and waste taxpayer money on a special October election.” State Democrats estimated that each additional election will cost the state $12 million.
Also Tuesday Lautenberg’s office announced that he will make a final trip to the Capitol — fittingly aboard Amtrak, the rail service he passionately championed — to lie in repose in the Senate chamber on Thursday before the Senate’s last World War II veteran is buried at Arlington National Cemetery the next day.
The Associated Press and The New York Times contributed to this story.
