Democrat who once enabled Chris Christie launches 2025 bid to lead New Jersey

Former New Jersey Senate President Steve Sweeney on Monday launched his long-anticipated campaign to replace his fellow Democrat, termed-out Gov. Phil Murphy, in 2025.

Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop, who entered the primary back in April, responded to the news by telling the Associated Press that Sweeney is a "conservative" who was "very, very close" to Chris Christie when the Republican was governor. Sweeney's intraparty critics also remember how he lost reelection to the legislature in a 2021 shocker against Republican Edward Durr, a truck driver who spent all of $153 on his campaign.  

Sweeney, who got his start as an ironworker and a union leader, is a childhood friend and close ally of South Jersey party boss George Norcross. To say Norcross was an important power player in the region would be an understatement: Steve Kornacki wrote in Politico in 2011, "It’s not written down anywhere, but it’s acknowledged by everyone (privately, of course): You don’t run for office as a Democrat in South Jersey unless George is OK with it—and you don’t win in the fall without him." In 2009, Norcross went on to play a key role in helping Sweeney oust Richard Codey, who served as governor for 14 months from 2004 to 2006, as leader of the state Senate.