Uncontested Races Dominate Upcoming New Jersey Legislative Primaries

MADISON, Wis., June 2, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Winners of Tuesday's legislative party primaries in New Jersey will move onto the November 8 general election. But with only 24 of 160 primaries requiring voters to choose between multiple contenders, 85% of candidates will automatically advance to the general election.

In the General Assembly, 15 of the 80 primaries are contested. In the senate, nine out of 80 primaries feature multiple candidates. A contested primary in the General Assembly features at least three candidates since the top two candidates advance to the general election. A Senate primary is contested when at least two candidates are competing for their party's nomination.

Geoff Pallay, Ballotpedia's state legislative elections editor, conducted a competitiveness analysis of New Jersey's state legislative elections.  The analysis shows that contested primaries increased from 18 in 2007 to 24 in 2011. Despite this increase, the number of uncontested incumbents has grown even more, from 53 in 2007 to 63 in 2011.  Of the 400 primaries over the past three election cycles, 80.5% have been uncontested.

In the Senate, 36 out of 40 incumbents are running for re-election. Of these 36 incumbents, 31 will not face a primary opponent. The remaining five incumbents do face opposition in the primary.

In the General Assembly, 64 incumbents are running for re-election.  Of the state's 80 multi-member assembly primaries, an incumbent is running in 39 of them. Of these 39 primaries, only seven are contested.

Although there are 44 open primaries in the State Senate, 27 Republican and 17 Democratic, only four of these races are contested. All of the contested open races are Republican primaries.

In the General Assembly, 41 open primaries have yielded eight contested races, six of which are Republican and two Democratic.

Redistricting has resulted in eight incumbents who are considered challengers because they are running in a different district than the one they currently represent.  

Also of note, 19 candidates either withdrew or were disqualified after initially declaring for Tuesday's primary. Had these candidates stayed in the race, the number of candidates facing primary challengers would be higher.

Ballotpedia.org is an edited wiki-based website about state and local politics.  It is sponsored by the non-profit, non-partisan Lucy Burns Institute (LBI) based in Madison, Wisconsin.

SOURCE Ballotpedia