Roy Wesley

With the 2009 gubernatorial field still far from settled, the majority of Republican county chairs PolitickerNJ spoke to today refused to commit absolutely to anyone, though many said they leaned toward Christie.

Monmouth County Republican Chairman Joe Oxley would not formally endorse Christie before he even entered the race, but said he was hopeful that he would jump in.

“At this point I think that clearly everybody’s anticipating, hoping and expecting that Chris may very well enter the race. I certainly can tell you he’s a personal friend, and I think he’s got broad support in Monmouth County,” he said.   

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Unable to field a candidate both willing and able to do the job, Mercer County Republicans yesterday took a pass on replacing a freeholder candidate who had dropped out last month.

Yesterday was the deadline to file a replacement candidate for Republican Darren Chell, who dropped out of the race on August 8th citing personal and business obligations. 

Mercer County Democratic Chairman Rich McClellan gleefully pointed that out in a press release today, trumpeting it as a proof that Republicans tacitly acknowleged that Democrats ran an effective county government.

"I want to thank Roy Wesley and the Republicans for providing the outstanding evidence to demonstrate what a great job the Democrats are doing in managing County government. By failing to fill the freeholder candidate vacancy, the Republicans are conceding the fact,” joked McClellan.

Mercer County Republicans missed yesterday's deadline to fill a vacancy on the Freeholder slate, and as Democrats see it, have given up their chance to replace Darren Chell on the ballot.  Asked why Republicans couldn't take advantage of the 2002 New Jersey Supreme Court's voter choice decision (the one the allowed Democrats to replace Bob Torricelli with Frank Lautenberg in the Senate race -- and affirmed a year later when Democrats replaced Joseph Suliga with Nicholas Scutari), one Merce Democratic leader said that the extended deadline to switch candidates only applies to vacancies that come before the deadline to drop out -- not after the deadline.

Roy Wesley just barely hung on to his chairmanship of the Republican Party in heavily Democratic Mercer County.

Wesley, who's held the seat for a little over a year, beat Robbinsville Mayor Dave Fried 93 to 90.

Things reportedly got heated between Wesley and Fried during the convention, but Wesley said that the two have settled their differences.  

"We're going to get along," he said.

Mercer County Republican Chairman Roy Wesley today charged that County Clerk Paula Sollami-Covello kept an accused thief on the job at the county clerk’s office because he was a political appointee.

Last month, county clerk employee Ishmael M. Raines was charged pocketing fees that residents paid to get or renew passports. Raines failed to process many of the applications, which included sensitive materials like birth certificates, expired passports and social security numbers.

Sollami-Covello told the Trenton Times that, following complaints about passport application materials missing from Raines, he was taken off that duty and that she contacted the inspector general.

Mercer County GOP Chairman Roy Wesley is leading a weekend push to get signatures on John Crowley’s nominating petitions.   In an e-mail to Republicans, Crowley said he was “looking for volunteers to help gather petition signatures for John Crowley for U.S. Senate.”  A group of petition canvassers are meeting at the offices of Jamestown Associates at 10AM this morning to begin circulating the Crowley petitions.

State Sen. Bill Baroni endorsed Goya Foods heir Andy Unanue for U.S. Senate tonight, just an hour before the Mercer County Republicans’ executive committee meets to endorse a Senate candidate.