State Senate President Stephen Sweeney on Wednesday conceded defeat in his re-election race against a virtually unknown Republican challenger, an upset practically nobody expected and one that has stunned New Jersey’s political world.
The South Jersey Democrat blamed ”a red wave” of Republican voter turnout for his loss and insisted his time in politics isn’t over.
“All votes have been fairly counted, and I, of course, accept the results,” a clearly emotional Sweeney, New Jersey’s second-most powerful elected state official after the governor, said during a news conference at the Statehouse in Trenton.
The Associated Press declared last Thursday that Sweeney, D-Gloucester, had lost his Senate seat in South Jersey’s 3rd legislative district to Republican Edward Durr, a commercial truck driver with no elected political experience. Sweeney, the longest-serving Senate president in state history, declined to concede for six days, saying he was waiting for more votes to be counted.
Sweeney said Wednesday he does not plan to seek a recount in the race.
His concession caps one of the most shocking losses in the history of New Jersey politics and solidifies an end to Sweeney’s 20-year run in the Senate and 12-year tenure as president of the chamber.
Sweeney, who has been considered a possible candidate for governor in 2025, would not say whether he would seek to regain his Senate seat in two years, when Durr’s term is up.
But the 62-year-old West Deptford resident said he plans to “remain fully involved in public affairs in New Jersey.”
“I’m not going away,” Sweeney said when asked about running again. “I don’t say what I’m doing. But I can tell you something: I’ve been a believer in making New Jersey affordable for a long time. ... We’ve got to take things serious, and we’ve got to fix New Jersey.”
Senate Democrats are slated to meet as early as Friday to choose Sweeney’s replacement as Senate president. Sen. Nicholas Scutari, D-Union, is the pick of Democratic power brokers and the favorite for the post. Sen. Nia Gill, D-Essex, is also running for the job.
Results from the AP showed Durr leading Sweeney by 2,212 votes as of Wednesday for the Senate seat representing South Jersey’s 3rd legislative district, which includes parts of Cumberland, Gloucester, and Salem counties. That’s a difference of 3.4 percentage points.
The final mail-in ballots in the race came in Monday.
Durr, 58, does not take over as Senate president. He simply will assume Sweeney’s seat representing the 3rd district.
“I want to congratulate Mr. Durr and wish him the best of luck,” Sweeney said during his concession speech. ”The people of the 3rd legislative district are the best of New Jersey. It has been an honor and a privilege to represent them in the state Senate.”
“I have had the opportunity to work with extraordinary people and I am proud of what we accomplished for our legislative district, for South Jersey, and for the state,” he added.
In his own press conference later in the day at the Gloucester County GOP headquarters in Turnersville, Durr explained how former President Donald Trump’s unexpected rise to the White House inspired his campaign and said his differences with Sweeney were “political, not personal.”
He also said he wants to help stop Gov. Phil Murphy from “making New Jersey the California of the East Coast” and suggested Murphy’s progressive politics inspired voters to support his upstart campaign.
“They don’t want government rule by a dangerous guy armed with dangerous orders,” Durr said.
MORE: N.J. truck driver who stunningly unseated state’s No. 2 Democrat wants to have a beer with him
Durr’s win over Sweeney will shake up the state’s power dynamic. The president of the Senate has control over what legislation will be called to the floor and which of the governor’s nominees receive confirmation hearings, playing a major role in shaping New Jersey’s policies.
Sweeney was expected to be chosen by Senate Democrats for a seventh term before this loss.
Now, he will now stay in office — and continue to lead the Senate — until noon Jan. 11. He can still influence legislation and control which bills are voted on until then during a period known as the lame duck session.
Sweeney also has a seat on the commission responsible for legislative redistricting and thus could have a say in the makeup of his district for the next legislative elections in 2023.
His loss came amid a surge of support for Republicans in last week’s elections — especially in South Jersey and suburban areas — despite registered Democrats outnumbering Republicans by more than 1 million in the state.
The GOP is poised to flip at least six seats in the Democratic-controlled New Jersey Legislature, including ones belonging to Sweeney’s Democratic running mates, Assemblymen John Burzichelli and Adam Taliaferro. Their district has seen an influx of Republican voters in recent years.
And while Murphy has been declared the winner of his re-election bid against Republican Jack Ciattarelli, that race was closer than expected. Ciattarelli has not yet conceded.
Asked Wednesday whether his loss was a result of a Republican uprising or a backlash against him that he wasn’t prepared for, Sweeney said: “It was a red wave.”
“We have to focus on the things that are important to people in this state, and we have to listen to them,” he added. “Twelve thousand more people came out. I lost by 2,000 votes.”
MORE: Did N.J. Senate President Sweeney fall victim to voter backlash, or was it something else?
Sweeney has often been a polarizing figure in New Jersey politics, lauded by moderate Democrats but sometimes criticized by advocates and public-worker unions who blame him for blocking progressive policies.
He has frequently clashed with Murphy, a more progressive Democrat, over policies the last four years — though he and other top Democratic lawmakers also worked with the governor to enact a number of progressive laws, including a higher minimum wage, equal pay, paid family leave, and a millionaires tax.
Last week’s elections have sparked an argument over whether the Republican gains should be a sign that New Jersey Democrats need to be less progressive or whether more progressive policies are needed to move the party forward.
Some Sweeney allies have argued the lawmaker was ironically swept up in voter backlash against Democrats who have veered too far left.
Others see Sweeney’s ouster as removing a roadblock that has kept Murphy from installing more of his agenda.
Sweeney didn’t address those thoughts directly Wednesday, though he did emphasize he will be “a champion for the enactment of policies that make New Jersey affordable” and said leaders “need to speak directly to the concerns of all voters.”
“I will be speaking from a different podium, but I promise you: I will be just as loud and just as forceful a voice for change,” he said.
Despite their differences, Murphy said in a statement that Sweeney “has had an incredible career, one that is incomparable in state history.”
“He has been a partner in the vast majority of the progress we’ve made in the last four years, and without him New Jersey would undoubtedly be a worse place for working families,” the governor added. “He will remain a friend to me and Tammy, and I wish him nothing but the best as he pivots to the next phase of his career.”
Sweeney, a union leader and iron worker and former Gloucester County freeholder, recalled Wednesday how he got into politics after his daughter, Lauren, was born premature and with developmental disabilities.
He was elected to the Senate in 2001, defeating Republican incumbent Raymond Zane, became Senate majority leader in 2008, and took over the Senate presidency in 2010, wresting the position away from longtime President Richard Codey, D-Essex, a former governor.
Since then, Sweeney has helped guide Democrats’ agenda in the Legislature and worked with then-Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican, to usher in bipartisan public-worker pension reforms that upset union leaders but sponsors say benefitted both workers and taxpayers.
Sweeney touted Wednesday how he helped install that pension reform, as well as usher in a new paid family leave law, increase funding for special education, bring offshore wind projects to South Jersey, reorganize higher education, revamp school funding, take actions to help bolster Camden and Atlantic City, and set the state on a course for a $15-an-hour minimum wage.
“I have never seen government do everything right, but I believe it has to do the important things right,” Sweeney said.
George Norcross III, the powerful Democratic power broker and a childhood friend of Sweeney, said “Steve’s presence in South Jersey is irreplaceable.”
“Although the region and the area will be undoubtedly represented well and forcefully by the remaining members of the Legislature, (Sweeney was a) dominant personality and someone who connected as well as he did with working men and women of all colors, and was able to affect governmental policies,” Norcross told NJ Advance Media. “He’s a larger-than-life figure in this region and undoubtedly will play a big role in the future.”
N.J. ELECTION 2021: Local and state results
Hours after the AP called the race last week, xenophobic and anti-Muslim social media messages surfaced that were posted from Durr’s accounts. A Twitter post in September 2019 labeled Islam “a false religion” and its prophet, Muhammad, a “pedophile.”
Durr later apologized and deleted his social media accounts. He said Monday that “you get behind a keyboard and you don’t see a person.”
“I just wrote something,” he said. “I didn’t mean to offend anybody. These are things I have done in the past. It doesn’t define me as a person. I’m apologizing to anyone who may have been offended by the things I did.”
Murphy said last week that Durr is “a dangerous guy” whom he does not “welcome” in “any way, shape, or form.”
NJ Advance Media staff writers Matt Arco, Bill Duhart, and Ted Sherman contributed to this report.
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Brent Johnson may be reached at bjohnson@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter at @johnsb01.