Still weighing a bid for governor, Newark Mayor Ras J. Baraka held his most high-profile fundraiser yet Monday night in the runup to the 2025 Democratic primary.
The 6 p.m. gathering at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center’s Nico Kitchen + Bar was not officially a campaign event. Instead, it was for Unite PAC, Baraka’s political action committee, to promote anti-violence, housing and other public policies he’s implemented as mayor.
A flier for the event listed a “suggested donation” of $2,000 and a “VIP reception with Mayor Baraka” for $10,000 while reminding donors that their contributions to the Washington, D.C.,-based Unite PAC are not tax deductible.
Baraka arrived about an hour after the fundraiser started after participating in a forum on public safety and victims’ rights.
Baraka told the forum that the key to breaking the cycle of violence plaguing his and other cities is to offer people opportunities for emotional, economic and other types of fulfillment as a form of healing.
“They’re repeating violence and hurting other people and creating mischief and misery as a way to lash out to solve their own issues, instead of doing it in a pro-active and progressive kind of way,” he told listeners at the Express Newark Lecture Hall on Halsey Street.
As he left the forum, Baraka said the fundraiser was not a campaign event and that, despite widespread speculation, he had not decided whether to launch a campaign to succeed fellow Democrat Gov. Phil Murphy.
“It’s for the PAC,” Baraka said of Monday’s event. “I don’t even know if we’re having a campaign.”
If he does decide to run, Baraka said he would do it by January.
So far, the only announced Democratic candidate for governor is Baraka’s counterpart from New Jersey’s second-largest city, Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop. Other potential candidates include former State Senate President Stephen Sweeney, U.S. Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-11th Dist.), and Assemblyman Craig Coughlin (D-Woodbridge).
Murphy has remained neutral in the 2025 primary, though he has praised Baraka as unsurpassed among the state’s mayors. During a groundbreaking ceremony with Baraka for a new pedestrian bridge in Newark on Tuesday, Murphy praised the mayor — “He’s a bridgebuilder” — but declined to say whether he would make a good governor.
Unite PAC has been raising and spending cash since registering with the Federal Election Commission in September 2022. According to the FEC, Unite had $491,327.68 on hand as of June 30 after receiving $127,610 in contributions during the first half of the year.
“The PAC has had many events,” said Baraka, now in his third 4-year term after a landslide victory last year. “This is, like, number 15, 16. And all of them have been pretty significant. There’s just been less people and, you know, quieter, I should say.”
The PAC’s registered agent did not respond to a request for comment after the fundraiser, and the mayor’s press secretary, Susan Garofalo, said she could not speak for the mayor’s fundraising or campaign activities.
The most vocal people around Monday’s fundraiser were a half-dozen demonstrators on the sidewalk outside the performing arts center on Center Street, who used a megaphone to criticize Baraka for what they said was his failure to adequately house the city’s highest-in-the-state homeless population, root out corruption or stem violence.
“We need more housing!” one protestor shouted through the megaphone across the NJPAC plaza toward the fundraiser inside. Later, four uniformed Newark Police officers told the protestors they had to stop using the megaphone because they lacked a permit for one. The protestors complied.
They included members of local groups Come Unity www.1comeunity.com and the Newark Anti-Poverty Coalition, who called for measures to improve education, health care and permanent housing.
“We out here contesting what is supposed to be a so-called Unite PAC fundraiser to raise money for ‘Moving New Jersey Forward,’” said the coalition’s founder, Munirah Bomani, referring to the slogan on the fundraiser’s flier.
“So when you say ‘move New Jersey,’ we think you’re running for governor,” Bomani told NJAM. “So, we’re out here because you can’t run for (governor of) New Jersey when you can’t run the city of Newark.”
Bomani is part of a nascent campaign to recall Baraka and all nine members of the City Council. However, the city clerk has yet to issue the “Total Recall” campaign, led by local activist Deborah Salters, petitions for the thousands of signatures required to schedule the recall votes.
The protestors had announced beforehand that they would be at the fundraiser, and Baraka said on his way there that they were within their rights, even though he said their criticisms didn’t make sense.
“We just came out of a room full of people from Newark who are doing anti-violence work, Baraka said, adding that he had been invited to talk about the issue at the White House, among other places. “We’ve put people in Newark in homes who never had homes before. We’ve increased employment.”
“They have a right to be opposed to whatever they’re opposed to,” Baraka said. “I don’t know whether there’s any elected official in the country where everybody agrees with what they say or are going to do, where there’s not going to be people that protest or argue against them. That comes with the job.”
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Steve Strunsky may be reached at sstrunsky@njadvancemedia.com
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