The New Jersey Supreme Court ruled unanimously Aug. 7 to reinstate a bribery charge against a North Jersey lawmaker who the state alleges accepted money during his attempt to become mayor of Bayonne. Jason O’Donnell’s lawyers maintained that the state’s bribery statute applied only to elected officials or party leaders, not candidates. In its summary, Supreme Court Chief Justice Stuart Rabner wrote “The bribery statute applies to any ‘person’ who accepts an improper benefit—incumbents, candidates who win, and candidates who lose….The statute also expressly states that it is no defense to a prosecution if a person ‘was not qualified to act’.” North-JerseyNews.com
Donald Trump’s lawyers on Aug. 7 clashed with prosecutors over how much evidence the former president should be able to access in the federal case charging him with conspiring to overturn his 2020 election loss, the first of many expected battles over free speech and the integrity of the sprawling probe. In dueling court filings, Trump’s team said prosecutors’ request to prevent him from publicly airing any evidence violates his First Amendment rights, while prosecutors accused the defense of trying to let Trump “try this case in the media rather than in the courtroom.” The Wall Street Journal
Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) clearly stated in a new interview that Donald J. Trump lost the 2020 election, diverging from the orthodoxy of most Republican voters, as the former president’s struggling G.O.P. rivals test out new lines of attack against him. “Of course he lost,” DeSantis said. “Joe Biden’s the president.” DeSantis still said he saw problems with how the 2020 election was conducted, citing the widespread use of mail-in ballots, private donations to election administrators from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, and efforts by social media companies to limit the spread of a report about Hunter Biden’s laptop. “I don’t think it was a good-run election,” DeSantis said. “But I also think Republicans didn’t fight back. You’ve got to fight back when that is happening.” NBCNews.com
Sen. Cory Booker recently voted to pass the U.S. Senate’s version of the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), but expressed concerns about the nearly $900 billion price tag. “Congress cannot continue to resist strengthening oversight, increasing transparency, and improving accountability at the Pentagon,” said Booker. “I remain concerned about the disconnect between unchecked military spending and the lack of investments in— and even proposed cuts to—diplomacy abroad and programs that help the American people here at home. Our constituents deserve robust investments in our schools, health care, and housing.” North-JerseyNews.com
China’s top diplomat assured Russia that Beijing hasn’t wavered in its stance on the Ukraine war, right after a Chinese envoy joined a multilateral forum—which excluded Moscow—to discuss ways to end the conflict. In am Aug. 7 call, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, affirmed the strong partnership between their governments and promised to keep working together to resist Western efforts to contain their countries’ development. The Wall Street Journal
A special election called by Ohio’s Republican-controlled Legislature for Aug. 8 would raise the bar for amendments from a simple majority to 60% of the vote. Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last year, voters across the country, in multiple elections, have approved ballot measures protecting the right to abortion. A similar election has been scheduled for November in Ohio, and legislators are hoping the higher bar for passing amendments will lead to its defeat. The New York Times
Former Vice President Mike Pence crossed the threshold of 40,000 unique donors required to take part in the first Republican presidential primary debate, his campaign said on Aug. 7. Pence had already met a polling threshold required by the Republican National Committee. Hitting both benchmarks means that Pence is the eighth candidate to qualify for the debate stage on Aug. 23. The New York Times
Proposals for four new offshore wind farms were submitted to the New Jersey on Aug. 4. Two of the new proposals would place the wind turbines beyond the view of the coast—twice as far as some of the projects that have already been approved by the state. If all four proposals are approved, it would more than double the wind energy projects planned for New Jersey. Just two of those projects could power 1.5 million homes. NJ Spotlight News
Acting Gov. Nick Scutari on Aug. 7 signed a law that increases the penalties in New Jersey for operators of so-called “boom cars,” nuisance vehicles that blast music from stacks of speakers and can be heard for miles around. The law sets a uniform standard for noise violations in the state as any car that pumps up the volume so that it is “plainly audible” from 50 feet away is guilty of a violation and subject to a fine, although the legislation does not give police the power to confiscate the vehicle, as was originally proposed. NJ.com
New Jersey’s Department of Community Affairs issued grants to four school districts exploring regionalization, moving forward a long-held goal intended to reduce the costs of public education in New Jersey. Belvidere’s school district will receive $150,000 for its study, while Union Township will get $120,000. The Delsea and Kittatinny regional school districts were each issued $100,000 grants. New Jersey Monitor
Park Ridge will be home to New Jersey’s youngest elected official come January 2024. Robert Fischer, an 18-year-old, is one of three candidates running for the three seats available on the Park Ridge Board of Education this coming Fall. Fischer said he would push back on the Murphy Administration’s efforts to mandate sexual and racial education curriculum, stating “I will stand up to Governor Murphy’s pseudoscientific and inappropriate sex and racial education curriculum, which the current Board has failed to do. I may be young, but I’m not stupid, and neither are the people of Park Ridge.” North-JerseyNews.com
A man accused in a recently settled lawsuit of espousing White Supremacist beliefs and posting a photo of a man with Nazi tattoos sits on the Rochelle Park Board of Education and is up for reelection this year. Charles Schaadt, who was a mechanic with the Jersey City Municipal Utilities Authority when the lawsuit was filed, denied the White Supremacist allegations, as well as others, in court documents. Timothy Carter, a Black construction supervisor, alleged in his 2021 lawsuit that Schaadt “openly espoused White Supremacist beliefs” in the workplace and was “so brazen” that he “screwed a photo of a White Supremacist with a Nazi War Eagle tattoo and a tattoo of the “S.S. lightning bolt” under plastic in the window of the door between the West Side Plant’s garage and its cafeteria. PoliticoNJ
Rep. Josh Gottheimer, along with Amtrak officials, got a chance Aug. 7 to see the progress on bringing commuter rail service to southern Sussex County and within a few years, all the way to Scranton, PA. Building the station and bringing rail service to Andover is well underway. The rest of the route, which follows the Lackawanna Cutoff to the Delaware River where it picks up existing railroad tracks, is on track for final federal approval. The Daily Record
NJ Transit locomotive engineers who operate the agency’s commuter trains will vote on whether to strike as contract talks have not moved forward since 2019. The 500 members represented by the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen will receive mail from the union’s national office with a ballot and voting instructions over the next few days, union officials said. Completed ballots must be returned by noon on Aug. 31. Engineers and trainmen are the last of 15 NJ Transit rail unions left to settle a new contract with the sticking point being salary increases that would put NJ Transit engineers on the same wage level as engineers at other regional commuter railroads. NJ.com
Civil rights activist and television host Rev. Al Sharpton will deliver the eulogy for Lt. Gov. Sheila Oliver at her funeral on Aug. 12 at the request of her family. The service at the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark will cap off several days of mourning for the lieutenant governor, who will lie in state in the rotunda at the New Jersey Statehouse in Trenton on Thursday and at the Essex County Historic Courthouse on Friday. The Record
United Black Agenda, a grassroots group of social justice and civil rights leaders in New Jersey, is calling on Gov. Phil Murphy to appoint a Black woman to replace Sheila Oliver as lieutenant governor. As governor, Murphy has made racial and gender diversity a cornerstone of his legacy. The decision belongs entirely to Murphy, who has until Sept. 15 to pick a new lieutenant governor; this pick is a direct appointment not subject to State Senate confirmation. New Jersey Globe
And finally…Tonight’s $1.55 billion Mega Millions jackpot is the 3rd largest in U.S. history. News12 New Jersey
