Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory Physicist Andrew Zwicker is predicted to be in the lead for becoming the first Democratic representative of the 16th District under the New Jersey State Assembly following a recount.
The elections were held on Nov. 3.
Republican incumbents Jack Ciattarelli and Donna Simon and Democrats Zwicker and Maureen Vella were the four candidates that ran for the two positions representing the 16th district.
On Election Day, Ciattarelli was said to have won 16,526 votes in the election, the highest of the four candidates, while Vella was said to have received 15,953, the lowest of the candidates, according to unofficial election results published by State of New Jersey Division of Elections on Nov. 4.
Zwicker had conceded the election on election night, thinking he had lost. However, because of the close results, the election went into a recount in which the provisional ballots within the 16th District counties will be factored into the total vote to determine a winner.
Zwicker was predicted to be leading Simon by 60 votes as of Friday, Planet Princeton reported. His lead had been predicted to be 29 votes on Nov. 4 before provisional votes were counted.
While the results of the recount won’t be announced until Monday’s certification, it is predicted that Zwicker will have a 70-vote lead over Simon, which would be a substantial amount considering the few number of voters who participated in elections, PolitickerNJ reported.
“I have watched Andrew learn to navigate the political landscape exceptionally well through the campaign process, and I am certain he will make a meaningful contribution,” Vella said after the election.
Ciattarelli did not respond to requests for comment, and Simon declined to comment.
Zwicker said that, if elected, he would be the first Democrat in history to have represented the 16th district of New Jersey. He added that it would also mean that the Democratic Party would gain four new states in the assembly, allowing them to secure 52 seats out of 80, two seats shy of a two-thirds majority.
The 16th District includes Mercer, Somerset, Hunterdon and part of Middlesex County. Princeton is in Mercer County. Princeton had previously been in the 15th District before redistricting occurred in 2011.
While the Democrats already have control of the State Senate, Zwicker said that attaining the two-thirds majority of the assembly would be crucial, since it would allow them to override the governor’s vote on bills.
Zwicker said most people didn’t expect that he would be a competitive candidate in the 16th district, considering its history as a predominantly Republican area. He noted that when deciding to run for general assembly he took into account that the district had been redistricted in 2011 to include Princeton and Brunswick to balance the number of Democrat and Republican voters. He also explained that there was a large number of unaffiliated voters who didn’t identify with either the Democratic or Republican parties, and he was able to tell that the district was behind for a Democrat to win by looking at the number of registered voters prior to the elections.
Zwicker added that people all along the spectrum of political inclination were willing to have conversations about his approach to politics.
“Regardless of the issue, as a scientist I will not be driven by ideology. I will be driven by evidence,” he said.
He said that his background as a physicist has heavily influenced this perspective on politics, but that his decision to run for general assembly was also largely shaped by his interactions within the Princeton community.
“You realize that you can solve, or you can try to solve, any problem if you can get people together and look for big really long-term solutions,” he said."I mean that’s what Princeton does — tries to solve long-term solutions. It’s really inspiring. And if you do that for enough time you get a certain level of confidence that I can recreate that outside of Princeton."
Zwicker noted that the Princeton College Democrats helped him knock on people’s doors and call their houses two to three weeks before the elections. He noted that when the election comes down to 29 votes, every single door knocked and every phone call counted.
“Although I do believe that Andrew Zwicker will be the first Democrat to represent this district, I hope that he won’t be the last,” Campaign Chair of Princeton College Democrats Samuel Russell ’18 said.
Zwicker had previously run for New Jersey's congressional seat for the 12th district.
Zwicker and Vella won an overwhelming majority of votes in Princeton, with 153 and 150 votes respectively, compared with 36 for Simon and 34 for Ciattarelli. Incumbent city councilors Arden “Lance” Liverman and Heather Howard won reelection to the City Council with 139 votes each, compared with 56 for Lynn Lu Irving and 40 for Kelly DiTosto.
The final tally of the votes will come out Monday at the earliest, and Simon can officially demand a full recount at any time until Nov. 14.
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