View all election coverage from The Daily Princetonian here. Polls have now closed in New Jersey.
8:00 p.m.
Samuel Posada Sanchez ’29 had been hoping to vote for Mikie Sherrill in this election. This would’ve been his first time. He was unable to because he is originally from Passaic County, so needs to re-register in Mercer for next year. His friend, Daniella De La Fe ’29, was there to back him up.
In reference to his support of Sherrill, Sanchez said, “I definitely support her stance on reproductive rights for women, and also her support for the immigrant community in New Jersey. Because I come from an immigrant family, her policies definitely would help my family and the people I surround myself with.” He also expressed support for Zohran Mamdani in the NYC mayoral election.
At the Princeton Public Schools Administrative Building, Daniel Palumbo, a 55-year old Princeton resident, said that he voted for Ciattarelli because he felt the governor had a bit of an edge.
“He was just really aggressive in his approach and his dialogue, and it didn’t seem to be a lot of BS, and I appreciated that,” Palumbo said.
Chi Lu, a 62-year old immigrant originally from China, voted Republican, because she feels the party promotes a “hard-working” mentality and “not just encouraging people to rely on welfare.”
“I don’t like how the Democrat promote gender. I really don’t like that. To make society — young people — transgender is damage to young people’s life.”
Shamsudef Bawa, accompanied by his wife and young daughter, said, “If my kids are gonna grow here in this state, in this country, I want them to have the right to the same opportunities as everyone else.”
“Whatever dreams are, she should be able to achieve. There shouldn't be any barrier to her success. Not the color of her skin, not who she votes for, or what ideology is,” Bawa said.
At the West Windsor Senior Center, Robert Ferrante told the ‘Prince’ that “the anti-Trump vote” has been the largest sentiment in “[his] circles.”
“Try and give them as big a black eye as possible. Vote as many Democrats in as possible,” Ferrante added.
Regarding local elections, he said that the sentiment is “on the fence. But I think we’re going to stick with the the tried and true people who've been in there for a while.”
7:30 p.m.
Sharan Kalkere told the ‘Prince’ that his voting experience at the West Windsor Senior Citizens Center was “pretty chill” until someone started yelling at a poll worker. “Some dude was yelling at one of the election people there, saying, ‘Hey… Why don't you check the ID? You know, you're supposed to. It should be a valid ID.’ It was a little weird,” he said.
“He also said, ‘Oh, that's some Democratic BS’ or something at the end of it. ‘Because this is what you Democrats do,’ or something,” Soundarya Nattuva added. “It's not fun taking that heat.”
Ashley Hines added, “It was kind of irate to just have an outburst like that, when everybody was just in line. Even though it's crowded right now, everybody was peacefully waiting in line, and he just flipped out.”
7:00 p.m.
Giovanni Torres, a 30-year old poll worker from West Windsor, has been at the Princeton Public Schools Administrative Building for the past two hours. He said that the energy has been “sporadic.”
Princeton Physics Professor Robert Austin voted for Sherrill, he told the ‘Prince.’
Barbara Majeski told the ‘Prince’ that she came out to vote for Ciattarelli in-person because “the Republicans have notoriously been lazy coming to the polls.”
Majeski is hoping Ciattarelli will bring back the plastic bags, support students, and fight “Mikie, Mickey, Schmickey, Schmucky’s” policies on education, especially regarding the “LGBTQ+ agenda.”
“I think she’s very nefarious,” Majeski added. “I don’t think she’s competent enough to be running our state. She’s not from New Jersey. Jack is — he's born, bred, raised New Jerseyan.
6:30 p.m.
Keller Morrison GS, a Ph.D. student in the Princeton Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering (MAE) department, said at the Suzanne Patterson Center that he was “very frustrated” this year deciding who to vote for, despite being a registered Democrat. He shared that he had thought Sherrill was “very much for the status quo and maintaining everything and not making any change” — but “fear-mongering Youtube ads” about Jack Ciattarelli changed his mind.
Morrison said that it did feel like voting between the lesser of two evils. “It’s very frustrating, because I want the Democratic Party to be more receptive to its voters,” he said.
At the Hook and Ladder Fire Station, Juan Cardona, a Princeton resident, was there to support his immigrant mother. “I’m trying to keep it blue, more for her, for her rights than mine,” Cardona said. “This is important for her. She wanted me to come, so I came.”
He added that “there could be some ways to make it easier for others” to vote — especially for the elderly and the multilingual. “Maybe you have more people that speak different languages in there,” Cardona suggested. He translated for his mother in the voting booth.
“I want to be optimistic, but sometimes it feels like we're voting for the ‘lesser-evil’ kind of thing,” Cardona said in reference to partisan divides. “Both sides have their own problems, but a lot of people don't want to acknowledge it.”
“Doing this, being an American citizen, and then seeing how everything is, it gets frustrating. Half the time, I feel like some people are just doing it half heartedly,” Cardona added.
5:30 p.m.
Jose Lopez, a Princeton resident “born and raised” in his early 30s, voted for Mikie Sherrill. He says that he is “very opposed to Republicans.”
“I feel like it’s not the same parties that were running before. It’s a lot of hate nowadays,” Lopez said. “I’m a brown person in this state, and anybody could tell me otherwise, but my experiences are that that I speak of. I witness, I go through things that people say aren’t existent, like racism and stuff…. I feel a lot of it coming from people who are very pro-conservative.”
At the West Windsor Senior Citizens Center, Julius J. Murkli, a self-identified “Trumper” and “true Republican” told the ‘Prince’ that he doesn’t vote for Republicans who “don’t put the sign out and advertise that they’re Republican.”
“I wasn't even gonna vote for this guy,” Murkli said of Ciattarelli, but he added that he felt forced to vote for him. In reference to Sherrill, he said: “We got a moron who's running, who used to be in the Air Force.”
Kaif Ahmed, a resident of West Windsor, said he’s hoping to get “someone who stands up to Trump” out of this election. He voted for Mikie Sherrill in hopes that she helps control rising electric bills and continues investment in renewable energy.
Natalie Agboyibor was there to teach her young daughter the importance of voting. “I want her to be able to be vocal, to advocate for what’s right, to advocate for education, and to just be a better person. It takes one person at a time to be good and to do good. It’s a ripple effect. It has to start somewhere,” she said.
Aylin Arifkhan, 23-year old multimedia assistant for Princeton Athletics, said “I just don’t like Jack Ciattarelli. He seems like a doofus.” She’s supporting Sherrill.
Robert Manduca, who voted for Ciattarelli, told the ‘Prince’ that he’s hoping to “break the one-party rule” with this election.
“When you have one party rule for too long, the government doesn't function as well,” Manduca said. “New Jersey, just comparing it to other states, does not necessarily function as economically as it should, and I think that an important message needs to be sent.”
5 p.m.
A small group of students gathered at 5 p.m. at Blair Arch organized by Vote100, a nonpartisan student campaign encouraging students to vote, to walk to the polls.
Ian Mann ’28, one student who attended, told the ‘Prince’ that he felt “the issues of state and local politics,” specifically regarding higher education funding and the interaction with Princeton Township and the City Council, affect him as a Princeton University student. Because of this, he believes “My vote matters, both here and in Chicago.”
At the Princeton Public Schools Administrative Building, a 21-year old Princeton town resident who identified himself as “Amos Neswit” said that he wrote in a joke write-in candidate — Mao Zedong.
“Mikie Sherrill is a Zionist — They could have gone with at least someone who has any interesting policies,” Newsit said. “Then obviously Jack Ciatarello, or whatever his name is, is just some idiot.”
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