Election deadline day finds McGreevey on go
By JASON METHOD, Home News Tribune from the Web, September 4, 2004
TRENTON, NJ -- Yesterday was a normal day for Gov. James E. McGreevey.
There was a morning union rally, a midday meeting with staff and an afternoon lunch with his mother.
There was no sudden resignation and no scramble by politicians to line up candidates for a special gubernatorial election this November.
The chances for such an election decreased dramatically yesterday. The state constitution says a special election must be held if the governor resigns more than 60 days before the general election.
That deadline passed at midnight.
McGreevey has said he would leave Nov. 15. He announced his resignation Aug. 12 after he said he is gay and had had an affair with a man, whom aides have named as Israeli Golan Cipel, a former adviser to the governor.
Republicans have repeatedly called on McGreevey to step down immediately to allow for a special election.
Some Democratic power-brokers did the same in the days following McGreevey's announcement, but that pressure eased.
There is still one chance left for a special election to be held. A federal lawsuit brought by two Princeton lawyers affiliated with the Green Party asks a U.S. District Court judge to declare the governor's seat vacant and order a special election.
A hearing on that lawsuit is scheduled for Wednesday. A political science expert, Ingrid Reed of the Eagleton Institute at Rutgers, said it was unlikely a federal judge would intervene on a question involving the state constitution.
At an event in Cherry Hill yesterday morning, McGreevey thanked about 400 union members for their support.
"Yes, I have made my mistakes and I fully accept responsibility and culpability for those mistakes," McGreevey said.
"I believe in a merciful God."
McGreevey never mentioned his pending resignation or the sex scandal that has forced him from office.
He ignored questions shouted at him by reporters.
McGreevey received several standing ovations and audience members chanted "four more years."
McGreevey spokesman Micah Rasmussen said McGreevey was working with staff yesterday on the proposed $1.3 million retail shopping development called Xanadu, slated for construction at the Meadowlands Sports Complex.
McGreevey was also working on health care and transportation initiatives, Rasmussen said.
"He's looking to build off the strong record he's already compiled," Rasmussen said.
But Rider University political scientist David P. Rebovich said McGreevey and his administration will be mostly irrelevant in the final days.
The focus will be now on what happens next.
"(McGreevey) has used this date as a deadline for avoiding the media, because he didn't want to answer questions like, 'Why stay in office?'" Rebovich said.
"Now he's auditioning for life after the governorship."
Republicans have already started talking about life after McGreevey. Senate Republican spokesman Joseph Farren said the state's ongoing budget problems, lowered credit rating, and the pay-to-play system of rewarding campaign donors with contracts, which had already cast an ethical cloud over McGreevey, will now take center stage.
"We have a culture of corruption, and the Democrats don't want to address that in any serious way," Farren said.
Contributing: The Associated Press
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